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An Ideal Customer You Can Fall In Love With
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Ideal Customers
We were talking about content for his website. The business owner was struggling with ideas. He’d begin to float an idea and before it developed dismiss it. “A lot of the time the customer just won’t open their mind to the idea of bringing in a new process or changing what the warehouse people are asked to do.”
When the conversation changed to what he was doing in his own business, the changes he had made and how those changes were making a difference – his voice changed, his energy changed, his patience with my questions changed.
And it hit me. The reason why the second conversation was more rich and instructive and positive than the first – he was speaking to an audience he believed was interested in learning. And the natural, compelling teacher in him began to emerge. He knew his audience (me) cared about what he was saying.
In the Duct Tape Marketing process, a lot of emphasis is placed on defining your ideal customer/prospect. From a pragmatic standpoint, it’s critical. The better defined your target it, the better steps you can take to reach the target. But it’s also critical from an emotional standpoint. The ideal customer is interested in what you have to say and values your advice.
When creating the strategy, message and plan for your marketing efforts, think of the ideal customer, not the difficult and stubborn customer that chewed up half your day with some petty complaint. The former will inspire you. The latter will dull you.
By visualizing the ideal customer it’s easier to write. By visualizing the ideal customer it’s easier to make the commitment of time and money to create and send out your message. When your output is targeted to the few who “get it” you will attract more of those kinds of people.
Trying to justify an approach or the value of products and services will drain you if you’re trying to convince a difficult, cynical bunch. You might be fresh and compelling your first couple of attempts, but ultimately the audience will wear you down. Conversely, when you are sharing and contributing value to an eager and positive audience, your own energy and enthusiasm grows.
It sounds painfully obvious, but narrowing our audience is an uncomfortable move. We’ve been conditioned to believe in the safety of numbers, bigger is better. But that’s always been a false premise. There would be no 80/20 Rule if that were true.
My challenge to you is to banish the mediocre customers from your mind when thinking about your marketing. Take the time to picture the ideal customer. Give that customer a face and a voice and a personality. Think about them when you turn to your marketing activities.
At a minimum, the ideal customer values your expertise. Beyond that an ideal customer is profitable, and not in a mercenary way, but rather in a win-win way. You both profit from working together. The ideal customer is the one who vocalizes that they wish you had more products and services because they would prefer that you take care of everything. The ideal customer is the glowing reference and your advocate, referring you to other ideal customers.
On a personal note, I am in the midst of one of my own marketing campaigns. It involves handwriting a personal note to every one on my lists. If a name comes up, and I can’t think of anything to say to them, I’ve been taking them off the list. The fact that I cannot find common ground means that we’re not a good fit.
I want more of the ideal. I want that for you as well. Let’s find those ideal customers that we can fall in love with.
Proactive Sales Plan
0Sales people have been taught to utilize new selling techniques and tactics. Tactics to help them have a better sales meeting and to improve their sales pitch. You can be the best at holding a meeting and giving a sales pitch – but if you are not taking into account who your audience is, you will not have much sales success.
In today’s world – our competition as sales reps is not the other companies offerings – their products or service, our competition is the sales reps that are interacting with the same people we are.
What was that sales rep able to, or not able to do when interacting with the prospect? What points did they get across, how much were they able to learn about the day to day problems of the prospect?
It is our job as sales people to not only get in front of the decision maker – but then it is our job to figure out what is going on their world. If we are giving cookie cutter sales presentations and sales pitches then we are going to have a pretty rough time. (more…)
Innovative Business Card Design Techniques
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Innovative Business Card Design
When looking for an inexpensive way to market your business, you best option is the business cards. As the tool that will initiate the initial contact you will have with your target customers, it is vital that your cards properly and effectively convey your image and sales message. Keep in mind that you target customers will also receive business cards from your competitors. So it is important that you card is convincing and appealing for it to stand out. Your credibility should be effectively carried out through your well thought out business cards.
The following are tips you need to consider when designing your business card in order to utilize its full potential and effectiveness (more…)
Is Procurement Outsourcing Right For Your Business?
06 months ago
by admin
in Outsourcing
Trends arise all the time in the business world, and one buzzword is procurement outsourcing. The basic idea is that a company large enough to deal with a bulky and complex inventory may need professional assistance to do the job. It is possible to use in-house employees to do the packaging and paperwork, and this is often the most viable strategy. On the other hand, internal staff might not be as efficient as professional procurement services. The job might require specialized knowledge or experienced handling. A new business might need to train its staff and so must resort to procurement outsourcing in the mean time.
The clear advantage is that a firm that specializes in particular types of inventory, such as perishable goods for a restaurant chain or keeping packages secure for an electronics firm, might do an excellent job. If a company is not too big, then it might not be able to afford or need its own warehouse. A third party vendor might sell space in a warehouse, and also do all the organizing for the customer. An economy of scale might just beat the middleman’s fee. If a business finds it advantageous to avoid having too many employees, then procurement services might be the solution. (more…)
7 Steps to Systemising Your Sales Process
0In today’s world time seems to be going faster than ever before. By the end of the day we look back at the To Do list we had at the beginning of the day and see it is now longer than the one we started with.
As our environment around us continues to change, we have to adapt and also change if we are to keep up and grow our business. The two biggest things any business can do to not only grow but also create a system around increasing sales and demand for their product or service are: delegation and systematization.
Too often I walk into a business and notice the owner is the sales consultant, boss, manager and every other role you can think of in business. Doing this is not only stressful for the business owner but also for the staff as they feel inadequate and unchallenged. (more…)