It is Valentine's Day. This is one of the largest money-making days for sales of flowers, candy, greeting cards, diamond jewelry, movie tickets, caviar and Vegas weddings. Anything that is red and has to do with love is selling today.

How did St. Valentine's Day get to be the retail king of anything romantic? Believe it or not, it didn't start with Hallmark or FTD. The legend of St. Valentine's Day dates back to the Roman Empire when Emperor Claudius II decided to forbid all marriages. It seems that Claudius was having trouble getting men to leave their wives and families to go off to war. Like the politician he was, Claudius thought he had solved the problem by banning marriage with a law. Valentine was a priest and he thought Claudius to be a cracked pot with too much power for anyone's good. Valentine knew you could not stop love by decree, so he started performing marriage ceremonies in secret. Claudius caught wind of what Valentine was doing and ordered that he be arrested, which he was. He was sentenced to be executed for his defiance of Roman law. While he was in jail awaiting his execution, Valentine became acquainted with the jailer's daughter. On the day of the execution, he wrote her a farewell note and signed it "From Your Valentine." The day was February 14, 278 A.D. Thereafter, the day has been remembered as St. Valentine's Day and gifts, especially small notes of affection, have been exchanged between lovers. This makes Valentine's Day one of the longest traditional holidays we celebrate.

But why is Valentine's Day the big hit that other holidays are not? Is anyone exchanging cards on President's Day next Monday? What about Groundhogs Day? Did anyone give you a chocolate groundhog or take you out for dinner? Back on Columbus Day, did you decorate your home with miniature Pinta, Niña and Santa Maria ships to celebrate the discovery of America? Of course the answer is that Valentine's Day has to do with love. Amoré! There is something both deeply emotional and totally irrational about feelings of love. That combination is just ripe for a marketing opportunity, is it not? When we market to people, we want to appeal to an emotion and meet a need. Love is a pretty strong emotion, but the real emotional appeal to Valentine's gift buying is happiness and fear: happiness when you give your loved one something they like, and fear when you fail to make a purchase. We want to convince people to turn loose of their money to purchase our products or services. One of the classic methods to convince people to purchase is known as the bandwagon approach. Everyone is buying it, so you don't want to be the oddball who is left out - so the marketing psychology goes. This appeals to fear. It is building peer pressure into your marketing efforts. There is great pressure to remember your loved ones on Valentine's Day. To forget about your true love on Valentine's Day is to be in the doghouse for perpetuity. When you have this kind of happy-if-I-do, fear-if-I-don't kind of emotional appeal, price goes out the window as a consideration in the purchaser's eyes. The most frugal consumer will pay top dollar for a dozen red roses on Valentine's Day. Why? Fear.

Take a lesson from Valentine's Day. Do you want your customers to stop looking at you for the lowest price? Try to engage them on a more emotional level and stop being a commodity to them. You may not be appealing to an emotion as strong and irrational as love, but you still need to find an emotional reason to purchase from you. How does your product or service make them happy? What problem are you solving for them? Do your customers feel like they have to have your products or they are missing something? Is there an urgency to get your product by a certain date or they have been left out of something big? Give them an emotional reason to purchase from you first before you ever mention the price. If you connect with them emotionally, the price simply becomes after-sales negotiations.

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Feb 14, 278: St. Valentine beheaded, This Day in History, www.History.com

Original photo by Liliya Kalianionak