Most supplement businesses have yet to capitalize on the growth trend in probiotics for weight management. Innova Market Insights found that only 5.7% of probiotics launches entail this market segment.
This article explains simple steps companies can take for exploiting this opportunity.
HANDING MARKETING OVER TO CONSUMERS
Garnering unsolicited commentary by consumers is a good place to start. It’s an excellent source of persuasive social proof.
In addition, personal stories of successful weight management also push key emotional hot buttons. The most effective emotion behind weight management marketing is hope.
Kate Harveston’s story is a good example of what social proof and hope look like together. She’s a big online influencer in women’s health. In her article about probiotics, appearing in Girls’ Globe, she states,
“I’ve noticed since I started taking probiotics that I actually have an easier time maintaining a healthy weight. At first, the connection wasn’t clear, and it seemed especially weird since they had cleared up my tummy problems and I was therefore back to eating more again. But I began researching it and, indeed, there is some sort of connection between metabolism and probiotics.”
She checks the both the ‘social proof’ and the ‘hope’ boxes at the same time.
Using stories like hers is a great strategy for handing over marketing to consumers.
Comments by customers who don’t run an influential blog also add up.
The following are typical examples from probiotics product reviews on Amazon. They also work by combining social proof and hope.
“This probiotic literally changed my life within a month! I will definitely be buying again and again! Oh yeah plus after 2 years of trying to lose the extra 20 pounds I put on, I lost 15 within the first month and this is literally the ONLY thing I did differently!”
“I read the reviews on Amazon and decided to give it a try. I’m down 3.6 lbs from 10 days ago!!!”
“I love this probiotic, it def has been working in conjunction with eating healthy and daily exercise. I’ve lost 7 pounds in 2 weeks. I take one capsule daily every morning.
Not only did it balance my ph levels but I’ve lost about 8lbs. since starting it 6 weeks ago. It’s a win-win.”
This is Storytelling 101 for marketing. Stories get people’s attention. It lets them imagine being in someone else’s shoes. In this case, the ‘someones’ are those who’ve already benefited from using probiotics for weight management.
ADDING THE POWER OF VALIDATION
My experience researching and writing about probiotics over the past 15 years reveals another critical dimension to marketing a healthy microbiome.
It’s the extensive body of scientific research behind what probiotics can do. Published research gives credibility to all the eBooks, white papers, special reports, and blog articles I’ve ever written.
Citing scientific studies lends yet another principle to persuasion marketing. I learned it from my old colleague, Dr. Robert Cialdini.
It’s #3 on his list of six principles: authority.
Individuals who are authoritative, credible and knowledgeable experts in their fields are more influential and persuasive than those who are not.
As far as weight management goes, research on probiotics is the new kid on the block. It’s almost brand new compared with all the published work on gut and immune health.
Nevertheless, those few early studies on using probiotics for weight management are already a valuable component for lending credence to personal stories.
IMPLEMENTATION
The key to marketing probiotics for weight management starts with harnessing the power of consumer input for implementing social proof and for providing hope.
The icing on the cake is generating authority at the same time.
Applying these strategies for marketing probiotics for weight management can be executed in three phases.
1) First, segment your list.
You already have a subscriber list. Without doubt it includes a segment interested in weight management.
Your first phase is to find out who’s in that segment. Surveys and questionnaires are the go-to strategies. Boost survey response rates by providing incentives such as special reports and discount coupons.
2) Second, establish your customer’s trust.
Trust is a core building block of marketing. It rests both on social proof and on authority.
How you build trust depends on how well you communicate with your customer base. This is the role of a customer appreciation strategy. Personalized emails play a big part in showing how much you value your customers.
Acknowledgments, thank you notes, and even phone calls round up an effective overall strategy for building trust.
3) Third, cross-sell to open up the new market.
Your customer base is perfectly set up for marketing probiotics in a new vein. In this case, it’s about weight management.
You already have your customers’ attention. They’re happy with your company. They’ll listen to your persuasive cross-selling pitch for a new application and/or a new product.
Cross-selling to repeat customers gives you an opportunity to educate them about something new. And it gives them an option to purchase a health solution that they were otherwise unaware of.
Effectively applying these three phases is the key to seizing the rapidly growing opportunity for marketing probiotics for weight management.
DEVELOPING MARKETING MATERIALS
Segmenting your list, establishing a customer appreciation program, and creating persuasive emails all require new marketing copy.
That’s is where I come in.