Ahoy and happy Monday!
Welcome to another week of Start Writing Online—where every week we dive into 1 of the 10 biggest problems all writers face:
- Distractions
- Over-editing
- Perfectionism
- Procrastination
- Self-confidence
- Generating ideas
- Impostor syndrome
- Writing consistently
- Finding time to write
- Loose feedback loops
(And, of course, if you want to crush all 10 of these AND master the fundamentals of Digital Writing in just 30 days, we'd love to have you in the next cohort of Ship 30 for 30!)
This week, we want to help you speak directly to your reader’s subconscious.
This sounds fancier than it is.
But it’s how you get to the root of what really matters to readers—and what really matters is something they can feel in their body (not some feature-set detail). And in order for readers to care about your idea, they first need to understand what PROBLEM it solves.
Problem = context.
But it’s not enough to just say “X is a problem.” You want to be very clear what type of pain you are speaking to—because in order for the reader to care, they need to know how to FEEL.
If you can pinpoint the type of pain you are speaking to, your writing becomes potent.
The 7 Types Of Customer Pain
- Social
- Mental
- Physical
- Sexual
- Spiritual
- Financial
- Emotional
Let’s break each one down.
(And then we’ll get ChatGPT write for you!)
1. Social Pain
Social Pain is rooted in the desire to be accepted and/or the desire to gain access to something (or someone) you don’t currently have access to.
The individual wants something, and what they “want” is closeness. So for them to care about whatever idea, product, or service you are providing them, they have to first connect to the lack of closeness they feel in some area of their life.
When speaking to Social Pain, it’s crucial that you remind the reader of:
- WHAT kind of acceptance they desire
- WHY they desire the acceptance they do
- HOW they can gain acceptance & access
2. Mental Pain
Mental Pain is when someone is paralyzed by uncertainty.
They have fallen into a wormhole of “overthinking” and are having a hard time climbing out. So again, before they can care about your solution for getting them up and out of their dark abyss, they need to be reminded of their current state of confusion.
When speaking to Mental Pain, remind the reader:
- WHAT confusion & uncertainty feels like (and WHAT caused it in the first place)
- WHY no one deserves to live in a constant state of “analysis paralysis”
- HOW they can move to a place of clarity
3. Physical Pain
Physical Pain is more than just “pain in the physical body.”
Physical Pain is also captivity: the feeling of being “stuck” and unable to do anything about it. To help readers/customers connect to their Physical Pain, you need to not only make them aware of the pain itself, but all the things the pain is keeping them from doing in their everyday lives.
When speaking to Physical Pain, tell the reader:
- WHAT immobility leads to—and why these are such negative outcomes.
- WHY physical pain is so much more than just “the pain itself.”
- HOW they can solve for their physical pain to overcome the immobility they feel and unlock all the experiences & outcomes they desire for themselves in a pain-free life.
4. Sexual Pain
Sexual Pain isn’t really about sex. It’s about trust.
It’s about speaking to the root fears keeping the person from being able to connect with someone else. To help readers/customers connect to their Sexual Pain, it’s important to make the conversation more about feelings, emotions, and other felt senses. You need them to know that the problem isn’t “sex,” but an underlying trigger.
When speaking to Sexual Pain, gently remind the reader:
- WHAT is really holding them back from being able to trust others (list their fears, and show you understand them).
- WHY they want the closeness & trust they do, and why those desires are OK, safe, and important.
- HOW they can begin to take steps to connect to their fears, empower themselves, and practice building loving relationships again.
5. Spiritual Pain
Spiritual Pain is about feeling like life is happening TO you, not WITH you.
As a result, anyone experiencing some kind of Spiritual Pain feels disconnected from the greater good. They feel alone. They feel like it’s them against the world, and more than anything else, they feel like a victim. Which is why it’s important for you to help them find a friend in you.
When speaking to Spiritual Pain, tell the reader:
- WHAT may be causing them to feel disconnected (list the things they “blame”).
- WHY they have every right to feel the way they feel.
- HOW they can free themselves from feeling the way they do (and what their life would look like on the other side of that transformation).
6. Financial Pain
Translation: scarcity & abandonment.
Financial Pain is rooted in a fear of “it all going away.” Ask anyone with Financial Pain what their biggest fear is, and you’ll likely hear them say, “I’m afraid of losing what I have.” As a result, people who carry around Financial Pain live in a constant state of scarcity. They cling onto what they have because they are used to having very little (either literally, in terms of money, or figuratively—mentally or emotionally or otherwise).
When speaking to Financial Pain, help the reader understand:
- WHAT caused their Financial Pain to begin with (how were they raised? Where did they come from?)
- WHY they have been carrying around this scarcity mentality—and what it has caused in their life (list the problems they’re currently experiencing as a result).
- HOW they can learn to trust themselves and live in a constant state of abundance.
7. Emotional Pain
Emotional Pain, at the end of the day, is about the relationship someone has with themselves.
But that’s not the way they think about it. Instead, they think about Emotional Pain as all the things that happened outside themselves (with other people/relationships in their lives) and, as a result, stay stuck in a vicious cycle of pointing to others and saying, “They’re the reason I’m so unhappy.”
When speaking to Emotional Pain, you must help them remember:
- WHAT their Emotional Pain is really all about, what caused it, but also what their response can show them about who they are deep down.
- WHY unhappiness, or feeling betrayed, is a symptom and not the root cause of their emotional state.
- HOW they can reach a point of acceptance and nurture that part of themselves that is still struggling to move forward (and would rather point the finger and blame someone else).
Train ChatGPT To Speak To Audience Pain
Ready to see this in action?
We put together a simple ChatGPT prompt for you, so you can see what this looks like using the Mental Pain framework.
Run the prompt. ChatGPT will ask you for your topic. And then it will write a short text following the Mental Pain framework.
Act as a my personal ghostwriting assistant.I will give you a topic.
You will write 3 short-form texts using the Mental Pain framework.
Mental Pain is a powerful way to connect with a reader subconsciously.
Mental Pain is when someone is paralyzed by uncertainty.
They have fallen into a wormhole of “overthinking” and are having a hard time climbing out. So again, before they can care about your solution for getting them up and out of their dark abyss, they need to be reminded of their current state of confusion.
When speaking to Mental Pain, remind the reader:
- WHAT confusion & uncertainty feels like (and WHAT caused it in the first place)
- WHY no one deserves to live in a constant state of “analysis paralysis”
- HOW they can move to a place of clarity
Please write an actionable, conversational, spartan short-form text following the Mental Pain Framework.
Avoid jargon.
Do you understand?
Let me know when you are ready and I will give you a topic.
Here’s what the result looks like for the topic: “waking up early.”
Take the output, use at as inspiration, and edit it in your style for the next topic you write about so your customer/reader feels it!
The 7 Types Of Customer Pain Recap
Notice how, if you can pinpoint which of the different types of pain you are speaking to in a reader/customer, how much more potent your language becomes.
They feel like you understand them—because you do.
That's it for today!
Hit reply and let us know how we did. Good? Bad? Helpful? Have ideas you'd like us to dig into or questions you want answered?
Chat next week!
–Dickie Bush & Nicolas Cole
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