Here are 7 ways to write curiosity into your marketing messages:

1. Challenge Common Beliefs
2. Open A Story Gap
3. Ask A Question
4. How To Benefit
5. Reveal A Secret
6. Numbered Lists
7. Hard-Won Lessons

The first blog in this series showed you how to write curiosity with the first 3 tools, so let's jump into the last 4 tools.

How To Benefit 

What does your community want more than anything else?

What consumes their thoughts for weeks, months or possibly years at a time? This could be financial freedom. This could be passive income. This could be becoming your own boss and turning your passion into profit or something that’s not related to finances such as finding the love of your life or finding the time to exercise regularly.

Whatever it is, it must be a top of mind desire that will grab your ideal customers’ attention.

Remember, people buy what they want not what they need so if you are going to attract their attention you’ve got to know what they want.

Here are some examples from the industries I’ve worked in:

Property

• Passive Income
• Financial Freedom

Business Opportunity

• Passive Income
• Huge monthly income with virtually no work
• Replace your salary working just at the weekend

Forex

• Double your money on an hour a day

Entrepreneur / Startup

• Turn your expertise into cash
• Passion into profit
• Turn your business ideas into income
• Turn leads into customers

Weight Loss

• Drop a dress size a week
• 6 pack abs

So how can you write a benefit into a curiosity statement that’s going to grab you communities attention?

Here’s a simple example:

How to turn expertise into cash

What do you think when you read that statement? How does that statement make you feel?

Do you think, great, I’m going to learn how to start or grow a business?

Or does that statement make you question if this is right for you? Does it make you ask yourself if you are an expert? Does it give you a sense of security because expertise is hard to earn and that will give you a business advantage that is hard to copy?

Ultimately, does it make you want to learn more?

If so, it’s worked? If you are put off by the word expertise because it’s not something that you would use to describe yourself or use when having a chat with your mates then what about this statement…

How to turn passion into profit

Do you think, great, I’m going to learn how to start a business?

This statement works better than the first one because it’s more top of mind. It’s also more emotional so carries with it a greater feeling of excitement.

But…

It isolates those that are already in business. They know how to turn their passion into profit and want to know how to grow what they’ve got.

As an email subject line it certainly works better than the first statement.

So, when you’re thinking of ways to describe the benefit your customers want… make sure you are using their language… and words that they can see or feel.

Think carefully about who you are talking to. As I've outlined above, it's easy to see how you can attract one audience and repel another. That's not a bad thing because all good marketing is speaking to ONE person. With how to turn passion into profit you are speaking specifically to someone stuck in a job who wants to start a business. Use this insight to craft a more personal message that is going to make the reader feel understood. Craft a more personal message that is going to make the reader see how you can help them.

Let’s look at a curiosity example from the weight loss industry.

How to drop a dress size a week.

What do you think when you read that statement? What do you feel when you read that statement?

Are you thinking Wow, I want that? Or maybe you’re thinking prove it!

Either way, you’re going to click and want to read more, right?

What's the beauty of this statement? It's visual (drop a dress size). It makes a specific promise (in a week). It also makes a promise of specific information (how to implies you are going to learn something).

If the promise seems too good to be true then great because if you want your ideas to stand out you’ve got make bold promises that are true and you can prove!

Remember, you are selling the shortcut secrets to a better life. And if you’ve got a better way to achieve an unbelievable result faster than ice-cream melts on a summers day, then don’t be afraid to say so.

How could you improve these curiosity statements?

You could remove some of the objections that you know will be in your prospects mind. Here’s an example…

How to drop a dress size in a week without sweating or starving

Does that increase your desire to learn more? Does that make the promise even more exciting? It does because it challenges common beliefs (curiosity tool 1). By stacking curiosity tools like this, you create more desire to learn your secrets.

Now it’s time to move onto the next curiosity tool.

Reveal A Secret

The beautiful thing about secrets is that people always reveal them… which immediately starts a story.

3 types of people reveal secrets:

1. Recognised expert
2. Expert from a well know company
3. Unknown hero

Secrets From Recognised Experts

What name does your community immediately know and respect?

For people in the property, finance and business community there is Warren Buffet. He needs no introduction, and those communities will clamour to learn a money-making secret from the great man.

Someone else that needs no introduction is Steve Jobs.

Steve Jobs has a broader appeal because he is even better know. Let's face it, we've all got an Apple product right? Chances are, you are reading this on an Apple device.

Yes, Steve Jobs is dead now, and people would still love to know his secrets to productivity, product design and creating new markets.

Fair warning: you don’t want to make a big promise by referencing an expert and then fail to deliver something new. If you've discovered a lost or little-known recording that gave some great insight then share it with your community.

If you’re going to grab attention with something like…

Warren Buffet’s secret to business success

Or

Warren Buffet's little-known money making secret 

… and then you just repeat and talk around a famous quote then you will have broken the trust with your community. Yes, you'll have won the click, and you'll have lost some goodwill. You'll make your community wary of clicking on a similar email subject line or blog title.

But…

Who else can you quote? How can you prove to your community that you are a geek and proud of it?

If I'm talking to copywriters, then I'm happy to discuss

The John Carlton secret to getting your letters opened and read.

Or

John Carlton’s secret to tell a story that’s shorter than a Tweet (under 160 characters) and makes the cash register ring loudly for years. 

The beauty of using a more obscure expert is that you will immediately appeal to the people in your audience that know and respect the expert. But… it will mean nothing to everyone else. So use this carefully. After all, it’s a technique to grab attention. This will isolate large parts of your community, and that might not be a bad thing. Remember, good marketing is speaking to one specific person. Referencing a copywriting giant like John Carlton is going to grab the attention of other copywriters and will fall on deaf ears of the less well read.

You must use this insight in your email copy to make the reader feel understood. Use this insight to let the reader in on a secret that they will love. This is how you can show the more experienced part of your community how you can help them.

So make a list of the celebrities in your niche. Who are the ones that are known by everyone? Who are the stars that are as well known as Steve Jobs within your niche?

And…

Who are the experts that will only be known by the more advanced people in your community?

Get clear on who you can reference, and the audience that the name will attract.

Experts From Well Know Companies

Do you know the name of Coca-Cola’s Marketing Director? If not, that makes 2 of us.

But…

Would you like to know…

Coca-Cola’s Marketing Director spills the beans on buying print and digital advertising for less than half price!

Or

Coca-Cola’s Marketing Director reveals why small businesses that copy the advertising of established giant’s are fanning the flames of their own bankruptcy!

It doesn’t matter who the current Marketing Direct of Coca-Cola is, entrepreneurs will respect the position and be hungry to learn why their business will fail if they copy Coca-Cola.

For years, I worked for a company where the owner wanted to copy Apple's marketing. Yes, both companies were in the technology space, and that's where the similarities ended. At that time I didn't have the knowledge and experience to be able to prove that the strategy would fail. So I did as I was told.

But…

Would I have eagerly read a blog post with the titles above? Absolutely!

Secrets and insights from directors of large companies will grab attention and if you have something new, hard to find, or simply something that’s unexpected then it’s worth sharing it with your audience.

Again, don't only use this technique to persuade your community to open an email if you don’t have some valuable insights to share. You want to give excellent value AND get as many people as possible to read it.

So think of the big companies that are revered by your community. Then research articles by their directors. That will be a well of valuable information.

Also think of the more obscure companies that demonstrate your knowledge and commitment to this audience.

Let's face it, to a small business owner,

Secrets to tripling email open rates from Digital Marketer’s copywriter

will be more valuable than

Secrets to tripling email open rates from TESCO’s Marketing Director.

Unknown Hero’s

How can an unknown hero create excitement, anticipation, and curiosity in the mind of your community?

Don’t we all love the Under Dog’s story? Don’t we all love the Rags To Riches Story? Don't we all love the story of struggle and success? Stories like…

Skinny geek reveals the secret to pack on muscle fast!

How a 27 stone teenager became skinny in 6 months by drinking diet coke.

40-year-old virgin tells how he found the love of his life without the internet or sleazy pick-up lines.

Bankrupt Cambridge photographer accidentally discovers the secret to turn expertise into £672,989 in just 9 days!

What do those statements do?

They start a story. They make a big promise, and if you'd like to learn how to do the same, then you've got to read on.

It doesn’t matter that the story is from an unknown hero. The truth is, the unknown hero is actually your reader. You are holding a mirror up to their life through your own story.

Sure, the details will be different. But they are struggling with the same challenge. How to find the love of your life, how to lose weight or how make more money.

By telling your story, you show your reader that change is possible. You show them that they can overcome the challenge in their life.

So, what stories can you tell like this? You can tell your own story. You can tell the stories of people you’ve helped.

Use this Unknown Hero curiosity tool to inspire your community and win their trust.

Numbered Lists

Numbered lists create curiosity by making a specific promise, such as…

The 5 most powerful sales vehicles

Or

4 places to find landlords desperate for your help

Or

7 ways to write curiosity

What does this really do? It combines curiosity tools, right? This is a combination of a benefit with a number. Instead of How To [Benefit] you’ve got 5 Simple Ways To [Benefit].

This is why you've got to get clear on what your community wants… and what their desires look like. You see, no one wants more money. They want what money can buy:

• Supercar
• Bigger house
• Luxury holiday
• Bling gifts for yourself and your family
• Security

Once you can start writing the wants in visual language, then you can grab your ideal customers attention in many emotional ways.

So, let’s get back to the curiosity examples above. How do they make you feel? Do they make you want to learn more?

You see, if you want to invest in property without buying a house, then you'll know that you must manage property for other people in a way that makes you a fortune. Where does that journey start? It starts with finding struggling landlords. This can stop many ambitious investors in their tracks so 4 places… or The 4 most powerful places… is sure to be read with great anticipation.

What about entrepreneurs. We are always looking for ways to grow our business, right? So The 5 most powerful sales vehicles are going to grab their attention, especially if they are only using one sales vehicle (most likely a sales team).

What about The 5 most powerful online sales vehicles! Is that going to get more attention? Possibly, I couldn’t really say. What I do know is that it’s going to get the right attention. Entrepreneurs who want to build a business without a sales team. Chances are they are using ONE online tool, most likely webinars. So would they want to learn the other 4 tools? Would they want to know if webinars made the top 5? You better believe it!

Numbered lists can let you off the hook because if someone clicks the link and already knows 1 of your 5 ways, then they are not going to feel burned because you've given them 4 new sales vehicles. The reader is also likely to want the validation that what they are doing has made the top 5. If they are reading your blog post or sales letter, then they are also open to improving their sales with webinars.

So this lets technique makes a large deposit in the bank of emotional goodwill.

I'm veering away from curiosity and into the territory of content. To get back to curiosity remember that you are using it to get more eyeballs on your content or sales message. The curiosity trigger has to match the message in your content or sales message, or you will burn the relationship with your community.

How can you use this tomorrow?

Start by writing down the width of your knowledge on a particular topic. For example, do you know ONE way to write curiosity or SEVEN or TWENTY-SEVEN?

Start doing this for all the areas that you can help your community. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised by how much you know.

Then start delighting yourself and your community… earn their trust and watch the money roll in.

Hard-Won Lessons

Writing curiosity with Hard-Won Lessons is an overlap with revealing a secret from an Unknown Hero.

But with a critical difference…

Hard-won lessons are everyday stories. They are not the Epic Stories or Once In A Lifetime story of struggle and success.

Hard-won lessons are your recent stories of struggle and success. This is how you prove to your community that you are still fighting in the trenches just like them!

Let's face it, the world is changing faster and faster, and we don't want to learn what worked 10 years ago… or even 5 years ago. We are interested in a story that happened 6 months ago that proves that what worked 5 years ago fails to deliver spectacular results and you need to do this instead.

To illustrate what I mean by this, let’s look at some examples. How does this statement make you feel?

After burning £10,000 on 500 different Facebook ad campaigns, I finally discovered the secret to building your list fast with a tiny budget.

Does that make you want to learn more? Does that make you trust the hero because they are revealing a flaw and the struggles that they went through to find a valuable secret?

What about this one…

Why my latest refurb took twice as long as expected, tripled the budget and how it still gave me a profit.

Don't you want to know what went wrong? Don't you also want to see how the hero climbed out of a dark hole to still salvage a win?

So what were you struggling with 6 months ago? And how did you overcome this challenge? What was the outcome? If you can answer those 3 questions, you've got a thrilling story right there.

What are you struggling with right now? This story isn’t ready to tell because you haven’t found the solution, yet. But when you do… you’ve got a new trust building story that’s just begging to be told.

Combining Curiosity Tools

So there you have it…

Those are the 7 curiosity tools.

But…

You can use these tools separately, and you can combine them to greater effect.

If that’s going to confuse the issue or prevent you from writing curiosity based email subject lines and blog post headlines tomorrow then just start with the 2 that you find the easiest.

Personally, the 2 that I think are the most powerful (although not the easiest to use) are Challenging Common Beliefs and Hard-Won Lessons.

The reality is that hard-won lessons often challenge common beliefs and the easiest way to state them might be with a How To sentence. Just like that you’ve combined 3 of the curiosity tools to write one irresistible statement. So please don’t limit your thinking to using one curiosity tool at a time. Think about what you want to say and find the itch that must be scratched.

Now It’s Your Turn

These secrets will only help you start or grow a business if you use them.

To help you start using these secrets, I promise to give feedback on the Curiosity Statements of everyone that emails me as a result of reading this blog.

You can use the 7 tools, or you can use multiple curiosity tools to write one statement.

Don't worry about a word limit. If you try to limit yourself to 5 to 8 words as you need in an email subject line, then you make it unnecessarily difficult to start writing curiosity.

Start by writing a sentence or even a paragraph. Imagine you were talking to a friend or prospective customer and you wanted to say something that would make them say Wow, tell me more…

Once you've got your sentence (of any length), it's time to take your sword and start cutting off limbs. I've got a silver Cross fountain pen with red ink specifically for editing. That's my sword, and once I've finished the first edit, I've got a blood-splattered page. Don't worry, that's nothing to fear and nothing to discourage you from writing more. You see, the reality is that all writers are bad writers. The good ones don't shy away from editing. They are brutal and ruthless. This is a blood sport produces better results.

So take your curiosity statement and start cutting unnecessary words. Distill it down into a powerful statement that’s as short as possible and as long as necessary.

Then email it to me at Roland.Eva@RolandEva.co.uk and I’ll happily give you feedback on your work.

If you know someone that could benefit from this, then please share this with them.

If you have found this useful, then please leave a comment below letting me know the better results that you have enjoyed as a result of reading this post.

Until next time…

Carpe diem

Roland Eva

P.S. if you'd like a proven system to turn your expertise into cash so you can become your own boss and work from home, then please click the link below to download your FREE copy of my book How To Turn Expertise Into Cash.