How to Grow Your Business Using an Empathy Driven Approach

Thriv­ing as a cre­ative is not about how much con­tent you cre­ate. It’s about the impact you have on oth­ers with what you share. As a small busi­ness, we know we can’t out­put con­tent for social media, blogs, and newslet­ters all of the time. If we did, we’d nev­er have time to serve our clients or actu­al­ly do the work of run­ning a busi­ness. It’s much more impor­tant for us to pro­duce qual­i­ty con­tent that speaks direct­ly to our audi­ence than to stress about how often to post. 

We know this advice goes against so much of what we see in regards to mar­ket­ing today. If you were to read the lat­est Twit­ter thread on mar­ket­ing or lis­ten to the so-called brand­ing experts on Insta­gram, you might believe you have to be on every chan­nel post­ing con­stant­ly in order to land your next client. 

But, fol­low­ing what every­one is doing or say­ing will only cloud your mis­sion and cause over­whelm. The best way to sell your prod­uct or land your next client is to speak direct­ly to them with con­tent that address­es their needs and pain points. When we do this, we authen­ti­cal­ly con­nect in ways that com­pel them to engage with our brand. If you cre­ate con­tent from a place of empa­thy, you can wor­ry less about chas­ing the algo­rithm because your con­tent will be tai­lor-made for reach­ing your ide­al audience.

So how do you imple­ment an empa­thy-dri­ven approach to content? 

How to Grow Your Business Using an Empathy Driven Approach

1.Understand your audience’s emotions and feelings. 

This will give you the best insight into what they need from you! 

2.Focus on building relationships.

Remem­ber, you are build­ing a com­mu­ni­ty not chas­ing likes. Engage with your audi­ence and pro­mote thought­ful con­ver­sa­tions. You will be sur­prised at how your com­mu­ni­ty grows! 

3.Listen before you speak. 

Don’t start with what you have to offer, lis­ten to what your com­mu­ni­ty is say­ing. How can you best serve them? 

Empa­thy is such pow­er­ful too!! When we learn to under­stand our audi­ence’s feel­ings and emo­tions and tru­ly lis­ten to them, we are bet­ter able to cre­ate con­tent that real­ly resonates.

what does an empathy driven approach look like in practice? 

1. Create valuable content.

Don’t just post what you want your audi­ence to see. Look at your met­rics and see what peo­ple are engag­ing with. What type of con­tent gets the most com­ments, shares, or saves? Engage­ment will always be your best met­ric. 

2. Test your copy.

Every­thing you post will not res­onate with your audi­ence. So, when you find a post with a lot of engage­ment, dig in! If your com­mu­ni­ty is pay­ing atten­tion to a post, swap out the visu­als. Does that copy still res­onate? Then try keep­ing the same visu­al but tweak the copy. Was it the visu­al that real­ly res­onat­ed? Test! Test! Test!

3. Use polls.

Peo­ple love to share their opin­ions, so ask your audi­ence what they want to see from you. And then listen! 

4. Focus on purpose.

What is this going to do for your audi­ence? What val­ue points are you bring­ing? What lessons are you try­ing to teach? Cre­ate con­tent that meets a need.

5. Engage with your audience. 

If some­one takes the time to com­ment or post some­thing on your feed, use this as an oppor­tu­ni­ty to start a con­ver­sa­tion. Don’t just like their com­ment. Ask them how you can help sup­port them in their mission. 

6. Establish a posting cadence. 

Focus on con­sis­ten­cy. Decide on how often you can post qual­i­ty infor­ma­tion and stick to it so you don’t burn out. Don’t wor­ry about post­ing dai­ly. Qual­i­ty over quantity.

Remem­ber, you have a pow­er­ful, mean­ing­ful, and wor­thy sto­ry to tell — don’t let the algo­rithm stop you! 

If you need even more help using empa­thy to bet­ter under­stand your audi­ence, check out our ebook Define Your Ide­al Client with Empa­thy Map­ping.