“Your idea is so great that everyone will want one!“ We’ve heard this before.
Well, the bad news is not everyone will want your product. The good news is not everyone will want your product!
Your customers are not everyone. Your customers aren’t all women, or all men, or all senior citizens, or all teenagers. Your customers aren’t even the coveted advertising demographic of all men between the ages of 18-35.
If your customer base is everyone, it’d be far too expensive to bring your product to market. Instead, your customers have common interests. They might need to have the latest technology or they won’t miss a sporting event. They might be college educated, thus a professional, or they might like to go to rock concerts. They may prefer jeans to khakis, football to baseball, and wine to beer. Do they read People or Time? This can go on and on…
The more targeted you classify your customers, the easier it will be to know who they are, where they hang out, what types of conversations they engage in, and what they care about. This will make it easier and cheaper to bring your product to market.
The goal of marketing isn’t to waste your time and money pitching your product to everyone. You want to pitch your product to everyone who will actually want it.
As always, I would love to hear your thoughts. How targeted is your customer’s persona?
{ 1 comment… read it below or add one }
You bring up an excellent point, Greg. I think the idea of specialization and identifying your target niche appears here and this qualifies for any type of business. I’ve come across some great things and learned how companies who do specialize succeed far beyond those who simply stay general. I’ve realized that as I get plan my business and get it up and running, I will have to focus on a specific type of customer who will actually want to know more about my leisure group travel business and not only that, but actually travel with me to various places across the world! This is key, identifying your potential customers. Who wants to travel? Where do they want to go? There is so much that goes into this. I am still researching the demographics and economics of my target audience, but I will say for sure that the “baby-boomer” generation is on my radar! There will be more than them of course, but I realize if I hone in on a specific group, anything is possible. Let the analysis of identifying your real customers begin!