Monday, March 1, 2010

Who Dat?: Do You Know Who Your Customers Are?

My sincere apologies for the lag between posts, but it has been a whirlwind simultaneously managing CMAC’s business, and preparing for the arrival of Daniel Rory Pillow, our first child. Fortunately for me, clients, partners, and followers have been extremely understanding during this obvious adjustment period.

I’ve been talking to a ton of prospects lately, and I am consistently astonished by business owners’ startling lack of knowledge of and insight into the identities of their respective customers. Granted, they have a vague idea about their primary audience (e.g., small ancillary service providers in the oil and gas industry), but more often than not, they are at a loss when asked to describe this audience in more specific terms. This is absolutely mind boggling to me.

How is this possible? How can one expect to be successful when he does not whom he is selling to, how the prospect makes his purchasing decisions, and what ultimately motivates a customer to buy a given offering (as opposed to a competitor’s)? Frankly, it’s an exercise in futility for many of these guys. They are content to just muddle their way through business, hope that a prospect will somehow discover their companies and products, and then pray they decide to purchase their solutions. This is a recipe for disaster.

If you’re going to be in business…any business…and especially if you’re planning to launch a marketing program, it is absolutely critical that you have as much intelligence as possible about your core target audience – that is, the majority of YOUR CUSTOMERS that buy from you most frequently. You need to know demographics, purchasing behaviors, external and internal dynamics, price sensitivities, product and payment preferences, pet peeves, and so forth so you can modify your sales and marketing approach accordingly.

Do your customers make their purchasing decisions based solely on price? Are they a sophisticated group that strongly prefers features and functionality over cost? Do they respond well (or only) to sales promotions? Do your customers consider testimonials and product reviews before buying? This is all information you must know. The more you know about your customers, the better chance you have of connecting with an engaging them on more authentic, meaningful levels.

So how does one acquire this intelligence? The easiest ways are to conduct online and offline research, and to poll existing customers. And in addition, you can commission proprietary surveys and focus groups, but these are very costly avenues that only a handful of companies can realistically afford. With this information, a more detailed picture begins to merge…a roadmap of how best to target and communicate specific prospects. And that is the map which shows you the way to future sales.

The moral of the story: make the time and effort to fully understand your customers and how they behave, and then, and only then, devise a customized sales and marketing program which takes all of these considerations into account. You’ll be glad you did, and so will your bottom line.