Ever had a friend just get it SO wrong?
Do you believe everything your brain tells you? I know, I know, this sounds like a trick question...
A few months ago a good friend and I were chatting about the stories we make up in our heads. A friend of hers had seen her sitting alone at a café that week. She had waved at my friend —through the café window— and had been upset when my friend didn't wave back. This woman then proceeded to send my friend a detailed email asking why things were so tense between them these days, and outlining just how disappointed she was that my friend had “completely ignored” her.
The issue, ? My friend hadn’t even seen her. She told me, “I didn’t see anyone waving. To be honest, I was deep in thought about which breaky I was going to order. When her email arrived my first thought was, Oh, how nice to see her name! We haven’t caught up in ages".
We see gaps in stories ALL the time and our brain rushes to fill them in. Depending on our mood and stress levels, these plot twists will be positive or negative.
I see the same situation happen all the time with small biz owners. We may only have part of the story of our audience and we fill in the gaps with assumptions, again either positive or negative. We stress out about sales not happening, email lists not increasing, followers not liking or tickets not being bought and we make up all sorts of reasons as to why this is.
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Likewise, when we pitch that podcast or media outlet, send a DM to that potential collaborator or suggest a partnership to that brand we think aligns so well with our own and don't hear back immediately — we tell ourselves ALL the reasons why this is.
What might be a better option?
Take the time to ask - and answers - the following questions:
What does your data say?
How can you validate assumptions?
What's your gut reading?
1. What does your data say?
Almost a decade ago I worked at Amazon in the UK, heading up the marketing for the entire Kitchen & Home category (literally millions of products). I often joke that you couldn’t say ‘Hello’ at Amazon without having analytics to back up why you were saying it. While that wasn’t entirely true, analytics played a huge role in making decisions for the business. From which emails to send and at what time, through to which words to test in the navigation (i.e. rugs vs. carpets), we referred to the numbers as often as possible.
If you're finding yourself filling in the gaps a LOT when it comes to why something isn't working in your business, consider looking at the data (or even creating the data if none exists). One of the best tools for this is Google Analytics, which can tell you pretty much anything about what's happening in relation to your website (including eCommerce sites). You can set up a range of "goals" within Google Analytics (here's how) that will enable you to see exactly what people are doing (or not doing). For example, a goal may be arrives on homepage > clicks on X > clicks on X> fills in contact form > submits form. From there you can can see where the drop-off happens and look at what you're not telling them / giving them to help guide them to the next stage of The Buyer Cycle. Likewise, tools like Hotjar and FullStory show you a range of information about your site, giving you insight into why something is / isn't working.
2 How can you validate assumptions?
We all do it - make assumptions then feel like an idiot when those assumptions turn out to be incorrect. One way to rectify this is to simply validate these. How so?
Ask current customers / clients for feedback /insights using a survey, phone call or direct email.
Use social media i.e. polls on IG Stories (i.e. would you rather X or Y when choosing your engagement ring online?)
Watch people #IRL work through your website or physical space, look at where they think they should be moving vs. where you would like them to be moving. When I worked in HQ for retailers, we would often go into stores, give customers an iPad and ask them to find something online, then watch as to how they navigated the site
Check feedback on competitors via Amazon, Facebook Pages and Google My Business reviews (those 3-star and under reviews can be a gold mine for looking at what people really want from a business like yours)
Test, test and test again.
Validating assumptions may take time up front, but it’s far better than rushing into making changes when you don't actually know if they'll have any impact.
3 What does your gut say?
The last part to this exercise is to consider how you feel about what’s going on; what is your gut reading on the situation? Now, this may seem contradictory to what I've just said, but I do believe that gut feel has to be included when looking at the stories we tell ourself in business. I have had one problem consulting client and one problem coaching client since starting this business in 2015. In both cases, had I followed my initial gut read, I wouldn't have worked with either of them.
If you have been in business some time, you may have experienced things in the past that lead you to know, intuitively, why something is / isn't working. Even if you haven't been in business long, something internally may be telling you that the reason X or Y isn't working is because of Z. When conducting a gut read, you want to have carved out some space to really think clearly about the situation and come up with the reasons why something is / isn't working. You also want to measure this against any data / validated assumptions to ensure it's not fear talking, but a genuine gut reading.
Consider the stories you’re telling yourself. You don’t want to become the #WorriedWavingWoman. How might you utilise the questions above to uncover a more truthful, helpful story?