My favorite underrated marketing strategy

Inside today’s episode:

• Why picking a villain is good for audience growth

• 5 tips for picking your villain

• New video with Erica Schneider

Presented by Goldcast

TURN ANY VIDEO INTO 19 HIGH-PERFORMING MARKETING ASSETS

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There’s a ton of advice floating around on how to build an audience online.

We talk about it here quite frequently. And for good reason. Because the most valuable assets in your marketing strategy — and business, for that matter — are your reputation and your audience.

And there’s one marketing strategy that can help you grow both at the same time.

Identifying and attacking your villain is one of the most powerful — and underrated — marketing strategies.

Villains aren’t just for Marvel movies.

Picking and defeating your villain has multiple benefits:

• Guides your POV

• Makes it easy to pick content topics

• Builds immediate trust with new and long-time followers

• Helps you understand your audience better than your competitors

• Makes your offering (product/service) enticing and irresistible

Why does this work so well?

It’s not just your red-bearded marketing friend telling you this from first-hand experience. (Though I have used it many times successfully).

Studies have shown that people are more likely to bond over a shared dislike – rather than a shared fondness – of a third party.

In other words, you can build trust with your audience fastest by sharing a common enemy. 

Let’s look at one of my favorite examples for inspiration.

Rejecting bro culture for the win

Few creators have picked and defeated villains like Erica Schneider.

She’s attacked two different (though related) villains: bro culture and "over-embellished” social hooks.

She wrote this tweet in 2019 that soared to 11M views, solidified her brand, and later was the foundation for her first course, Hooked on Hooks:

By sharing what she’s against, she’s also telling you what she stands for.

This is how to resonate with people.

Many executives and marketers, specifically in B2B, are unwilling to draw a hard line in the sand and say specifically what they believe in and who they are (and are not) for.

They’re afraid they’ll push away potential buyers.

I say you'll pull the right buyers towards you, faster. And if there are a few could-be buyers who don’t like your style, then to hell with ‘em. They were never going to buy from you anyway.

So, let’s chat about choosing that enemy.

5 Tips for Picking Your Villain

*The following is based on our recent conversation on Reed Between The Lines. (You can listen to the full convo on Spotify and Apple.)

1. You can’t fake it.

   You have to find the thing that you actually give a shit about. If you end up playing a character thinking that it’ll get people to follow you, but it’s not authentic to who you are, you’ll eventually burn out, have a mental break, or reevaluate and then pivot. Then people will realize you’re not really that person. Not good for that whole trust thing.
   
   

2. Your audience is ALWAYS the hero.

   Not you. Not your product. This is often hard for CEOs and Chief Product Officers to understand because they love their products like their children (and in some instances, seemingly more than their children). Your product is the sidekick helping the hero overcome the villain.
   
   

3. Know when to pull back.

   You have to be careful when attacking your enemy because you don’t want to be known solely for someone against something. You also want to be known for something. Otherwise, you risk being known for negativity. Plus, you miss the opportunity to help people with your content, which leads to them viewing you as an expert, trusting you, and eventually, buying from you.

   
   

4. Own the problem. Sell the solution.

   “When you understand the audience better than they do, they’ll assume you have the best solution” - Chris Orlob. Soon your audience will expect that you not only know their problems, but that you can solve them too. This is your opportunity to sell to them. If you build products or services that are directly aligned with them, they will sprint to buy from you — and be much more open to buying more from you in the future.

   
   

5. Be prepared for people to disagree with you. 

   This is arguably the hardest part for most people. You have to be okay with disagreement. Some people will defend your newly minted villain. Do not be deterred — each disagreement strengthens your position. For everyone who disagrees, know that dozens more are seeing your content, liking it, and following you as a result. Many will even buy from you much faster.

Identifying and addressing these villains can make your content more engaging and relatable, driving stronger connections with your audience.

So ask yourself: Who is my villain?

Identify your villain. Uplift your hero. Win together. 

Holler at you next Saturday,
Devin

PS: Once you ID your villain, the next step is producing memorable and effective content for your hero.

To do that, you must understand and master conversions.

Content That Converts is a playbook that details my repeatable content creation processes for capturing attention and converting it into audience growth and revenue. 

Inside you’ll find my proven frameworks, templates, and examples that you can use to build a better business and a bigger career with intentional content.

Here’s a peak at what’s inside:

Section 1 reveals the tactics for creating fascinating, irresistible content. Sort of like the Krispy Kreme doughnut recipe, but for content.

Section 2 sets you up to write crazy good emails that actually sell. Forget being dumped in the spam folder or being trashed instead of opened. The tactics in this section have generated well over 10M+ in pipeline.

Section 3 contains my best tips for writing mouth-watering LinkedIn posts. I break down viral posts and show you how to “stop the scroll” and grab attention.

There’s also a bonus section that covers mindset. It’s full of mental models and habits that will keep you motivated throughout your content journey.

If you’re serious about winning with content, you can pick up your copy of Content That Converts here.