Sunday is National Chocolate Milkshake Day. Are you ready to celebrate? My guess is, you may not know that this special day was coming up – or maybe you’ve never even heard of a day set aside to eat (or do you drink?) a chocolate milkshake. By my guess is also that if you love chocolate milkshakes, it wouldn’t take much enticement to get you to buy one on September 12.

How did National Chocolate Milkshake Day come about? According to the National Day Calendar website, no one knows for sure who originated the day. There are also conflicting stories about when and where ice cream was actually blended in chocolate drinks to make the modern day chocolate shake. It doesn’t matter to people who are consuming the product. You see, they don’t care about the history or the founder of the day, they just want a reason to indulge in this frozen dessert!

This brings up an interesting marketing scenario, doesn’t it? Are you overthinking your marketing promotions? There is a tendency when you get into a marketing meeting to overcomplicate very simple messages. For instance, you may spend a lot of time and effort coming up with the history of your company with a story of how the founder worked hard to get things started and grew the brand to where it is today. You can also get bogged down in aspects of your product or services that mean a lot to people inside your industry, but the consumer doesn’t find interesting. If you focus on what the customer wants your brand to do for them – and only that aspect of the transaction – you will be successful in marketing. Most of the time, keeping your marketing message uncomplicated works best. Give your customers one thing to think about and one decision to make. If they are sold on your product, give them a reason to buy it now. Do you like chocolate milkshakes? Buy one at half price on September 12. That is a straightforward message with a trouble-free call to action. That transactional process needs to feel effortless to your customer.

What if you are selling something a little more complex than milkshakes? Does your marketing still need to be so simple? Absolutely! The first thing you need to do is to find out what the customer needs from you, especially if you are solving a problem for them. Next, figure out how you are helping them beyond what your competition is doing for them. Promote this difference to them, but make sure it means something to the customer and not just you. What do I mean by that? Here is an example. If the difference between you and your competition is you use American made components, that could be the tipping point in the mind of the customer to choose you over them… or maybe not. It would depend upon the point of view of the customer. What customers typically want is a true solution at the lowest price, regardless of where the parts were made. Here is the bottom line: know your customer well. You have to get into their heads and be a junior psychologist because you have to understand the way they think if you are going to successfully market to them.

After you have figured them out, make their decision a simple one. Do you like chocolate milkshakes? They are on sale on September 12! Simple message: uncomplicated call to action. Make the marketing easy on your customers.