Target Markets

Improve your Production Forecast

Actually most people tell me the their marketing is working, they just don’t have the time. Or, they would like to make it more professional. Or, maybe I could help them with start a blog. Very few people ever admit to a marketing problem. Even the better organizations that have built a great brand will leverage it as well as they should. And the single one thing that stops them is understanding their ideal customer, or the term buyer persona. They even spend little time on the process he uses to purchase and the expectations he has of the product.

The most used the excuse I see in developing a buyer persona is that the buyers vary too much. Okay, let’s just try to segment a portion of your customers. Maybe it’s only 10% or if your lucky as high as 50%. But creating some channel will facilitate in mapping out that buyer persona. If we look at how will the purchase was made and determined by that group, it will lead into some very insightful information. But I would encourage you to really try to understand the compelling reason they chose you. That reason alone can clarify your marketing your sales processes, and improve your production forecast.

I know that may sound silly over just one statement but look at it this way. If you could know the compelling reason that 50% of the customers buy from you, what would that mean to your bottom line?

P.S. A quick check to validate this, would be to talk to a few prospects that you lost. Ask them what their compelling reason, not to buy from you.

We use our Lean Marketing Assessment to see where you stand and how well you leverage your core message and it is at the basis of our Product launch strategy. Learn more about these two products.

The first step in any lean process is understanding or identifying your target market and ideal client. The Marketing Mavens by Noel Capon is a great book to assist you in this identification. They have slightly different take on it but the book brings out some points that may help you identify your market and client. He professes that the fundamental challenge of business today is to serve customer needs amid continuous change. Nothing earth shattering but he also states that the top companies do this based on these five core values:

Pick markets that matter.
Select segments to dominate
Design the market offer to create customer value and secure differential advantage.
Integrate to serve the customer.
Measure what matters

Marketing Channels

How do you go about creating sales channels and making them not competitive with each other. It is a pretty tall order in today’s world and one that really takes quite a bit of time so that they and yourself are not competing with each other. The Channel Advantage is a good book to start with and can be found at bargain prices. Let me give a couple of suggestion from the book and a few places on the web that you can find information.

If you are trying to find the best way to take your product to market there is a U.K business link that you can take a survey to Identify Potential Sales Channels and it will give you a set of recommendations. It is only a 5 minute exercise and well worth it.

The Channel Advantage recommends using a 4-step process to evaluate and manage each channel.

It looks straight forward but in today’s world I think it is missing one component. There should be 1-block on the bottom saying consumer and final price. Distribution is so good these days that the channels cross over so effectively that the consumer has to see the same price. Many times even when there is value added services being included. So, how many sales channels do you have and do they all end up with the same price to the consumer?

I wrote a post recently that All Sales Channels are not Created Equal and talked about the resources that you would have to commit to each one. But today I had an appointment with a new client and was discussing their Core Message and went through an exercise that I thought might prove useful. More importantly, I discovered that you can have more than one sometime and that All Core Messages are not Created Equal.

List your core messages, you can have more than one but keep it short and sweet.

Which one differentiates you the most?
Which one screams the loudest?
Who and what influences whom?
Which would could prove the most effective?
Which one has the highest risk attached to it?
Which one has the Lowest Risk?
Which one is the easiest to support?
Which is the easiest to implement?
1. In the short term?
2. In the Long Term?
Which one is the most affordable?
Which of them is most recognizable to your customers?
what are the best vehicles to reach your audience or constituents?
Can you combine and optimize?
If you decide on more than one, what is the best timing to introduce each?

So what is your core message?

It could be as simple as the shoes?

How is your marketing doing? Have you increased it? We have just about completed the first 30 days and are you cutting back or moving forward? I am still talking to perspective clients that seem to lack direction. How can you not be focused by now?

Case in point, Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz! She was running away from home for a better life. They did not understand her. I have 2 teenage boys, can I run? No, I understand that this is a part in their life that they need to find themselves. They need to find their own identity.

I have always thought many companies struggle with that. I talk to businesses everyday that define their target market as small business. I want for someone to take note here, SMALL BUSINESS IS NOT A TARGET MARKET.

So how do you define your niche? For starters, it is what you do well. Now, think about this – what do you do better, really better, than anyone else. What individualizes you more than any one single point. What would your customers say? What would your strategic partner say? What would a referral partner say?

I was taught the “Five Why” method. Keep asking why to each answer 5 times. At the end, you probably have the answer that you are looking for.

Who(Why) is your target Market? Small Business
Why? I work with companies that do not have an in-house marketing department.
Why? Our system is set up to handle that function.
Why? Because it is a systems.
Why? Because systems work.

So now, who is my target market from just that short exercise, I can tell you right now. If you don’t believe a system works, you are not my target market.

How about Dorothy? Remember the words of the lion to the wizard. Yeah, and the wizard took off without her. Linda, the good looking witch came back and told Dorothy what? “You have had the power all along, you just had to find it.” I encourage you as a business to find your niche and identify with it. If you want your marketing to work, don’t try to be everything to everyone. Find the power within your organization and tap those shoes together. It’s about the shoes!