Designing Strategies newsletter

March – April 2018            Volume 15 – Issue 82

Face it, if your small business doesn’t have customers, who will purchase your products or use your services?  You’ll be out of business in no time.  A steady stream of revenue coming in on a regular basis is what keeps businesses of all types running smoothly and profitably.  Advertising and marketing to the masses is not the way you want to go.  Unless you are selling a commodity like soap or toothpaste, you need to be looking for your ideal customers.  Ideal customers are the ones that are the best fit for what your firm does.  They are the people you should focus your marketing on with laser accuracy.

What Are Ideal Customers?

Ideal customers are the ones who like the way you and your staff work to provide them with your product because it is just what they need.  Ideal customers like how you  provide solutions to problems or challenges they are facing.  And, they value what you have to offer enough to pay a little – or even a lot more than they would pay someone else.  And, they pay their invoices on time! They keep coming back again and again.  They tell friends and colleagues about how great your firm is.  Those are ideal customers and the ones you should focus on finding.

Be Selective About Customers You Market To

Make your life easier and more pleasant.  Life throws enough challenges at us, so why attract customers that are going to make things worse?  Not everyone who has a home is in search of an interior designer.  Not everyone with an income needs the help of a CPA to file their taxes.  Healthy patients may not need a physician – yet.

Before you strike off in the wrong direction looking for customers, take time to be sure you are looking for the ‘right’ customers.  It is always more profitable to attract your ideal customers, not just any living, breathing human being.

Research and Plan – Then Search for Ideal Customers

Before starting your next marketing campaign, take time to do some serious research and planning.  Use your past and present customers as your starting point.  Who are the customers you really, really like and appreciate?  Jot down some notes about WHY you like them.  Are they easy to work with?  Why?  What is it, specifically, that makes you want to work with them again?

Then, make a separate list of clients or customers you hope you never, ever see again.  They are definitely not your ideal customers.  Jot down some of the things they did that are not at all what you think is ideal.

Use the steps below to help you get a good grasp of who your ideal customers are.  Then, you can build your marketing plan around those customer types.  Marketing budgets can be tight, regardless of the size of your company or what market sector you operate in.  Spending money that won’t reach the best customers for your firm is not something you want to do.

How to identify your ideal clients

With those notes you jotted down to identify your very best and very worst customer in hand, you are ready to begin.  Develop several personas to help put a ‘face’ on a specific customer type.  Give them a name if you want. Two of mine are:  Sally/Stan Startup and Glenna/Grant Growth.  Heck, draw a picture of them or find an image that you think this ideal ‘customer’ would look like.

Make a list of details about them:  income level, profession, family or single, age range, clubs and associations they belong to, what they do for entertainment, where they live, kind of ‘home’ they own, what they do for fun – sports fans, skiers, art aficionados, animal lovers.  If you attracted earlier customers that fit this personality, odds are good that others with similar backgrounds will be drawn to your company, its culture, products and services.

Where to find your ideal customers

You can’t send winning marketing messages to your ideal customers if you don’t know where they are. Finely tuned, focused targets will provide much better results.  With your personas in mind, it’s time to begin your search for those treasured people to bring into your business community.  Try using some of the resources below to find solid prospects.

Networking venues:

Find the ones your ideal customers attend, and schedule yourself to be at two or three of them a month. Online event notification programs like Eventbright.com can be a great source of who is being invited. Decide that you want to meet a set number of new contacts – maybe three or four – at each event.  Sites like Eventbright allow those invited to indicate if they will attend, or ‘maybe’ attend – and list them by name.

An added plus is their online directory of events in your area. You have to scroll all the way to their website footer to find the directory link, but it’s worth the effort.  You can easily find networking opportunities and other events scheduled in your city. They have a list of all types of local events to choose from.  Identify the ones that your ideal customers are likely to attend and sign up.

Set a goal for each event you plan to attend.  Do some research to learn more about the individuals you target so you can strike up conversations with them when you are face to face.  After the event, follow up.  Don’t let warm leads go cold. Odds aren’t good that these new leads will immediately become customers, but that doesn’t mean they won’t tell others about you and what you have to offer.

Online Forums: 

Quora, LinkedIn, Facebook, and Alignable all have online forums you can join.  There are many, many more out there in Cyberspace.  Participation in these types of online platforms provides opportunities to build credibility and share your expertise with specific types of customers.  Once on those platforms, you can share your professional knowledge and skills through their Q&A features.  You can answer others’ questions that fall within your areas of expertise and engage with potential customers.  Or, post questions of your own on topics at which you excel to attract interested prospects.

Social media sites like LinkedIn and Facebook offer specialized groups you can join.  Identify the groups that your ideal customers might belong to.  Join in the conversation to build relationships and share your expertise.  Be helpful.  Be visible.  Show potential clients that you are knowledgeable and trustworthy.  Or, set up your own group and invite potential customers to join.  You can control the conversations as group moderator.

What do they read? 

Visit sites like Magazines.com to see what magazines are published for your ideal audience.  Interior designers can look for magazines focused on home owners or the commercial field in which they practice.  Financial planners might create a list of magazines that focus on people nearing retirement, or those with young families with college tuition looming on their horizon.  If you are looking for graphic designers or photographers, find magazines of interest to them.  Look at the articles they publish.  Check out their blogs to see what is of interest to their readers.  Find names of potential customers by reviewing comments, join the conversation.

Amazon.com is another excellent source of information on customer types.  Do a search of book or video titles related to your ideal customers.  Even something as basic as a Google or other Internet search can turn up useful information. Type keywords related to your ideal customer for a search.  Once you have typed in the keyword(s), click on the search box and usually a drop down listing of related searches are revealed.  This can help you widen your research for topics of interest to your ideal customers.

Conclusion

Running a small business isn’t easy.  If it was, everyone would be doing it.  There is enough stress that goes with the day to day operation of any business, regardless of the industry sector you belong to.  The best thing you can do is make your business as easy as possible to operate and grow.  How?  By creating a series of business systems to help your business can run more easily and smoothly.

This includes a set system of attracting and retaining new customers. Once you have researched information that is of interest to them, you can target the right customers in a laser focused manner. Reduce daily stress levels by only serving ideal customers.  It takes a bit of work to identify them and find them, but in the long run, it will be time and effort well spent.

If you are tired of working with customers that just plain give you migraine headaches, it’s time to stop and change direction.  For help developing a strategic system for bringing in the type of customer you want, connect with Terri Maurer today.