How to Sell More by Selling to the Right People

25 Mar How to Sell More by Selling to the Right People

3 tips to help you identify your ideal customer

Would you like to sell more? Of course you would! No business owner is ever going to believe that their work is done as far as sales are concerned. There’s always room for more sales and more satisfied customers.

But the mistake that many business owners make is believing that their product or service suits everyone. While it’s tempting to think this way, not everyone wants what you’re selling, and failing to define exactly who does want your product runs the risk of you trying to be all things to all people, and potentially doing a dis-service to the people who need you the most. 

The secret to selling more is to define exactly who you want to sell to: what they look like and what problems they currently have that only you can solve. 

For example, it may be wise for all UK adults to have made adequate pension provisions for their retirement. And if you’re in the pensions business you might reasonably argue that your target market is every UK adult. It would cost you a fortune trying to get your marketing message out to everyone. But once you start excluding all those who already have pension arrangements in place, those who aren’t actively looking for pensions advice, those who are already drawing a pension, those who live outside your catchment area etc, then you can start to see how your real target market shrinks quite considerably – along with the amount of money you need to spend on marketing to them. 

The better you understand your ideal customer, the better you’ll be able to serve them, the more efficient you become. You should be able to picture the person in your mind. All your marketing and advertising should appeal to that person, and only that person. And once you understand the particular market niche that your ideal customer occupies, you can dominate it.

Here are our 3 tips for defining your ideal target customer

1.     Review your current and lapsed customer base

Examine the profiles of all your current customers and those you have sold to in the past. What do they look like? Are there any common demographic themes such as gender, age, location, education, occupation, family, interests, stage of life etc? What sales channels did they use and what information did they need? Then write out a statement along the following lines, filling in the details in the brackets: 

“Our target market is [gender] aged [age range], who lives in [place or type of place] and likes to [activity].” 

2.     Know your product and what it does for people

Be absolutely clear about your product, your proposition, and the problem that you solve from your customer’s point of view.  What customer needs does your product or service satisfy? How does your product improve your customer’s life or work? Which are the most important product benefits? Why should your customer buy from you rather than from someone else?

3.     Set your goals

Define your objectives for leveraging your ideal customer. It may be in pure sales or revenue, but you can also consider creating customer advocates or developing new capabilities or products that meet their needs. Also set a timetable for when you want to deliver on your objectives. 

By using these simple tips you will have a clear idea of who your product or service appeals to the most and what activities you need to undertake to sell to them. Then you can design your marketing and advertising focused on this person and to be 100% relevant to them. Not only will your advert resonate with them, they will believe that you understand their problem, that you have the ideal solution, you will get more sales and a bigger ROI for your marketing budget. 

We have many years’ experience helping our advertisers define their target market and creating impactful marketing messages. For more advice about advertising your business locally, please call us on 01494 727000 or email us.

Author: Raj

Owner