Does marketing feel spammy and gross? Try this.

If you’re a heart-centered, mindful entrepreneur who feels gross and spammy when you market your business, here’s an easy fix. 

I’m a business coach, and almost all of my clients feel this way sometimes. They want to promote their business in a way that feels good for them AND their audience, but that’s easier said than done.

Here’s the problem. If you’re an empathic entrepreneur who cares as much about serving your clients as you do about profits, a lifetime of hearing old-school marketing tactics has probably conditioned you to use language that flies in the face of your truth.

They will tell you to “target” your ideal client in your messaging. And on the surface, that will feel like good advice. But your subconscious might associate “target” with its dictionary definition, which is:

• a mark to shoot at
• a goal to be achieved
• something to be ridiculed

Yikes.

And if you do get them on the phone or convince them to book with you, traditional marketing lingo will call them “leads” and say you’ve “captured” them. 

But we know what “capture” means:

• to catch, win, or gain control by force
• to move in a board game (such as chess) to gain an opponent’s piece
• one that has been taken (such as a prize ship)

Suddenly your potential clients, for whom you care deeply, have been reduced to things you aim at or prizes to be won. 

And that feels f-cking gross.

I want to offer that you’re allowed to get rid of this language and swap it with words and phrases that feel more aligned. 

Like, nobody checks. 

You make the rules.