[Special Episode] The Mindstate Marketing Hour #13 with Will Leach - The ROI Online Podcast Ep. 71

Welcome to the ROI online podcast. And this is a special series of interviews with will Leach. He's the author of marketing to mind states the practical guide to applying behavior design to research and marketing. And I'm your host, Steve Brown, the author of the funniest book on marketing, the golden toilet, stop flushing your marketing budget into your website and build a system that grows your business. And then this series of conversations, we're going to explore everything about marketing, your messaging, and connecting with your clients, your customers, your employees. So come on, and join us. And let's have some fun. All right, Welcome back, everybody. We're live. This is the mind state marketing hour with will Leach. He's the famous author of marketing to mind states how to the practical guide to applying behavior design to research and marketing. And, as I like to say, it's just a nice way to use science to connect with your clients. Will. How are you doing?

I'm doing well. How are you today, Steve?

Excellent. So you had me on a little show the other day, we had a great conversation. And it spawned an idea for this. Tell us a little bit about what you want to talk about today.

That's right. So finally, I had you come into step into my world of a lot of researchers, and you did great. And we had a great conversation. And what was interesting about that conversation is right after we finished, I was running in my own workshops, I was back and forth, Steve, it was crazy. Going back and forth to different platforms. And two things happen yesterday. One was that I went back to my workshop. And what I do in these workshops every month is the back part of my workshop is when I actually look at other people's creative and we go through the creative review process. And I, and I show them how to look at their advertising through the lens of a mind state. And it's usually one of the kind of funner moments of the, of the workshops, people really get into the the nuts and bolts and the potatoes and of their marketing. And what happened was, we um, we actually had a two people talk wanted me to speak specifically to an image in their marketing. And, and I did, I talked to images and talked about how those relate to mind states. And then I got off my workshop. And I was looking through emails, and I actually had feedback from my, I have a guy who was helping me out looking at the new book cover of my upcoming book, in the future, this will no longer be the cover of the book, I'm doing a revised edition of the book in the next couple of weeks. And there's a new book cover. And the book cover is, the idea is on the book cover is to have an orchestra or a Maestro, like a Maestro. Right? And, and the idea being that you know, you know, the idea of subconscious marketing, things like that it's kind of having control over things to make a better outcome. And so that was an association I was trying to use. And he came back and he said, Well, that's really hard on stock photography. So in one day to find that, and so one day, I thought, you know what, like, I've had three major things happen to me today about the identification of the right stock photography. And so it just dawned on me that there are actually behavioral psychological principles, if you're going to select the right stock photography, so for a lot of people out there, know that stock photography is a main staple of marketing, just you know, you can't all afford to do photo shoots and everything else. And so I thought, you know, what, these two business owners were talking to me about their stock photography, and I'm looking at stock photography. And I started thinking myself, how can we use mind states to select the best stock photography to actually get a conversion? So that's what I figured I'd talk about today.

You know, it's one of the hardest things when you're working in, you know, we help our clients get their act together online, and it includes a website, that's one of the important pieces of a bigger system. But when we go through Yeah, we nail the messaging the text, right? But it has to be complemented and supported with not only the font, the colors, but images, and most web designers slash, yeah, online, new brochures, whatever. They quickly grab a photo from the stock photography and everybody can tell it stock photography, but I'm telling you, it's one of the hardest things to do is find the right photography to To complement the text, but even harder is to how to find the right photography that helps you support your behavioral psychology intent of that, that asset that you're creating.

That's right. And and I'm going to give you some tips during this session on things you can look for. But in the day, you're right, it's really difficult. And I think what makes it somewhat difficult is that we have subjective opinions on what type of, you know, stock photo I should have versus an objective opinion based upon behavioral science. So I think sometimes the hardest part is when you know, you look at, you're looking for people in an agency, and you'll get 300 pictures of people in some sort of an agency environment or whatever, you know, and you're looking at them. And then you may have four or five, maybe 10, that you really like. And now you're like, well, now what do I do? Which one's best? And we just go, I kind of like her, like, I like the lead model on that one, or this one just seems brighter, it's all subjective opinion. And behavioral science can give you some clues on how to take that list of 10 and bring it down to something much more manageable. And it comes with this idea around semantic networks, basically, and this idea of being able to create these associations that you're looking for, so that when somebody looks at that image, regardless of whether they read any copy, they can now, they can now be associated, have that copy associated, I'm sorry, that visual image associated with a feeling and that feeling is now associated with your brand.

Yeah, so what you're telling us is that the seemingly insignificant choices can have a big impact. And we make decisions based on emotions, and justify later with logical thoughts or justifications. But little Do we know that these photos, this atmosphere that you're creating on this asset, this via digital or hardcopy can really impact that decision process? No?

That's very, very true. And, and a little bit on the science behind, I'm going to run a little experiment on you here, Steve, just so you get a feel for why there is some thoughtfulness on that you should be thinking that you should be thinking about. So I'm going to talk a little bit about semantic networks. And so it's a concept that's just about, you know, associations that are in your head. And so when I say the word Apple, like, let's think about Apple, the company what words kind of come to mind?

Well, Mac, iPhone, apps.

Hmm. How about what do they, What do they stand for in your mind?

Well, they stand for a particular lifestyle brand. You identify being tech, tech? A tech astute? By utilizing these things. It's interesting that, that even older people can feel modern, by utilizing the Apple products.

So I like that. So you've brought in things like you know, the functional things that they sell, you brought in technology, you brought in image, you brought in innovation. So those things are these nodes that are in your head, you have these associations with the brand Apple, and we all have associations with everything out there. I mean, everything what the mind does over the course of many, many, many decades, is whenever you experience something, and it kind of figures out how things interrelate. So when I say the word Apple, a lot of people will say, well, Steve Jobs, iPhone, innovation design, like these terms come up again and again and again. And that forms an association. So when somebody says, Apple, these feelings, these desires come up. And why that's important is because those desires, those feelings, those associations are also important for you to know because you are trying to create associations with your brand as well. So I got another, I got another thing. I'm gonna, I'm gonna ask you to see how this kind of plays out. I'm going to list out four or five words. And all I want you to do is after I say those four or five words, tell me what comes into your head. Okay. So ROYGBIV, color, sun, rain, sky.

An artist

Ah, didn't work as much as I thought it was.

Remember, you're working with a very, this is a low level aptitude person.

Okay, let me think. I'm gonna try not to try another set of words. I'm gonna try ROYGBIV again, ROYGBIV.

I don't know

Sky, connection, color.

ROYGBIV, ride?

Oh, connection sky, and color. There's no right or wrong answer

Museum. I don't know man.

Ah, well, I'm gonna I'm gonna hope somebody out there got rainbow popped up in their head. Do you remember the old ROYGBIV you remember that from grade, from grade school? That's how you knew the what are the colors? The main colors ROYGBIV knows that the colors of the rainbow? Right? That's why I threw that in there. Well, the idea there is that there are associations with sky, color, sun, clouds, ROYGBIV. And then if these things come together, in your mind comes rainbow, same idea that I want you to start thinking about stock photography is that there are associations in your stock photography, that if you're thinking about, what do I want to stand for? Rather than looking for a subjective, I want to have a pretty girl in an office, right? very subjective. Think about the associations that you want to create. And just so happens, I know the nine associations that I think you should be creating, because they're in my book Marketing To Mindstates, they're they're the nine motivations. If all of our behaviors are driven, or they're fueled by motivations, then those motivations, I believe, are really critical, so identify the one motivation that you want to be associated with, and then design or find stock photography that is associated with that motivation. So that when they see that stock photography, they feel that desire and if they feel that desire and associate you with that desire that helps build your brand, and it creates you a brand that is associated with their internal desires.

I love that. So you have on here, the show that FRMI brain images to trigger and a little what, what in the world is FRMI

Functional? Resonance? Oh, gosh, functional, I can't believe I don't remember, fr image resonance, functional resonance imagery with the M stands for calculator I haven't seen, I haven't done FRMI in so long.

Mental.

Before I go, you look that up. For me, I can't believe functional resonance anyways, resolution, I think it is. Um, before we get there, it's important for us to think about two types of conversion. So there are two types of conversions. And that's why you're really using stock photo photography or any kind of marketing, you want to convert something, right? And there are two types of conversion, one conversion is called more rational. And those are people who kind of in that moment, need, I think you've even talked a lot about it, they need to feel as if they are confirming an emotional desire. And so those people in those moments need rational confirmation. And then there's another group of people more emotional, or decisions that are more emotional in that case, they need more emotional. And so what, I really want to talk about this, because you and I are so focused on the emotions, but the fact matter is sometimes in some categories, for some decisions, you need to be leaning more more rational. I think the majority are much more around emotional confirmation, aren't our emotional decision making, but frankly, rational it makes sense in some period, or sometimes sometimes in B2B marketing, when somebody has a very specific budget or set of requirements like a government contract, frankly, those people you may need to lean heavier on rational, or right now, let's say if you are, you know, you're in one of the states that are locked down, and you want to lock or maybe having high COVID rates. But you know, you're thinking yourself, do I want to go to the restaurant or not? You know? It's not locked down yet. You want to take the wife out to a restaurant, but you know, you're not sure but you're being more rational. You're going to be Yeah, I want to get the restaurant, that's emotional. But hey, is the restaurant safe? So sometimes we got to be rational. And so in certain circumstances, there's some stock photography, actually, Steve that will make you become more rational in your thinking and so, the first one was that brain image. Did you look up FRMI

Yes. So we have functional magnetic

FMRI, Yes, that's why I was getting it wrong. Sorry, functional magnetic resolution imaging, got it. Okay. So basically what that is, is that is the brain photos that you guys are used to seeing, but the real brain photos of seeing like kind of inside your skull. So if you ever seen those things when you're getting a CT scan, right, that's what we're talking about. So it's funny, but those images actually trigger analytical thinking. It's been scientifically proven. When people see, like that image of a brain, something deep down psychologically triggers that there science behind this. And therefore, since there's science behind this, then you're you will become more rational. And so that would be really important. If you're trying to convey very complex information, you want somebody be analytical in mind. And so let's say if you're competing on a technical innovation, that you are superior versus your competitors. I know it sounds funny, but a small thing, like an image of a brain can make somebody become more analytical thinking, and they will find the details that you put in there more important to them. If you can't really compete on emotion, you want to compete on rational kind of scientific evidence.

I'm, so I would argue that most marketing and what it's, what I feel is broken about marketing, everything's done on an analytical stance, analytical first, that people are going to actually sit and focus and digest all of this and then come up to a nice logical decision. But it's not true.

That's not true. That's right. That's right.

But so putting a brain image, you're actually helping the emotional, handover to the rational. So that they do lean in and digest it a little bit better.

Just for a while. Exactly, exactly, will still make the emotional decision. Do I trust this ad? Do I trust this company? But that analytical thinking, if you can prime analytical thinking by activating analytical thinking processes, in this case, the brain activates that it gets you to, it gets your customer to focus on the details. And if you're if your point of differentiation or advantage is in those details, you got to make sure they do that. So that's exactly right.

Wow, that's fascinating. So where did you learn about this? Where is it? Yeah.

There's actually a study, I read all this nonsense, right? So there's a study. I'm gonna look at, I have right here because I thought you may ask me something like that. Yeah, it was actually a study done not too long ago in 2008, from Cave and Castle, where basically what they did is they showed people images of brain brain images. And then and then they compare those to other images like graphs and charts and things like that. And those in the research concluded that the data lends support to the notion that part of the fascination in the credibility of brain imaging research lies in the persuasive power of the actual brain images themselves. And therefore, when showing an MRI or FMRI image, it created associations with analytical thinking. And when that was activated, visitors developed stronger appreciation for the rational benefits that helps with conversion.

That's fascinating.

Yep, it's all in literature, guys. He's got to go to google, google scholar and look it up.

So if you have a kid and you want them to focus on the homework a little bit, you just wave around some brain images?

Mm hmm. It actually could help them focus on the same thing they hear about classical music you've ever heard about that? Getting your kids to wake up to classical music. There's no difference that but you we can't use classical music we do one of these shows one day about music, we'll bring in classical music and tempo, and will do the exact same conversation those things matter. They, classical music creates associations in your mind, about you know, elevated thinking, status, and therefore you will act differently, you'll move slower you'll be you'll be more thoughtful in your in your words, etc. No doubt about it.

That's crazy, that stuff, our brains desire information in such an interesting way. And yet as, as humans, we're somewhat inept on understanding that and then creating content that honors that.

Yeah, that's right. Good. Because we use objective. We think that picture looks pretty, but we're not thinking what does that picture? What's associated with that picture? And could it hurt your brand?

Wow. So tip number two?

That's right. So we're still an analytical thinking. So the rational thing, but another way, let's say you're like, well, I sell ice cream. I'm not doing anything with a brain right. Got it. So that'd be a bad I don't think I'd sell ice cream analytically, by the way, or rational I think I'd go only emotion on that. But let's say if you're a B2C consultant or a B2B consultant, right? Well, actually showing pictures and photos of business situations. Think of it as you know, a briefcase, dress shoes, business suits, ties, things like that, that actually triggers a very similar response, but around competition. So these images signal competition. And when you are more competitive in nature, you look for rash, you tend to look for more rational reasons to validate why winning and success is important. So that's another kind of a small trick that you could use to if you want people to really be detail focused. And think about the rational reasons or at least confirmation or reasons why they should choose you. Dropping in business photos, things that are associated with business drives competition, competition creates that association with you are going to help them succeed. And therefore, they look for more likely look for rational reasons why they can count on you.

So the rational when we think of the rational confirmation or thinking that's in the yearbook, as you refer to the system too part of the brain, right?

That's right.

And so this is the follow up confirmation that acknowledges or confirms the emotional reaction to the experience.

That's very much, so it's important.

So in the emotional side, now we want to talk about, we want to have a conversation about what photos support the emotional confirmation part.

Yep. And so, you know, you and I've talked a lot about this is this, you know, and I want everybody to know that we stand for emotional marketing, human marketing. And so this is where you should be lenient almost always on almost any any business out there, you know, unless, yeah, there's just very few businesses unless you're a government contractor. So like that really, you need to work in the emotional space, like I've done work with surgeons, I've done work all over the globe, with people that are in very high professional jobs, and they are still making emotional decisions. So lean in, if you're going to ask somebody to make an emotional decision. Think about leaning people to use more system on emotional thinking when they're looking at your pictures or your photography. And so I have a couple of tips that get you to a much better, faster emotional place, and they're actually going to seem very intuitive to most of you.

So I'm curious what they are.

That's right. So the first one is, and I've had this fight for a while, in almost all occasions try to show people's faces in your stock imagery. So I went to a very huge, huge company one time and battled the vice president, this company is the one of the top five company in the world in terms of revenues. And they said that you should never, their perspective was never show people in your stock photography, because people can't see themselves. Like let's say, let's say if you had somebody who was Hispanic, well, there's a group of your of your population that won't identify with that nationality or ethnicity. So therefore, let's not show anybody. And I am telling you and I told them the same thing, I categorically can tell you that it's absolutely wrong. From a neurological perspective, people's faces matter in almost everything you do. Why? Faces almost always in the first one 20th of a second, drive visual attention and interest. So when I first, when you first look at anything, before even consciousness happens to you, the human eye is looking to figure out what this thing is. And within one 10th of a second the eye is it's through biology, we'll actually find faces, because as we've been growing up, and I think yesterday, you made this good point, you know, kind of back when we were hunting and gathering and things like that in the woods, faces, let me know whether or not you are in my tribe or not in my tribe, were you a tiger? Or were you, you know human? Faces, in almost all studies, human eye goes immediately to a face. So why would that be important? Well, I want attention on my ad. So first and foremost, it drives visual attention and interest, because when you see images of facial expressions, it almost always drives an immediate reaction to interest as well. I may not be interested, but at least tries to figure out what is this thing which drives this idea of interest.

Want to pause here just for a moment and talk to you about a program that we have just released called ROI quickstart Academy for authors every day, I talk to business owners just like you who struggle with quickly getting their fundamentals in place. We want to create a great foundation and we want to grow our business. But the things that are in our way, our lack of knowledge about the specifics, we should put in place, what kind of technology what kind of messaging and what kind of campaigns and that problem exists for authors as well. And we just chill so good with authors because, well, I'm an author, and I understand everything that you struggle with. You have a great idea you have a great book, but What do you want to do? You want to get your book in front of more people? You want to make it easy for them to find you? Learn how they can schedule a time to talk with, you hire you for a conference, or maybe sign up for the services that your book promotes? So what is the Quickstart Academy for authors? Imagine working with a small group of like minded authors, and the experts from the ROI quickstart team, it's a great way to get your messaging clear to be confident with the technology in your marketing automation, and how to run a strategic campaign to get you more of what you want from the investment of your book. To learn more about the Quickstart Academy for authors, you can visit ROI online.com, or click in the link in the show notes below. And now, back to this episode. So in this time of this COVID, or whatever people are wearing these masks, and I've noticed that you don't know if that's a friend or foe behind that mask, because you can't tell what their facial expression is. And then I've seen all these pictures now up on the walls where they show the people wearing a mask. And it's, it is such a mistake based on what you're sharing right now to cover up the impact that you could be earning, or the connection you could be making with your images by putting masks on people. It's totally anti human.

It is it and I get it because like, Well, why? Because remember, it's in the first one 20th of a second. It's before people can rationalize Why aren't they wearing a mask? You've got to make that initial emotional reaction immediately. So it's absolutely proven again, and again. Even when I was running neuroscience over at PepsiCo, we knew this. What facial expressions do immediately as well as they convey the emotion, right? Just like you said, If you can't see facial muscles, I mean, you can get a little emotion in the in the eyes, I totally get that. But if you can't see the head, you can't see the muscles here in the face. You can't really convey the emotion. And if there is no emotion, you're advertising Why would I feel any emotional response to your advertising right? There does it, a blank look to you, you know, if you have a mask on or if you pick photography that has no face means it's that much harder to create emotional engagement.

You know where that comes from. As babies, I'm read these fascinating studies how babies, if I asked you Will, I'm going to send you to another planet, you're going to be naked, you're not even going to know the language you can't even walk, you're going to have to just lay there and figure out how to not just survive, but thrive. And then that's what a baby does. It shows up totally helpless. And yet, quickly, the brain connects and starts to develop relationships and connections and communications before any language happens. It's amazing. And here, you're and as marketers we're totally missing the boat by not acknowledging and honoring what's going on there.

That's right, we are emotional people that need human connection, you gotta show faces. And then the last literally is within the first one 20th of a second, you have an initial avoidance or approach response. Remember, you have a fear of fight, fight or flight, right? That is all legit. And you get that from facial muscles. That's why you look when somebody looks frowning, there's an immediate avoidance reaction. Now, avoidance isn't always bad, by the way, because depending on your brand, that may be the perfect reaction. If you are, you know, if you're selling insurance, you want a visceral avoidance reaction, so that who can help me? The insurance company. But the problem is you've got to have you will have an initial reaction in either approach or avoidance. And that comes through seeing people's faces don't force people to read copy. Let them see the face. So you first thing you got to do. Tip number one, try as best you can to not I'm sorry to have faces and people in your stock photography.

Mm hmm. Yeah, that's just, I noticed that when I drive down the highway, the billboards I focus on has a face on it. And you don't realize it but, your eye naturally goes to or you're sitting in a restaurant and they have TVs going, you know, the movement attraction, but when you, invariably I find myself staring at a stupid commercial, even though it's on mute, because there's a person sitting there, but your eye just goes there without any...

It's interesting, right? Tip number two on this something I learned at PepsiCo neuro lab is make your images as best possible anyways to showcase the benefits as close to the moment of use. So let me give you an example from potato chips. So there was this ad called Lay's Jenny. And it was done I believe in the early 1990s. And even to this day, it's by far the highest rated ad in terms of driving sales ever in the company. And so you know, we always kind of hypothesize on why that would happen. Well, when I was there, we actually started doing testing because we wanted to update Lay's, Jenny, right, because the ad was doing well. But it was the photos and they're really dated, it was back from the early 80s or early 90s. So we wanted to update it and what were the what were the things that seemed to work. And what we found through the literature, as well as the neuro testing of these images is the closer you can get to a moment where somebody is using your product, the greater chance you have, of being able to, to kind of create that emotional reaction you're looking for. And I know stock photography is not going to get you perfectly there, because it's not your product. But if you play somebody in your stock photography, in a similar situation, it's much easier for the brain to figure out what am I supposed to do? And how is this going to benefit me? So here's what we did. We did a study where first we showed a potato we did neuro imaging of a potato, and it gives you a neurological response. Raw potato, then we actually did the same test and we showed a cut potato. So now you're starting to see it being cut almost into a potato chip. Then after that, we showed a plate of potato chips, potato chips on a napkin, and the neurological scores go even higher, because now it's not a raw potato, it's something that's closer to what I'm used to eating. Then after that, we did neuro testing on a potato chip with plate and a sandwich. Now neurological jumps up a lot, then when you take a potato chip and show somebody about to read it boom, neurological responses immediately. And it's drastic. Why? Because the brain was never made to differentiate between what I see on that ad, and what I feel here. So actually, your digestion actually starts when you see an advertisement, somebody's eating or something very close digestion actually can start up. So the brain takes in all these, images to create emotional meaning other neurological level. So the closer you can get stock photography to be in a similar situation, you would hope your customers in whether they're winning, they're winning the deal, or whatever, the better chance it has of creating that emotional engagement.

That's interesting. Your brain can't discern whether it's real or not. Because it generates the emotions.

That's right. It's exactly right. That's why we talk about mirroring effect and things like that. Because the brain looks at the situations and the biology, you'll get endorphins, you'll get serotonins, things like that, that happen when the brain just looks at it, the brain doesn't really realize in that in those first couple of moments, whether something's real or not real.

Kind of like the Pavlov's dog experience where they hear the bell and they start to salivate.

That's right. That's exactly right.

But it's visual not auditory. So tip three.

Tip number three, and this is the one that you'd get from my book, but match your photo to the key motivational or desire that you're trying to activate in your category. So the reality is, is that there are these nine desires or nine motivations that drive us all to, to act. And those are, those desires you know, we've talked about it before success, freedom, acceptance, mastery, control, captivation, admiration, love or safety. At the end of the day, these are the nine desires that everybody has, that you want to relate your category or your brand with. So if I knew this, if I knew that I want to be associated with, let's just say security. Let's say you are selling alarm systems, security is probably a good bet that that's what they desire in your category. So as it relates to finding stock photography, you should first be thinking about the word security, that desire, and don't think so much about, what do I think? Should, do I want to show a home or? Don't think about that. Just say, what are those photographs that are going to be highly associated with that desire? In this case, maybe it's security. look those up first, because what'll happen is when somebody sees that image, it'll evoke an emotional response. It'll create that desire. And that's within the first one 20th of a second, which again, is what you want. You want that emotional connection very, very quickly before they read into your copy. So for that, there are, you're gonna look for things that are kind of inanimate in your photographs, but also kind of more people in phases and emotions, right? because like you said, or like I'm saying your images create that desire. So if I knew that I wanted to immediately create a sense of security in a photo, I would I would look for things that are highly associated with security not, doesn't matter about Home Security, I'm just saying with security, which would be things like armor, barricades, guards, locks, umbrellas, seal, keep protect me from the rain, right? A shield offense a blanket, the thing about babies blankets, right? How they provide a sense of security, those things, even checkmarks can actually provide a sense of security because a checkmark is associated with job done, right? So that could even be associated with security. So when you're looking up images, you think about security, and just look for anything that relates to security, you write this out on a sheet of paper for your company, for your brands, and what are the things that I believe that are associated with security? and just write as many as these things out and try to find images with that, that is slightly more important than talking about your brand at all. It's all about curating that desire. And if you are going to look for, because I remember, you're like, Okay, well, you told me about human people, you said you want humans in your photographs. Absolutely. So what I want to do is I want to have photographs or find photographs. And so it makes it hard. I know this is it's easy for me to say this. And it's hard, it means your job doubles, but also the impact of your images will double too, will be you would want to show people with either negative emotions or positive emotions, you can go either way on security, right? So the negative things you want to avoid, you would show people that look anxious, or nervous or tense, right? Because if you see a facial expression like that, that conveys that that voice just was like, Whoa, what is that about? That would evoke security, seeing somebody who doesn't feel secure creates a sense of I desire security in yourself. Or you can go positive, you can show somebody who looks calm, composed, um, has a little bit of peace of mind, a little bit of confidence, those emotion, those facial expressions will make you feel calm, composed, kind of have some peace of mind. So if you can find people's faces, and it's not easy, like I said, but sometimes we forget that people's facial expressions are conveying the emotion and that emotion is being conveyed, you can immediately create that emotion in your response, or in the person who's looking at your ad. So inanimate objects, look for things that are associated with with security, safety, and in people's faces look for avoidance of bad things, or kind of approaching of these good feelings of, you know, things like being composed, having peace of mind, etc.

That would come from in your book you talk about, Alright, here's our motivation, but here's our stance. And he and I like to say either we got us sugar version or a salt version. And so you wouldn't want to make sure that your images support, if it's a cautious achievement. And then we want to make sure that we our images support the cautious at, in some percentage of those images, correct?

That's correct. Yeah, that's exactly what I think about it. So it's chapters five and six in the book. And so I, what I like about this idea of stock photography is just putting some objective criteria around it. And again, some people when you go through, you may go on seems like extra work. But the impact can be so powerful if you have that kind of structure. So yeah, a great example of your next one right achievement. So if you want to, if you want to be associated with achievement if you're Nike, or you know, you're selling services that can take somebody's business to the next level, and achievement may be a very strong desire of your customer. So in that case, think on a sheet of paper, write out those things that are associated with achievement, hopefully relates to your category, but achievement would be things like trophies, crowns, ribbons, fist pumps, you know, when you ever see stock material, people pumping their fists, or people with their holding like a with a V or something like that you're holding the arms up in a V formation. Those things are highly associated with success, right? And that's what achievement's about this desire for success. So you want to find objects somewhere where it conveys these moments of success and trophies are highly associated with success, winning things like that. And on the facial expressions, if you want to drive successful feelings, the facial expressions you're looking for, on the negative side, would be showing somebody who's complacent, a bit unmotivated, maybe lethargic, right? So, you know, the opposite of winning is not losing the opposite of winning really from emotion perspective as being kind of lethargic, and you have no drive. Showing somebody sounds funny, but just showing somebody with very little kind of emotion, or showing them that they're complacent or kind of not focused would actually create a sense of I don't want to be like that I want to be a success, or you show the positive feelings of success, which are exactly say, tenaciousness, determination, confidence, victorious. Images of success or smiles. Usually when people are successful they're like, Yeah, but they're not joyous smiles, like I'm in love with you smile, it's more of like a confident smile, like I did it, yes! That kind of moment. So finding those moments in your stock photography will immediately evoke that sense of achievement, that a sense of achievement, and success, hopefully will Halo to your brand.

So like, like a teenager that's on a family vacation and doesn't want them. So get some pictures of that pouting teenager to represent the opposite of success, and

Yeah, you know, it's so funny you said that, there was a bank or was that there's a TV commercial a couple of years ago, we had the, the girl was in the car, and they're taking this family road trip. And she's, you know, she's all sad the whole time. She didn't want to be there. She's always on her phone, the parents are just struggling to get her to look. And then they finally go to the beach. And she throws down the phone, and she runs to the beach, right? And it was a car ad. And I thought to myself, Oh my gosh, what that was really about? That was really about showing parents being successful in creating a family and creating a family moment. That's what that car ad was about. And that finally that car allowed them, the parents, to feel like they were successful in getting their kid to not look at that damn cell phone. But that was what that was about, I love that.

All right, so empowerment.

Last one, I there's a lot of these examples. But empowerment, remember, is our desire for greater control, particularly over things that are in our environment, things that we naturally don't have control over. So what you would do again, is okay, let's say if you know that your customers desire greater control over their business, or greater control over sales or whatever, what you want to do is look for objects that are associated with control. And this is funny, but things like things that I see that are highly associated with control are things with dials, remote controls, um, lists, when you see lists of things that feels like there's a semblance of control, especially those lists are numbered. Doing things like breaking through walls, breaking of chains, and people associate being under somebody's control by being restricted. So chains being broken walls being coming down people, overcoming barriers, things like that are associated with having greater control, dials on a thermostat, options on a website, things like that having the ability to give people different options. So for visual images, if you can associate yourself with anything where people can take control over their environment around them, that would be an important association to have. And in the faces, if you want to communicate from a nonverbal kind of the from the facial emotional expressions of somebody you would look for, on the negative side, somebody who looks a bit overwhelmed, a bit like in control a little bit fearful, because when people don't have control, they kind of fret, right? So they're a little bit of anxiety in their expressions. But somebody who does have control, they look confident, they look strong, they may be multitasking in some way they're going to feel, it's going to look like they're in a controlled, kind of confident looking expression. So those are types of facial expressions you're going to want to look for, again, not always easiest thing in stock photography, but trying to give you some objective kind of science based rationale and selecting them, once you get down to a manageable number they can make or break your success.

So I love this conversation. It's, I've always thought about it. But I've never been in a position of confidence to approach what stock images would be a perfect complement to the text or the intent, the asset that we're creating, and so to know that we have associations with everything and they generate feelings, and that small, seemingly insignificant choices and stock photos can help or hurt your conversion rates, conversion rates being the emotions that are evoked from consuming, seeing, being exposed. Those images in your assets that you're creating, be they digital or or a physical. People's faces are extremely important. And it's just the way that we're designed from birth. It's how we communicated and became acclimated to In the world as a baby, we judged what the situation was based on facial expressions, whether we're safe, whether we're in danger. Images, create desires, as well. So by making sure that your text is complemented with images that create the exact desire, that desire being from whatever that state of mind that we are in when they're experiencing your brand, it would be smart to make sure that it complements that what, the motivation and the stance that they're in. Will, what's some, what's one last little thought that you want to leave us with today?

Yep, it's always going to be, let's think about marketing through the human eyes, the human condition designed for human beings, and you're in a much better place.

Yeah, the biggest, biggest quote here that I really like that you've given is, Being human is an actual competitive advantage. And that means creating stuff for the humans. On the other side, we're not consumers, we're humans. Well, this has been another excellent code on The Mindstate Marketing hour Will. So you got workshop coming up, correct?

We do. We just actually finished that workshop yesterday. But every month we do more workshops. And starting in January, we're going to have a totally different format that you can engage with us. So currently, you can buy a book bundle, we call it the starter package. And the starter package allows you to buy a copy of the book, a workbook and a charter, so you can do the activities in my book. And you'll actually get an autographed copy of my book and to be sent to your house. So we have those right now. And starting in January, it looks like we're going to have a master course where you can actually do a series of videos on your own in your time to identify your own understanding or to create a greater understanding around the book, but also identify mindsets for your company. And then of course, we're always going to have these workshops where you can come in with your data. And we'll work together to identify the correct mindset that you should be marketing to. And also even doing these audits on your creative, which has been fun. That's what we started off yesterday, doing audits on creative. So if you go to mindstategroup.com, you will start seeing more and more of those offers in the very near future. But you can get a package right now, a starter package is ready to go.

Excellent Will, this is a excellent episode really worth my time. And I'm Steve Brown of ROI online. And we've been spending time with the author Will Leach from the Mindstate Group, his book Marketing to Mindstates, go get it and be enlightened and become a better marketer and connect with the humans that you want to support. And thanks for being on another episode there Will.

Thank you so much for having me, I appreciate it.

All right, that's a wrap. Thanks for listening to another fun episode of the ROI online podcast. For more be sure to check out the show notes of this episode. And feel free to connect with me on LinkedIn where we can chat and I can help direct you to the resources you're searching for. To learn more about how you can grow your business better. Be sure to pick up your copy of my book, The Golden Toilet at surprise thatgoldentoilet.com I'm Steve Brown, and we'll see you next week on another fun episode of the ROI online podcast.