Marketing is a lot of science. Think of a laboratory somewhere where researchers and engineers will work to determine what the ‘wonder drug’ is that will cure the common cold. That is a great description of marketing. Marketers (scientists) will often have an idea of what the market (customers) want; however, that is where the certainty ends. The rest is science.
However, I have discovered that the risk associated with marketing to prospects and customers can be mitigated with a simple, but rarely used technique. Profiling. Yes, like crime fighters that build profiles on a suspect. Good Marketers will profile their target prospects and customers to incredible detail. Nothing is left to chance. A prospect or customer profile will look at gender, age, income, lifestyle, habits, housing, religion, occupation, family, hobbies, friends, etc.
For example, Vancouver based – but known around the world – Lululemon has two pictures hanging in their corporate offices. The pictures are of Duke and Ocean.
The thing is that Ocean and Duke are totally fictitious. They don’t exist. What they do though, is focus the entire Lululemon team on who their target audience is and what they need to do to serve them. Those that don’t closely fit the Lululemon target audience, do not get their marketer’s attention.
Do you have a detailed profile of your target prospect or customer?
If you don’t, you are probably trying too hard to serve an audience that is not interested in your product or service and… not profitable.
Robert Murray is a Vancouver, BC based Business Strategy Consultant, #1 Best Selling Author, and International Keynote Speaker. For further advice, insight and inspiration on how to unlock your inner leader, follow Robert on Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook.
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