Basic right? Think again, missing this mark can have you missing out.
Determining who your audience is, is truly one of the foundational pieces of growing a successful business and often an area businesses get it wrong.
While everyone you come across is a connection that may lead to a client, sale, collaboration or referral, everyone you come across is NOT your audience.
Your audience is your ideal client – that perfect prospect, the 5-star dream client. Think about being able to wave a magic wand and have your pipeline filled with just the right prospects.
When you aren’t specific enough on exactly who your ideal client is, the likelihood of your marketing messages being specific enough to actually land and evoke action, is slim to none.
When you’re incredibly clear on who you serve – including the pain points, challenges, obstacles they are facing – you’re able to create a marketing message that is so specific that it draws in your ideal prospects.
Your audience is never about resonating with the masses. It is always about resonating with a specific niche of individuals who will be most directly served and positively impacted with the service you offer.
Your audience is who you focus your marketing towards. They are the ones that have the potential to see and appreciate your highest and truest value because they have the specific need for the benefit your services offer. They want the solution you offer.
There are 3 specific questions to answer when it comes to Your Leadership of YOUR AUDIENCE: Who? What? And How Much?
The Who:
Take a few minutes and picture your ideal client.
- Who needs the exact solutions you provide?
- Of those individuals, who specifically do you want to work with (in addition to the standard demographics, what are their psychographics – characteristics, values, opinions, interests, hobbies, lifestyle values, etc. of your ideal clients?)
You may feel like you are taking this down a rabbit hole and know that the more specific you get, the more targeted your marketing messages can be, meaning the more spot on they will be for your ideal client to be provoked to take immediate and inspired action. This is all part of the process allowing Your Leadership to Lead Your Audience!
**Important Tip:** If a contact doesn’t meet all these requirements, DO NOT discard them. Put them in your funnel, they may not be ready or at the level they need for your services, and you still want to make sure they are seeing your marketing. This way when they are ready you are already in their mind. As I am often sharing with my clients, you want to be focused on today’s money AND tomorrow’s money – those that are ready to buy today and those that with further cultivation will be ready to buy “tomorrow” – whether it’s 24 hours down the road or 9 months down the road.
The What:
“The What” refers to your desirable / compelling offer for this Ideal Audience. You can do the same exercise as above, this time think of the solutions you make possible, thru your specific service, for your Ideal Client:
- What are the pain points, challenges, problems and/or obstacles your Ideal Audience is currently facing?
- What pain points, challenges, obstacles and/or problems do your services solve?
- Why should they want to work with you?
- What is your USP (unique selling proposition) that sets you apart from competitors?
The How Much:
The “how much” is so much more than simply trading time for money. Trading time for money is an “employee mindset”, not an “employer mindset”. As the owner and leader of your organization, evaluating the amount of time it will take your team (whether it is a team or 1 or a team of 100) to deliver on that service does need to be evaluated, that is only a piece of the PROFITABLE pricing equation.
The other, often overlooked pieces of your PROFITABLE pricing equation are knowing your experience levels, knowing the amount of time you’ve invested to become as experienced as you are, your wisdom and PROVEN track record.
All of these factor into you being the expert you are, which means you can typically get the results for your clients quicker. Your pricing helps them to potentially avoid costs – costs of mistakes that you’ve learned from and can help them avoid, costs they would be incurring if they continue on the path they are on, which means improvement is delayed.
At the same time you may also be helping to position them for growth and/or peace of mind (which we all know can be priceless).
Now that you know your who, the what and the how much, you should be feeling confident and ready to start promoting your services with stronger messaging and results than you were previously achieving.
One last tip. Get comfortable with the idea that you aren’t for everyone. Marketing is not about how many people your messages won’t resonate with. It is 100% about reaching a smaller, targeted and specific audience who are your ideal client.
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