It’s videos like this that make it clear CBD companies should work to engender trust marketing all day long, every day of the year. It’s anecdotal evidence, which isn’t as good as statistical evidence, most of the time anyways, but it’s testimonials like this that will help get more people into CBD.
To the video. Joe Rogan is telling his guest, Maynard James Keenan, about how he has benefited from using CBD to help with his anxiety. In the video, he holds up a bottle of pills, shakes it, and first says that those pills can fuck you up because, if you take too much, it can make you paranoid. Not off to a good start, right? Wrong. Leading with the negatives is a great way to engender trust because if you’re willing to lead with what’s wrong with a product that signals to people that you are honest.
Then Joe goes into how CBD, and not just the pills in the bottle that he shook on camera, but also CBD oil, has helped him immensely with his anxiety. CBD is a “vacation saver” for Joe.
After rewatching the video perhaps the most powerful part of the discussion was when they talked about the negative effects ibuprofen can have on a body. Joe relates the story of a person he knows who is a runner who took ibuprofen to help with inflammation only to have his problems with inflammation increase. Turns out that it was the ibuprofen that was destroying his gut biome and causing his problems to worsen.
Joe also went on to talk about how CBD creams are a great way to help with aches and pains.
The key takeaway from this is that in a world where trust is provisional and the CBD industry is akin to a mellow Wild West with a short history of clinical research and a proliferation of fantastic claims abounding, it’s the companies that opt for a more genuine dialogue with their customers by acknowledging the truth, warts and all, upfront that will win the day. This isn’t to say be a dope about it, or do it in a weak way, that’s not Joe’s public persona at all, but be forthright with how you talk with customers. Customers who trust you are more likely to stay customers.