Pain to Pleasure…

How to Write Content for Your Business

Take Your Ideal Client on a Journey to Success

When you’re writing for your business, you’ve got to show your Ideal Clients the journey from Pain to Pleasure or they won’t know which way to turn.

If you’ve watched this week’s Mojo Moment, you know already that I’ve got writing on my brain these days – or, at least, the lack of words that happens when we have writer’s block.

Writer’s block is super-common, and the fear of writing is also really common. Most people are still suffering from the wounds inflicted by their 3rd grade teacher who made some ridiculous comment about their inability to string words together…

… as if the ability to tell powerful stories is something we should have mastered by age 8.

On the other hand, I do believe that we are ALL natural story tellers.

I mean, just think about the excited story telling of toddlers. It’s not until we have it beat out of us by learning that there’s a right way and wrong way to tell a story that we develop the fear.

(because we’re good girls and we want to do it right and if we can’t do it right then we shouldn’t do it at all, right? bleah! enough of that nonsense! the world needs your story. be a rebel and start sharing your brilliance with a world who needs you!)

Humans are story creatures. We love a good story. We want our lives to be a great story. And we communicate best with others when we lead them through a story we’ve created just for them.

This natural desire and ability to weave a story makes it that much more tragic that so many of us fight with our words and carry ancient wounding that makes us feel like we have ‘nothing worthwhile to say’.

Gorgeous, I can guarantee that you have a LOT to say.

You were built to tell a story – you came with a Mission and a Message.

You have a unique vibration to contribute to the tapestry of fate and destiny that is being woven in every moment. 

The world needs you.

That’s why one of my very favourite things to do with my clients is work with them to find their true voice and to learn how to express it in the marketplace.

We’re going to dive in to some thoughts around story and how to write powerfully over the next few love letters and hopefully it’ll help you face the blank page and channel a bit more of your brilliance out into the world where it will help lift people out of darkness.

That’s the key, by the way. We’ll get right back to that. 😉

What to Do with the Writing in Front of You

So, let’s say that you have a writing project in front of you. 

Ugh.

It can be pretty intimidating. 

Whether it’s a page for your website, a post on Facebook or Instagram, a blog post, or a book that you want to write – whether it’s 200 words or 50,000 words – you’ve got to have a plan.

A structure. A framework.

If you sit down without a plan, it’s easy to get overwhelmed.

Why?

Because you have an infinity of options in front of you. That blank page is infinite possibilities. You could write about anything. You, beautiful creator, are connected through your powerful Unconscious Mind to the very fabric of the cosmos. Tapping into the infinite stream is part of your birthright.

And that can be pretty intimidating.

Move Your People Toward Their Goals

The key, therefore, is to choose the right thing to write about. The thing that will move you toward your goals. And that happens when you move your people toward their goals.

This is where we start. We have to lay out the general story arc – the journey – that we want to take our readers on.

This is important if you’re writing fiction and it’s absolutely essential if you’re writing for your business.

E-S-S-E-N-T-I-A-L.

If you don’t have a clear path that you’re leading your readers along – with a clear destination! – they’re going to get lost and confused and they will disengage.

So! We’ve got to lay out their journey. And here’s how you can do it:

It’s called the Now to Success framework. Or the Pain to Pleasure framework. There are lots of names for it, and everyone likes to put their own spin on it but the essence of it is this:

Your reader is somewhere, right now. And they don’t like it. They’re stuck. And suffering. They’re in pain. There’s something they want that they’re not getting.

(we know that that means it’s outside of their Comfort Zone, but that’s another topic…)

The Steps to Creating Your Story Framework

Step #1 is to grab a piece of paper, or open up a new file, and write this:

NOW: 

Yup. Just the word “Now”. Write it at the top of the page. 

Congratulations! You no longer have a blank page. 😉

And then write the stuckness, the suffering, the lack that your reader is experiencing. Again, if you’re doing this for your business, this will be the thing that is vexing your Ideal Client that will bring them looking for you.

Don’t worry about making it good. This is just for you.

Take a breath, drop in, and feel into your Ideal Client. If you did the interviews that we talked about last week, you have it fresh in your mind what they’re suffering with. 

Know Your Ideal Client

You need to know your Ideal Clients inside and out. What are their fears? Their dreams? Pains? Their sorrows? All of it. You need to know what isn’t working for them – because, as an entrepreneur, that’s the gap that you’re going to fill for them.

Let it flow. Take up as much space for this as you need to get clear on exactly what is keeping them stuck and away from their dreams, right now.

Then, when you’ve let it all out, we have Step #2. Below all that you’ve written for Now, write:

SUCCESS:

And then write that all out. What will they have when they’ve won. When they’ve solved all the riddles of their Now-stuck state, what will their life look like.

How amazing will it be. Write it all out.

Narrow It Down – Get Really Specific

Okay, when you’ve got that handled, you’re probably going to have to narrow it down.

Why?

Because the journey you’ve written out is probably pretty big, and unless you’re creating a major course or writing a book you won’t have space to take them through the whole journey.

In one blog post, or one social media post, you can only give them a taste. A glimpse of what winning feels like.

Give Them A Taste of What Winning Feels Like

But you’ve got to do it.

You’ve got to help them feel that lightness and victory that comes from taking action toward their goals – toward the Success that they desire. 

That’s the key. 

Lift The Vibration of Your Ideal Clients

We’re here to lift the vibration of our Ideal Clients and, through them, change the whole dang world.

Are you with me? Let me know in the comments if you’ve got questions popping.

So, let’s say, for instance, that you’re me. Here’s a quick example of my Now.

An Example of the Pain to Pleasure Journey

First, We Start with Pain – Where Are They Stuck?

NOW: When my clients come to me they are D-O-N-E. They say something like this: “I’m fed up with my ‘job pretending to be a business’ and having to worry 24/7 about where the money will come from and pouring all of my energy into what is supposed to be a business but actually isn’t – because as soon as I let down a bit so does my ‘business’ – and I’m burned out, bitter, and frustrated!” 

They’re seriously considering throwing in the towel.

My Ideal Clients are smart, determined, passionate (or at least they used to be passionate – nowadays they have trouble finding that passion) and they don’t get what they’ve been doing wrong.

The problem feels huge, and they don’t even believe that success is possible for them anymore. They are totally stuck at the beginning of the Pain to Pleasure process.

They don’t know what they don’t know and that vexes them to no end. And they feel guilty about it. And they feel shame because of all that there spinning. It’s embarrassing to be working this hard and not seeing results. They just want a way out. They want to win.

Then, We Talk About Pleasure – What Does Winning Look Like?

SUCCESS: When they’ve won, my Ideal Client is serving clients, making money, and feeling lighter and more powerful than she ever has. She knows where she’s heading – she’s got that Strategic Plan handled – and she believes she has the tools to get there.

At the end, my Ideal Client is building with the end in mind.

She’s gathered a quality team around her who support her brilliance and close her gaps and she has been seeing victory after victory in her business and personal life. Ultimately, she’s feeling so much better in her body and it’s like she’s fallen in love with her business – her REAL business! – for the first time.

That’s the overall arc of my client journey – they journey from Pain to Pleasure.

Pretty cool, huh?

Finally, We Narrow It Down to Create Our Content

Annnnnnddddd… it’s way too BIG of a journey to do in one blog post. I mean, it can take a couple of years to right the ship of someone’s life and business and get them sailing the beautiful seas of Destiny. And that’s with 1-1 coaching.

It takes time. Yes, there are quick wins in the beginning and along the way. And it’s a process. It’s a journey. My Ideal Clients become new and improved versions of themselves – more of the them that they were created to be. It’s the best thing ever.

So, in any one piece of content, I can only show them a teeny bit of that journey. 

My goal is to reach into their stuck places, into their painful Now, and show them a bit of the light. 

Give Them One Thing to Take Them From Pain to Pleasure

One thing. 

One resource. 

One step. 

Something that they can do now to move them a bit more toward Success.

Does that make sense? I’ve got to narrow it WAY down for them so they can feel what Success feels like which will motivate them to take the next step… and the next… and the next… all the way through the journey.

So, for instance, my Now to Success / Pain to Pleasure framework for today’s article would look something like this.

And this is Step #3: Narrow it down to one simple thing.

NOW: My Ideal Client has to create content and doesn’t know where to start. They hate facing the blank page and so they procrastinate until panic drives them into action. It’s a sucky way to create.

SUCCESS: They have a tool – the Now to Success framework – to quickly lay out the over-arching journey that they will take their Ideal Client on as they move from Pain to Pleasure in the content that they’re creating.

Pretty cool, huh? 😘

Remember: You’re here to build a new world.

You don’t have to do it alone.

And we’re here to help.

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It makes life so much easier. 😍

Vanessa Long

Vanessa Long is creator of the Seasons of Success and author of Discovering Your Passionate Purpose. Focused on providing straight-forward, no b.s. solutions, strategies, and support to move you from where you are to where you yearn to be. It’s time to tap into your purpose and build a life that expresses all of who you were designed to be.