Far too many small businesses lack real focus when it comes to precisely who their customers are. They have not taken the time to really think about who their customers are or what they need. Perhaps they think it’s too difficult or too much trouble to figure out. Maybe they simply miss the importance of profiling customers. Not everyone is a perfect customer for you – you need to accurately profile customers to get to your ideal customer base. Identify your target customers through accurate profiling.
It is important to develop one or more detailed customer profiles or personas for your market planning. Why bother with all of this customer profiling? Do I even need it? You want to make the most of your marketing budgets and efforts, don’t you? It is nearly impossible to create a worthwhile marketing plan if you are clueless about who you should be marketing to.
Every small business should accurately profile customers
Designers, decorators, or home stagers who do residential work: “anyone with a house” is not a customer profile. Those who make and sell office furniture: “anyone with an office” is not a precise definition of a group you can market to with success. Nor is “anyone with walls” a descriptive customer persona for wallcovering manufacturers and distributors.
Customer profiling requires far more detail. You need to know more about your customers. It is best to understand their wants, needs, desires and challenges. These details allow you to realize you are the best person or company to provide the very best solutions for anyone matching your descriptive persona.
How to begin profiling customers for your company
Begin with your existing client base. Decide what commonalities exist between those customers. Observe them on the job, or in casual settings. Perhaps their children all attend the same schools or summer camps. Maybe they belong to the same clubs or participate in certain hobbies or sports. Taking time to observe people for profiling customers is not as complex as you might think.
Social media is one place where business owners do research. If clients are on FaceBook, Twitter, or other popular platforms, you have a next step. What a great place to observe what they like to do, their favorite music, TV shows and movies are, or what hobbies they have. Who are their friends? What business issues keep them up at night? What magazines, papers or blogs do they read? All of this information goes a long way in profiling customers on which to focus your marketing efforts.
All of this information is not that difficult to find and collect. It can help you develop client profiles with laser accuracy. It’s too much trouble, you say? Without profiling customers, your marketing efforts will be less than efficient. One message will not likely resonate with every potential customer. If you know what a specific group of customers have in common, you can target them with specific useful information.
Stop wasting time and money taking a generic shotgun approach to marketing. One message is not likely to resonate with every prospect. Consider your customers, their commonalities and needs before sending out marketing messages. Potential customers are not always in the same phase of your sales system. Targeted marketing based on profiling customers will result in improved sales.
