Find and Capture Your Audience
Before you can sell anything to anybody, you need to have a clear idea of just who your target audience is. There’s an old saying in marketing that goes something like “If you’re selling to everyone, you’re selling to no one”, and there’s a great deal of truth in this. What it means is that if you don’t have a clearly defined audience, and you’re just pitching your product to the masses, there probably won’t be anyone listening.
You’ll be much more successful if you have identified the group(s) of people who are most likely to buy your products, and why they buy them. That will enable you to craft your message much more directly for them, and that’s when you can expect to achieve some level of success. Here are some steps you should take to make all that happen.
Do Market Research
Market research will be the best way for you to find out the demographics and the specific groups of people who would be interested in your products. Historical data will be very useful in this regard, as will current surveys and questionnaires. Consumers’ needs and preferences will come to light during your market research, and that will help you to provide products which satisfy those desires and needs. When you can have an understanding of what motivates people to buy specific products, you’ll have a better idea of which features should be included on your products, and you’ll know how to pitch those features to potential buyers.
Find your target audience
There are quite a few tactics you can use to accurately identify your target audience, beginning with the surveys mentioned above. If you have a group of current customers, you should analyze what makes them buy from you, and extend that concept to potential new customers. Another strategy you can use is to closely observe your competitors, to see what they’re doing to identify their target audiences. Consider all the best features of your products, and then think about which groups of people would benefit the most by having those features available to them.
Set Goals & Objectives
If you don’t set some objectives for yourself, you’ll never know how you’re doing. By establishing realistic, practical objectives, you’ll be able to measure your progress, and have something to compare against when you’re underway with sales and marketing campaigns. For instance, if you’ve set a goal to acquire 100 new customers this month, and you actually earn only two, there’s not much doubt that you need to do something different in your approach. On the other hand, if your goal was 20 and you brought in 40 new customers, you’re on the right track and you need to do more of what you’re already doing.
What is your unique selling proposition?
Your unique selling proposition (USP) is something which makes your product more desirable than your competitors’. This one feature will play to your business strengths, and it’s the one thing that makes your product uniquely desirable to your customers. If you don’t have one – get one. If your product has nothing at all which distinguishes it from the competition, that means you can expect no better than lackluster sales, because you’re just one of many on the market. When you’ve identified your USP, make sure to feature it prominently in your sales messages, so as to generate maximum appeal for your product.
Love on your customers – create loyalty
When you have accurately identified you target audience, you’ll want to do everything possible to make them loyal, recurring customers. Search Engine Marketing is a great option. Show them some love by offering loyalty discounts on your products, or by starting up a full-blown customer loyalty program. When your customers feel needed and valued, they will be more apt to continue with you rather than dashing off to a competitor. Everyone needs to feel wanted, and customers are no exception. Make them feel wanted, and you’ll probably enjoy their patronage for quite a while.