Targeting your most profitable customers - Market Segmentation

We only want to market to the people who are most likely to be profitable customers right?

Grouping these people based on their common characteristics and how they best respond to marketing would make it easier to communicate with them, right? 

This blog is about how businesses can use market segmentation as a strategy to reduce their marketing costs as well as getting better results. Attract more customers with more effective marketing.

What is Market Segmentation?

Market Segmentation is the act of grouping or cluster together customers within a target market who share similar characteristics, to give direction to marketing strategies to effectively target these customers. This process helps match customer wants and needs with your businesses’ ability to satisfy them. Segments are comprised of consumers groups that are likely to respond similarly to marketing strategies, helping brands optimise their marketing, advertising and sales.

“Market Segmentation is… the artificial groupings of consumers constructed to help managers design and target their strategies.” (Wedel & Kamakura, 2012)

Just think about how many different personality types there are out there. They will all have unique buying patterns to try and understand. One brand or product will never appeal to everybody or have the ability to solve every person’s unique problem. You need to consider what customer groups are most profitable to your business and focus on understanding their needs and providing the best solution. Then allocate your attention and marketing resources.

It is important to note the difference between customers and consumers. As defined by McDonald, Christopher, and Bass (2003):

“Let us start with the difference between customers and consumers. The term ‘consumer’ is generally interpreted to mean the final consumer, who is not necessarily the customer. For example, parents who buy breakfast cereals are probably the intermediate customers, acting as agents on behalf of the eventual consumers (their families). In order to market cereals effectively, it is imperative that the marketer understands what the final consumers want, as well as what the parents want.”

Segmentation helps businesses divide their target markets into smaller and more manageable groups of customers. This can help businesses make informed decisions not only on advertising, marketing and pricing but also new product development. The information uncovered from the research for segmentation can provide a new direction for innovation, based on providing a solution to customer needs.

Helping businesses focus their marketing efforts

A message can also become blurred and lost if the size of a target audience is too large. The broader their preferences, needs, desires and opinions become. Businesses need to define precisely who their customers are. When we sort these customers into segments, they become easier to prioritise and become more economically manageable. Businesses can target their marketing resources on the most promising opportunities and develop the right offer for those submarkets. Marketing this way becomes a lot more cost-effective than mass-marketing.

Communication with customer groups tailored to this audience so they are more receptive to the message. A segment might have age demographics as a characteristic. One segment may be young people fifteen and under, and another age group could be over 50 years of age. Video games for example. Marketing to people who grew up in the 1970s and 1980s playing video games would be drastically different from a young person of today growing up with a smartphone in hand.

Being more focused with the customers we target allows us to better cater to their specific wants, needs and desires. But it also allows a business to focus on their strengths. They might be better suited towards one segment of the market, and another business will be better suited to serve another segment. You will never be ‘all things to all people’.

Segmentation also reduces the risk of unsuccessful marketing campaigns. Many businesses uneducated in marketing have the idea that they will just “chuck something out there”, in the hope it will somehow reach the people most likely to be their customer. It does not work.

The research phase to understand our customer helps ensure that our marketing strategy is going to reach the customers in a way they will have a positive response to.

The importance of research

Knowing where your sales and profit is coming from is key to a business understanding their current market position and to assess any potential market directions. Research gives direction to marketing strategy and any potential new product development if the research uncovers a gap in the market. Once we better understand the market better, we aim to leverage this by optimising our marketing and sales processes.

Businesses can use quantitative research methods such as customer surveys and data analysis, as well as qualitative research such as focus groups to do market research to set their segmentation strategy. Interpret the results to create market segments unique to your brand.

Segmenting a marketplace

Businesses derive market segments from the diverse nature of customer motivations. Developing market segmentation strategies depend on the current market as perceived a business. Segments do not necessarily naturally occur in the marketplace instead marketers define segments based on the ability to best serve customers. Brands need to connect with their target customers through a tailored communication that resonates with specific aspects of their lives. Here are four popular ways a business can segment their target market.

Geographic segmentation

Targeting customers based on geography and location. E.g. The people of Hamilton, or maybe the whole of Australasia. Characteristics of buyers such as values and preferences vary based on culture and location, so it is important to recognise these subtle differences. Holidays and religious events differ in importance and the way the local people celebrate these holidays. Languages change between continents and some things lost in translation. Geography and climate can change drastically within one country, such as the US, that have states that are tropical and states that are freezing. This means swimsuits should not have the same marketing campaign across the whole country. Same with raincoats.

Demographic segmentation

Characteristics of demographic segmentation include age, gender, family background, religion, education, occupation and income. Using demographics to segment customers is widely popular as a marketing strategy, and a market segment can contain a range of varying demographics. For example, it could females aged 15–25, with numerous siblings, low socio-economic background, from Latin America with Christian religious beliefs.

Age is a common variant that brands try to understand and communicate accordingly through the most relevant and effective tools. For example, a product targeted at B2B professionals aged 40–60, would not be advertised on TikTok. LinkedIn would be the most logical communication tool or network.

Psychographic segmentation

The segmentation of customers based on Psychographic variables focuses on subjective traits and behaviours, unlike Geographic and Demographic variables which are objective and measurable. The focus is on intrinsic characteristics of customers. For example, a person who grows up on a farm, who will work on the farm until they take it over from their parents and never get a university education; will be quite a lot different to a person who grew up in a big city, going to a private school, with an expectation to get a university degree in law or medicine.

Qualitative research is a powerful tool to understand the psychographic tendencies of our target customers. Interviews, surveys and focus groups for example. This will help us understand subjective traits such as values, personalities, interests, attitudes, motivations, lifestyles, and opinions.

Behavioural segmentation

Behavioural segmentation is like psychographics in the sense it is subjective, but the focus is on how customers react to marketing and go through their decision-making and buying process. Their attitude towards brands and purchasing behaviour are examples of behavioural segmenting. This kind of data is collected through qualitative research. Talk to your customers and find out what makes them tick. You can also check online reviews.

Brand loyalty is an example of a behavioural segmentation. I used to always buy Sony electronics automatically without doing any research. Stereos, TV, phones, video game console, Walkman, Discman… The list goes on. This was because of the trust I had in the quality of their products from previous experiences. This consistent buying pattern is behaviour, and something marketers work hard on to try and create.

Criteria to evaluate the effectiveness of market segments

Not all market segments will end being as profitable as hoped for a business. Wedel and Kamakura (2012) identify six criteria often used to evaluate the effectiveness and profitability of a marketing strategy. Identifiability, Substantiality, Accessibility, Stability, Responsiveness and Actionability.

· Identifiability is the extent to which a business can recognise a distinct group of customers in the marketplace. Can we identify the customers in each segment based on variables we can measure?

· Substantiality identifies whether the target segment of the market is a large enough portion to justify targeting it. Is there enough of a return on investment? Micro-markets can become profitable because of lower marketing costs.

· Accessibility is the degree to which businesses can reach their designated segment through promotion and distribution. Can you reach them with your message?

· Stability of your segments over time should be a basis for a marketing strategy. If the segment you are targeting changes their behaviour during implementation, then this market segment is unlikely to be profitable to your business.

· Responsiveness is if a market segment responds favourably to your marketing. It is critical for any segmentation strategy that the unique marketing mix for each segment justifies the effort.

· Actionability of segments guides specific marketing choices. Here the focus is on whether the customers in the segment and the marketing necessary to reach them and satisfy their needs, is consistent with the firm’s goals and strengths.

Segmentation Mistakes

A big mistake that businesses make when they segment their customers is becoming too niche with their segments. No matter how good your product or service is, if there are not enough customers to buy it, you will not survive. All market segments must be profitable.

When you start to do more research on one of your segments to find out more about their needs, you can discover you do not have resources or skills to take advantage of that opportunity. Focus on the strengths of your business when setting your segmentation strategy. There may be opportunities out there, but if you do not have the resources or skills to take advantage of it, you are wasting your time and money. If there was an opportunity in the high-end luxury sports car market, for example, KIA would not try and target that niche, because is too far removed from their “bread and butter”.

Keep up with trends and changes in behaviour from your customer base. Blockbuster had the opportunity to purchase Netflix 20 years ago for $50 million… They said no. Netflix is now worth almost $200 Billion. They should have seen where the video rental market was heading. Survey your customers from time to time and refresh your marketing strategies.

Thank you for reading. I hope you found this week’s topic on Market Segmentation useful. You can now use this knowledge to start segmenting your target market!

Check out 50 weeks of marketing for new weekly marketing topics over 50 weeks.

Dan

How a Marketing and Sales Funnel works

Marketing & Sales Funnel

Is it a marketing funnel or is it a sales funnel? It really is both. Both need to work together to capture as many leads as possible (Marketing), Nurture them (Marketing and Sales), and Convert them into customers (Sales). But even then the job isn’t over. We need to maintain and strengthen our relationship so they keep coming back, and becoming raving fans (Customer Service).

In the age of digital marketing where we can monitor and track our marketing and interactions with customers, the marketing and sales funnel has become a powerful tool for businesses. 

This week’s content will explore what a funnel is, how it works, and discuss the marketing activities businesses can use in their marketing funnels, to convert more of their leads into paying customers.

What is a marketing & sales funnel?

The Marketing and Sales Funnel is a model & framework to simplify and quantify each step of the customer journey. It is the process of turning a lead into a customer, from a marketing (and sales) perspective. From the awareness stage when someone learns about the business, to the purchase stage, to post-purchase — satisfaction, word of mouth and customer retention. A funnel is a fundamental way for any business to model their marketing and sales systems to work together to first connect with a lead and then convert that prospect into a customer.

The funnel works together holistically, so every phase needs to align and work together to make the buyer journey to the bottom successful.

“The marketers` goal is to funnel prospects into buyers, moving them from the top to the bottom of the funnel. The shape reflects the fact that a large number of people will never complete the journey through the funnel.” (Sapian & Vyshnevska, 2019)

A big advantage of using a funnel is you can map out your process and measure any week points in your marketing and sales systems. If they are not moving from one stage to the next, you can tweak your email copy or increase your content marketing, or wherever you are not having the impact to move customers to the next phase.

Analysis of data allows a business to learn how they can better “influence” or persuade a consumer at each phase.

Like a funnel, at the top, you try to capture as much volume as you can. Like fishermen throwing a net out wide to capture as many fish as possible. As prospective customers go through the purchasing decision, there is a reduction of numbers at each level. As the shape suggested, every single lead is not going to be converted. But you can make continuous tweaks to improve your result as you get to understand the process better.

“A Marketing Funnel is a way to frame other marketing strategies and understand how the customer interacts with a company.” (Sapian & Vyshnevska, 2019)

Example of a funnel

An example of a basic funnel is as follows. And it is a basic funnel! There are some overly complicated funnels out there, but I do not want to over-complicate things. I will use an example from when I was in real estate for four years before starting this business.

· First, I post on LinkedIn about a local infrastructure update that was in the news or something that would be of interest to local businesspeople.

· When they are on my website, the read the article, and there might be a pop up before they leave to join a mailing list for local news/updates.

· Even if they do not join the mailing list, a tracking/marketing pixel can start marketing to them on Facebook or other social media with targeted paid advertising.

· They might then start following my Facebook page.

· They might then see a house for sale on one of my posts that they are interested in and come to an open home.

· If they do not buy that house, they supply their phone number at the open home.

· I call them to ask for feedback for the house and build rapport and after following the usual script of Are you looking to upsize or downsize? Have you had an agent look at your house yet?

· They then later agree to sell their house with you, and you sell them their new house.

· They enjoyed their experience. You email them quarterly with market updates and local news. You send them a Christmas card every year and call them once or twice.

· 5 years later, they sell with you again.

· This is the best case scenario obviously, but an example of how a funnel can work from the top to the bottom.

History of the Marketing Funnel

The funnel originated over 100 years ago, with ideas from two people — John Dewey and Elias St. Elmo Lewis. John Dewey introduced the Buyer Decision Process, which is still relevant today in understanding buyer behaviour. There are five stages: Problem Recognition, Information Search, Alternative Evaluation, Choice, and Outcomes.

Elias St. Elmo Lewis was even more influential, introducing the AIDA (attention, interest, desire, and action) model of customer persuasion, to help illustrate the stages of a customer’s relationship with a business. Still commonly used today, the model puts the purchase process into four stages.

The AIDA Model

· Awareness: The prospect is aware of their problems and practical solutions for them. Marketing attracts customer attention to the product. The customer becomes aware it is available.

· Interest: The prospect shows interest in a group of services or products. Marketing develops an interest in a product or service.

· Desire: The prospect begins to evaluate a certain brand. Marketing develops a desire to own a product. The customer wants it.

· Action: The prospect decides whether to purchase. Marketing prompts action to purchase the product.

Originally, many funnels only included aspects up to a sale, but as we have begun to understand the importance of customer retention, models have included aspects of customer service and post-purchase factors such as “loyalty” and “advocacy” to help improve marketing strategy.

The design of marketing funnels differs depending on the context. For example, between business to business and business to consumer. Although the steps might be similar, the execution will differ.

“The firm is going to need a well-devised sales funnel that will effectively guide the target audience throughout the purchase process and turn them into buying customers.” (Sapian & Vyshnevska, 2019)

Developing a marketing and sales funnel

The process of developing a funnel that works is easier said than done. There are businesses set up that concentrate solely on online funnels. This was not the case ten years ago.

Businesses need to thoroughly develop a marketing plan for executing each stage of the funnel to yield their desired results. We need to consider each step’s role in generating a positive buyer journey through the funnel. Leverage what we learn through analytics to tweak the marketing at each step.

Setting a marketing strategy

Important Tools for digital marketing sales funnels

Sales teams and marketers have never quite agreed on whose funnel it is, and how much control each should have. In the age of digital marketing, marketers have taken most of the control, leaving sales to look after the bottom of the funnel. But, to work together efficiently, they should meet somewhere in the middle. The Cross-sell or upsell goal is popular with digital marketing and having a product available for every step of the buyer’s journey.

Digital marketing is a powerful tool across an entire marketing funnel. Tactics used via social media are helpful for brand awareness at the top, to content marketing in the middle, to customer relationships at the bottom. These are digital marketing tools useful in marketing and sale funnel.

· Social media is a crucial tool to use at the start of the funnel for building brand awareness, but it also great for customer retention and keeping people engaged in your brand.

· Email is a powerful tool in a funnel and can be effective at every stage, especially in the retention stage.

· User Reviews are often the deciding factor on whether the purchase is made. Roughly half of the people find the information in a user review more important than any marketing material.

· Website and SEO are important in the awareness phase — you want to get traffic to your website. Creating SEO friendly content such as blogging and getting backlinks will help.

· Lead magnets are a valuable piece of information given in exchange for contact information (usually an email address). This could be a free e-book or whitepaper for example.

“Cutting through clutter now requires more-imaginative and sophisticated use of social tactics across the marketing funnel, including the integration of social with paid media. Simply raising awareness through social has become a more sophisticated and rapidly changing exercise in which new approaches can make an impact and then become passé in a matter of weeks.” (Deal, 2014)

Phases of the Marketing and Sales Funnel

These are the six phases of a sales and marketing funnel. There are several variations on the marketing and sales funnel, but they all follow the same methodology. I have created this example based on the common components of popular versions of the funnel. The six levels are: Awareness & Problem Recognition, Interest & Information Search, Consideration & Evaluation, Intent & Commitment, Conversion & Purchase, and Loyalty & Advocacy.

1. Awareness & Problem Recognition (TOFU)

The first step in marketing and sales funnel is Awareness and problem recognition. When a person recognises a certain need they have, this is the trigger for the first phase of a marketing and sales funnel. This is the lead generation phase. A brand must attract the attention of potential customers, so they are aware that it is available. A prospect must become aware of two things, problems of customers and solution of the company. This is where a business needs to throw its marketing net wide and have a presence in places where its target market spends time to try and capture their attention. Try to engage with potential customers.

Position yourself / your brand as a thought leader in your industry through marketing activities such as SEO, social media, advertising, events, content marketing. This establishes the initial trust.

This recognition of a problem or need triggers a search for more information.

Social media is a great tool to increase brand awareness

2. Interest & Information search (TOFU)

Once Marketing has created awareness and interest in a product, brand or service, we move into the interest and information search phase. Consumers learn more about a company or brand and its offering. Your content marketing continues in this phase and is more information and value-based than basic brand awareness. Here you position your brand in the minds of potential customers and start to develop and nurture a relationship. You also start to introduce customers to your services.

“Using tailored landing pages, webinars, newsletters, testimonials, customer guides, online videos, media interviews, blogs, and even customer service training is a perfect way to get consumer interest.” (Sapian & Vyshnevska, 2019)

Nurture leads through more targeted marketing such as email marketing, Case studies, e-newsletter, whitepapers, “how-to video”, webinar, and targeted ads. The goal is to reinforce that the prospect is in the right place and guide customers towards what they need to know about the offering.

Here you position yourself as an expert in your industry with your content marketing strategy that provides useful information that helps people, no strings attached. Whoever your target audience is, centre this content around helping them with their problem. Help your audience understand that you can solve their problems.

You can do keyword research through Google Trends, and other tools will give you an indication of what types of searches people are doing related to your industry. You can then create content that matches those queries.

You want to understand the reasons a customer would have for choosing your company’s product or service. Each search phase will be contextual. Buyers will search for a solution on Google or another search engine like social media. The amount of time and energy that put into this phase depends on the product or service. It could be a voice search on Maps for nearby cafes for example, or they could visit numerous stores for a larger purchase like a car.

3. Consideration & Evaluation (MOFU)

Following the information search, the next phase of the funnel is consideration and evaluation. This is what Elias St. Elmo Lewis referred to as “desire”, and some models refer to this as “Middle of the Funnel”. A consumer starts forming their decision at this point, so businesses should nurture their leads as they have become more qualified. At this phase, Marketing must develop a desire to own or have the product.

Emailing is more regular at this phase, and case studies are a useful tool to highlight your previous success and increase your credibility. Marketing content contains more product information, and you might give exclusive offers to these leads. A low cost or even free e-book is another tool at this phase. Resources like pricing guides and “how-to” guides are useful for marketers to keep the attention of leads at this phase. Having copy on your website covering things such as FAQ and Shipping also helps gives peace of mind, and if you can provide powerful social proof.

Depending on the type of product or service, the time spent at each stage varies. It could be a snap decision for something like fast food. A large investment will take a careful and thorough evaluation process. This is often the longest phase in a funnel, lasting weeks or even months. Marketers must consistently reinforce their relationship with the customer and give them the necessary information they are using to evaluate this decision.

4. Intent / Commitment (MOFU)

After the consideration phase, leads move onto intent & commitment. They are ALMOST a customer. These people have demonstrated some interest in buying a product or service. Marketers offer free trials, demonstrations, consultations and arrange sales meetings with people at this phase as they are ready to go. They might have left a product in a cart on the website. They have shown strong intent to consume. Marketers to make a compelling case for why their product is the best choice for a buyer.

This is also where the sales team would take over, and marketing can be more direct at this phase to help people make their final decision. Ideally, marketing and sales tactics work together to nurture the decision-making process and convince the buyer.

5. Conversion / Purchase (BOFU)

If consumers reach the Bottom of the Funnel, they have decided to buy, and become a customer. Congratulations! The customer has gone through all the phases — determining they have a problem and deciding you provide the solution.

The Conversion and Purchase phase is where sales processes have control of the customer. The aim is to make the purchasing process online as simple, safe and efficient as possible. Reduce any risk for the customer. The customers can also be cross-sold or up-sold to a more expensive product or service.

If this stage is effective and efficient, and customers are happy with their purchase, then this phase should mostly take care of itself.

Customer online shopping

6. Loyalty & Advocacy (BOFU)

What happens after the sale is key, but many companies fall short at this phase. Simply happy to make the sale, they let many potential future customers just walk away. We want to retain our best customers. The cheapest path to conversion is through existing customers. Loyalty and Advocacy is the final phase of a marketing funnel.

“And one last thing to remember, buyers can always finish the action or purchase but still be left frustrated, confused, or upset. A truly positive experience at this stage in the funnel means the marketers have moved the customer closer to the advocacy and loyalty stage.” (Sapian & Vyshnevska, 2019)

Emailing and social media are great tools to use at this point to stay in touch with customers and keep nurturing that relationship. You can send the odd offer and keep the customer aware of what you are selling, but mostly you want to create value to try and create a bond with that user, so they advocate on your behalf. Word of mouth is a powerful marketing tool and it is free! Try to create “raving fans” who will become loyal advocates for your brand.

But do not expect the time and effort you should put into this phase to be free. Create a brand promoter.

That is it for another blog! I hope you find this useful and use this knowledge to start creating some marketing content for your business! If you found this useful, check out 50 weeks of marketing

See you next week,

Dan

How to market your business online for free! (or little cost)

In 2020, having your businesses visible online is essential to your success, it is key to attracting new customers. This has recently been enforced by Covid-19 and the subsequent lockdown and quarantines around the world.

This week’s blog discusses ten ways you can market your business online for free… or little cost. Things that your businesses can be doing yourself, to increase your brand awareness with your target market, increase your website traffic, and generate more buyer leads.

1. Website

A website is essential to a business in 2020. It used to be an advantage, and now you are left behind without one. A lot of people will either find your website via a Google search for a product or service you provide, or they will use your website to research further about you if they find you elsewhere.

If you do not already have a website it is easy to set one up yourself, and you can do it for free. I would recommend paying for your domain, however. This is because a .com or .co.nz web address is far more professional and credible than yourwebsite.wordpress.com for example. I have had a few business websites in my time, and I have set them all up myself through websites you can use for free, and then pay for a domain and extra features. There are numerous options available, such as WordPress and Wix. These are user-friendly for beginners and should offer all you need for your website. WordPress is probably a better option if you’re going to write a lot of blog content, and Shopify if you want to sell things from an online store.

“Rapid growth of Web-based platforms that facilitate online social behaviour has significantly modified the nature of human activities, habitats, and interactions. Real-world social relationships have been migrated to the virtual world, resulting in online communities that bring people together from across the globe.” (Tiago & Veríssimo, 2014)

Help people to find you — SEO

Most businesses rely on a digital marketing specialist for their search engine optimisation (SEO). It is a pretty complicated topic to explain, and Google is always changing the way its algorithm works. But once you wrap your head around SEO, there are many activities you can do yourself to improve your search result. In essence, SEO helps Google’s brain understand what your website is about and what value it provides. Google wants to match relevant search results to those searching.

Use strategic keywords to help make your content and website easier to find. Long-tail keywords help Google’s crawlers understand your website content. These are three and four keyword phrases contextual and specific to what you are selling. Do not overdo it though, Google’s algorithm works out you are trying to cheat the system. Use variations on your keywords. Use keywords for names of files and folders, have keywords and phrases in your page titles and use keywords in your copy. But do so naturally, your content also needs to read well. The headings and subheadings within your pages also a prominent place to use keywords.

You should know keywords that people are likely to be searching for, but there are also tools you can use such as Google Keyword Planner. Research google trends to see popular search terms that could be relevant to use to use on your website as keywords. Some studies have indicated that over 90 per cent of searchers stop on the first page of search results. You want your business to be on that first page! If you are in a competitive area, chances are you will never be been on the first page, but you will improve your ranking.

Create content for your websites such as “how-to” guides and blog posts. Long-form content is full of keywords, so it is easy for Google to understand what the content is about, helping you rank better. Provide value to your target market through this content. Create incoming links to your website. The easiest way to do this is through having a blog or other forms of content on your website, that you share through your social media. Social bookmarking is a similar tactic to create links sending people to your website and add your website to relevant directories such as the Yellow Pages for more incoming traffic.

Make sure you include a sitemap on your website. This is a list of the individual pages, and it helps search engines understand your site architecture better and can also help users navigate your website. Use this resource to create a site map for your website.

Follow Neil Patel for anything to do with Search Engine Optimisation, he gives away plenty of advice for free and has a program you can use to check keywords other things your competitors are doing. Use that here.

2. Copywriting

Copywriting is an important aspect of the business to get right. Spend a bit of time writing a description and explaining what you do. Try and make it as simple as possible understand. You do not want people who click on your social media account and then exit confused as to what you do. Make sure you set up links to your website from your social media.

Use Grammarly to improve your writing, this is also free and will improve your writing massively. The copy you write is particularly important to build credibility, so you want to have well-worded content on your social media and website without spelling mistakes and bad grammar. This app is fantastic and integrates with a Word document for example or with websites. Download it here.

Good copy should connect with its audience. Copywriting should also tell your brand’s story. Paint a picture of why customers should want to do business with you. A brand story can connect with its intended audience in an instant. It is the “WHY” behind what you are doing. “HOW” you provide expertise. Your brand story should make the reader feel like you understand their problem, and that you could potentially solve it. It helps your audience feel like they know you, even if just a little. This establishes trust, builds rapport and establishes your credibility.

3. Video

Video content is a valuable tool to build a connection with a target audience. Users share videos more on social media than other forms of content. A third of the time spent online is by people watching video content and four times more people would rather watch a video about a product than read about it. Create content to explain a certain topic associated with what you do, providing value and expertise to your target customers. It could be a “how-to” video or explaining a complicated topic.

Technology is important to utilise if you are a content creator. But it does not have to be expensive. You can buy a cheap microphone and tripod to record from your phone for 5–10 dollars each online from AliExpress for example. Any modern mobile phone should have the capability to take a decent quality video. If you buy a new phone, anything more than $300 should be enough.

You do not need a $2000 iPhone!

You do not need to be a computer whiz to edit video footage, although there will be a learning curve initially. Editing can be from a basic mobile phone application or your computer. I prefer to use a program from my PC. If you want to use your phone, this article will give you some options.

To edit video footage on PC for FREE, you can download Microsoft Movie Maker, which I have used for about ten years. Using the software, you can add basic titles and text, you can cut it all up and add transitions that look good and add music and narration. Microsoft discontinued this program, but you can download Windows Essentials 2012 and is it included. Visit this site to download it. I still use it for quick editing. It is a very user-friendly software that has all your needs covered for basic editing. Once I have done the initial editing of footage, I give the final changes in with flashy animations and titles in Adobe After effects and premiere.

Host longer videos on YouTube to set up on your website or in blog posts or post shorter videos straight to your social media account. Social media videos should be 1 to 5 minutes long. The videos you post to YouTube should be a bit longer. Algorithms on social media sites usually do not like people sending them away from the website, so post short videos on Facebook for example, and provide a link to send them to the full video which could be on a blog post on your website

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4. Social media

Most businesses need to have social media accounts in 2020. Social media is a powerful tool to reach your target audience. The problem is, there are so many platforms now, it is hard to know where to focus. Start with a Facebook account. Such a high percentage of the population uses Facebook, it has such a large potential audience for your business. Use Facebook to have conversations with people — have a content marketing strategy, designed to stimulate conversation. Share content such as blog posts, videos and memes.

You can also use platforms such as Instagram, Pinterest, YouTube, LinkedIn, Twitter to reach your target audience through social media. Choose what is right for your business, based on where your customers are most likely to be and what you are trying to achieve. Some businesses are more suited to Instagram than LinkedIn and vice versa.

In general, think from the perspective of your target customer. The people most likely to buy from you repeatedly, and the people you want as your customers. What information or content would be interesting or funny to them? How can you provide them with value with your expertise? How can you encourage them to click on a link and visit your website to find out more about you?

It is important to get your copyright on your social media accounts, so put some time into creating your profile. Do not rush writing your description. Equally, your profile picture/logo and wallpaper images are important. Each platform uses a different sized image, so take some time to edit logos and photos to get them the appropriate size. If you don’t have software to resize pictures, click here to use an online resource.

Click here for a resource that shows the different image sizes to use on the different social media platforms. You can use this website called Photofeeler where users rank each other’s profile photos. It is a useful tool to see what impression your photo is giving people. It is an important part of your personal brand to get right!

5. Blogging

Blogging is a key component of a successful content marketing strategy. If you are good at writing, you will be a good blogger. If you are not, get someone else to write it. You can write a blog post in ten minutes, or it could take a week or two. The length and depth all depend on you. But consistency is key.

Blogs are great for SEO as if you are writing about topics related to your services, they are keyword dense. As you consistently create valuable content, you build a stronger relationship with current customers and builds credibility with prospective customers.

A great blog post can position you as an expert in your industry, so often they are a crucial step in a sales funnel. Make sure you link to other relevant content such as free tools or other blog posts. Include a call to action at the beginning and end of a blog. You want people to keep going further with you. The end goal is to leads or a sale.

As well as a blog on your website, you might want to have an external blog such as Medium, Blogger, or Tumblr. You have a wider potential audience, and the same blog posts from your website can be repurposed. Each blogging site has its feel and target market, so check them all out to see which one you prefer the look and feel of.

Try and get your blog syndicated. Syndication is where your blog is republished on websites dedicated to informational articles and posts. These websites can often have quite a larger audience. My blog posts are syndicated on Business2Community.

6. Google My Business page

Create a Google My Business page to capture more customers who search for a service like you offer on Google search or maps. Just like with your website and social media accounts, you want to maximise the change of somebody taking your business seriously by using it to its best potential. List all the attributes of your business to highlight what you do. You can provide useful information such as whether you have Wi-Fi or disability access.

Make sure you add all your products and services to your Google My Business page, with detailed descriptions. You can link from these products to your website’s online store if you have one. You can now add a short name to your Google My Business account, which makes your business easier to find through a map search, and URL’s are not as messy if you share the link. Add photos to your account. If you are a restaurant, add high-quality photos of menu items. If you are a consultant, add some photos of you in your work element. You can also add video, so include a video of you introducing yourself and how you help people.

Marketing Kits are now available with a recent update, which you can use to share on other forms of social media to bring traffic to your page. One of these is to encourage reviews. On the topic of reviews, make sure you have some! Try to encourage satisfied customers to write you a glowing review. This will increase your credibility with anyone who finds you.

Google reserve is another useful function, allowing people to make reservations or book a meeting time with you via integration of a calendar application. This syncs with your calendar with notifications. This is a very convenient feature to show people what time slots are available to book without having to go backwards and forwards.

7. Lead Magnets

A lead magnet is an incentive that marketers offer to potential buyers in exchange for their email address or other contact information. Lead magnets usually offer a piece of digital, downloadable content, such as a free PDF checklist, report or eBook. Lead magnets attract the people you want as customers.

Also called gated content, lead magnets usually have a landing page set up on your website. They require a “lead” to supply information about themselves to access the piece of free content. This is usually a name and an email address, to add these people to your database. If they are interested in a piece of content about the expertise you provide, chances are they are a strong lead as a potential customer.

Once you start compiling a database of people, start emailing them. Most website builders have a built-in customer relationship tool and eNewsletter / email marketing system. If not, check out Mailchimp. Around 50 per cent of people check their email more than once daily, and over 50% of people have made purchases from an email.

8. Start a community

If you have a strong brand community, you will have a strong brand. People express who they are through their consumption, so often seek to be a part of brand communities. Members of brand communities are more loyal, as the community helps them reach their goals and meet their needs.

People seek to fit into a community and project a desired social identity. Why not set up a community for your customers or a general community based on the industry your business is in. A genuine community where people connect and interact and people help other people to find solutions to their problems. Engage with people in your community and create relationships. Do not try to sell to people. Use the community to enhance your credibility and build trust, and when the time is right, the business will come.

Facebook is the best social network to create a community around your brand. Check out this guide on how to create a Facebook community.

9. Small investments for content creation

It is worth making some small investments to help you create professional marketing content for your business. I would recommend having at least either Google G Suite or Microsoft Office 365, each will cost $10-$20 a month. Many people have access to one of these two options through a corporate or government job. If so, utilise the available programs!

Both offer similar programs and give you more cloud storage space which is great for storing big files like videos, but they both also have their strengths and weaknesses in terms of applications. Google G Suite includes applications such as Google Drive for storage, Gmail for mail and Google Forms is a great tool to create surveys to distribute to customers to understand more about their needs. Microsoft Office includes Word for documents, Excel for spreadsheets and PowerPoint for presentations. It is also great for creating frames for social media videos. Use this resource for an in-depth comparison between the two suites. Both offer similar products, but there’s som

If you have a little bit of a budget I would recommend purchasing Adobe Suite, for numerous professional video editing and photo editing products. You can also sign up for websites such as Envato Elements for around $20–30 US a month, for access to thousands of video templates, stock images, PowerPoint templates and the like, to make your job as a content creator much easier.

10. Engage!

Wherever you are online, the algorithm (brain) favours those who engage. If someone engages in your content, respond! This ensures more people see your content and therefore, more potential customers. Aim to get people to engage in your posts, and then have a conversation with them.

But do not just engage in your content, engage in other peoples’ or businesses’ content. Join groups dedicated to the industry you are in or a service you provide and have conversations with people. Provide value for people through sharing your expertise. Without trying to sell! All these trivial things add up and increase the awareness of your brand and what you do.

The aim is to build relationships with as many people as possible. People do business with people that they trust. Having genuine conversations will increase trust in you and enhance your credibility.

That is it for the week. I hope you find this useful and use this knowledge to start creating some marketing content for your business!

Dan

Persuasion Knowledge: A Consumer’s Defense against Marketing

People are a lot more alert to the intentions of marketers than they used to be 50 years ago. Consumers have learnt to recognise the persuasive attempts of marketing developing what we call persuasion knowledge.

Persuasion & Persuasion Knowledge

To understand persuasion knowledge, we must first discuss persuasion. 

In marketing, persuasion theory suggests attitude measurement predicts consumer behaviour.

Shopping in a retail store

Persuasion is the act of trying to modify a person’s attitude and beliefs toward a certain topic. Persuasion is the process of convincing someone to do or believe something. For a marketer or salesperson, they want to persuade you to purchase something. They want to convince you that you need or want it.

A person’s Persuasion Knowledge is how they “cope” with persuasion attempts, and “beliefs about the tactics that advertisers and marketers use to try to persuade them” (Boush, Friestad & Rose, 1994)

“…Because attitudes exert a strong influence on behaviour, attitude research offers a potentially useful device for explaining and predicting consumer behaviour.” (Udell,1965)

Salesperson talking to a prospect

Persuasion defined

Scholars have researched Persuasion extensively over the years since in psychology since the 1950s. Persuasion theory is adapted from the behavioural sciences, in a time when it measured the persuasiveness of propaganda — political or advertising. It was a much simpler time back in the 1960s, where government experimentation and mass-marketing were commonplace. Messages subtly tried to change the attitudes of receivers of the communication. Attitude the most commonly explored metric in persuasion research.

This was under a belief that learning is a process of where knowledge is acquired, and behaviours changed through stimuli and response. A person’s behaviours learned through their environment. Assumptions of persuasion theory are that everyone has a unique level of ability, readiness and motivations to deal with each persuasive message we encounter. Which is many.

Reinforcement is one tactic used by marketers, under the assumption that the more we see often we see a message, the more credible it becomes. Credibility is a key moderator of persuasion.

The Persuasion Process

There are four factors important in facilitating the persuasion process. First, the communicator’s credibility and reputation. Are you reliable and credible. Next is the order of statements and there are two approaches here, primacy or recency. Whether you state your position right at the beginning, or if it is the last thing you do.

Third, completeness of statements, meaning being able to cover the topic holistically, for and against, and have a complete argument. If you can weigh the pros and cons, you can be more persuasive. Finally, announcement of intentions. If you are going to persuade your audience, they need to be interested in the first place. Be specific with your message and intentions.

Several factors need to be in your favour to persuade an audience. The audience needs to be receptive and interested in your message in the first place, it needs to support the same ideas and opinions as to their own. People have a filter and quickly tune out, so receivers need to be open to a conversation and to receive a message.

Marketers always try to rationalise a behaviour, so created a formula to explain the process. Values, Beliefs and Motivations influence a person’s attitude, and this attitude then influences their behaviour. Value + Beliefs + Motives = Attitudes → Behaviour.

Marketing communicates a message to try and change an attitude. They do this in two ways. First, to try to change a belief. Second, to try and mature a belief through modifying that person’s values and/or motives. The second route is much more difficult as values and motives are part of who is a person is and is not easily changed. It is far easier to add a new value or motive.

Car sales — can be a very persuasive encounter…

Persuasion tactics

There are several tactics that marketers/brands can use to try and influence and persuade their audience. Five persuasion tactics are:

Creating Uncertainty: If a communicator has an audience strongly opposed to their view, creating questions around that topic in the audiences’ mind is a powerful tool. This tactic is used when the audience is strong in their stance.

Reducing Resistance: if the resistance in the audience is moderate, it is possible to influence their view from negative to neutral. You do not expect them to side with you but to accept your view.

Change Attitude: When the audience is neutral, there is a good opportunity to persuade their attitude to your favour.

Amplify Attitude: Where the audience is already favourable, a message reinforcing your point of view is beneficial here to stay strong.

Gain Behaviour: When your audience is strongly on your side, the goal is to act. Like for a salesperson, making the sale.

“In its most basic form, persuasion involves changing a person’s mental state, usually as precursors to behavioural change.” (O’Keefe, 2008)

 

Persuasion knowledge — a defence against marketing

Marketing is everywhere in our environments containing persuasive messages. We are living in a media-saturated world. “One of a consumer’s primary tasks is to interpret and cope with marketers’ sales presentations and advertising” (Friestad & Wright, 1994). A theory of persuasion would not be complete without understanding how a person’s recognition of persuasion alters what occurs.

Consumers activate the persuasion knowledge to cope with persuasion attempts, to lessen the effects of its influence. Persuasion knowledge encompasses a person’s experiences and beliefs about the goals and tactics marketers use to persuade them. This includes the extent to which they find these techniques effective and appropriate, but also personal beliefs about how to cope with these tactics. Consumers choose a response tactic and we should not assume that people use persuasion knowledge only to resist an attempt.

The understanding of persuasion and advertising starts developing at childhood with the ability to distinguish commercial content. Persuasion knowledge develops throughout their life span, learnt through different scenarios such as social interactions and conversations with friends and family, and day-to-day general observations. Because of this, persuasion knowledge will differ among individuals.

Consumers are also far more likely to develop negative perceptions towards a person trying overly hard to persuade them into something that they do not want to do. In sales situations, negative perceptions of the sales agent also lessened the agent’s ability to persuade and increased the chance of the target’s resistance to the persuasion attempt. While some of these consumers may still make the purchase recommended by the salesperson, there are still long-term consequences of these negative perceptions such as negative word of mouth and a lower chance of repeat purchase.

“When a persuasive agent uses a credible tactic, persuasion knowledge access can lead consumers to evaluate the agent and its offering more (rather than less) favourably.” (Boerman, Willemsen & Van Der Aa, 2017)

 

Persuasive content online

Credibility, expertise and trustworthiness are key to being able to persuade an audience online. Social media allows brands to reach their target audience in an obtrusive way than traditional media.

Many consumers who engage in an entertainment experience do not expect to find promotional motives within that context. This means people are less likely to recognize something like product placement in a movie as advertising. Similarly, on social media, some people may not recognise a fitness influencer posting photos of a product they “use” as having persuasive intent. Sponsored content in the form of endorsements can seem more natural and some people have difficulty recognising the commercial intent.

The use of celebrity to endorse products on social media is “influencer marketing”, where content suggests that a celebrity is an authentic customer of the product or service. Interestingly, studies found when sponsored content is disclosed and noticed, the positive effect of celebrity endorsement disappears, as consumers recognise the advertising intent and trust reduces. A sponsored advertisement does not have the same effect as it is not perceived as being deceptive.

Different forms of marketing have a different effect on persuasion knowledge activation. For example, People are far more likely to have a positive response towards sponsored content than banner adverts. People are more receptive to messages that are not being deceptive with advertising intent. When an advertiser uses what consumers consider a credible tactic, an individual’s persuasion knowledge can lead to a positive evaluation rather than a negative one. Audiences perceive advertisements to have more value if ad scepticism levels are low. Trust is an important mediating factor for persuasion.

That is it for another week! I hope you enjoyed the content and learnt something new.

If you enjoyed the content, check out https://brandyourselfbetter.com/50-marketing-topics.

Cheers,

Dan

How to use buyer personas to target the right customers

Customer making a purchase

If we do not understand our customers, how do we give them what they want?

There are so many options for consumers in a global marketplace. If we do not utterly understand what customers want and their motivations, then it is likely that someone else will be doing a better job giving them the service they want. This is where Buyer Personas come in.

This week’s blog is all about buyer personas and how businesses can use them to target their ideal clients or customers more effectively. 

Buyer Personas are a relatively new topic, first discussed in the late 1990s. They have sprung to relevance in the rise of social media, where we have a far better ability to target our marketing to specific segments of the market. 

What is a buyer persona?

Personas are fictional and generalised representations of real people.

Buyer personas are representations of your customer types - profiles depicting your ideal customers and describing their different personality types. Accountant Andy or Groundskeeper Willy. Your buyer personas are the people you want as customers. Not just your best, long-term customers, but your competitors’ customers, new customers who a very profitable, and potential customers who do not know your service exists or that it could be valuable to them. You want to know about the people who have not bought from you to get the full picture.

It is common to have multiple buyer personas for business – these buyer types have different motivations. Some personas have families and a spouse who plays a key role in the household decision-making process. Variations between buyer personas include customer demographics, behaviour patterns, motivations, and goals. The more detailed you are with these personas (within reason), the better you will understand your customers and the people you want as customers.

“A buyer persona is a semi-fictional representation of your ideal customer based on market research and real data about your existing customers.” (Ravella, 2011)

Give your main buyer groups their own “Avatar” – a character that represents them and their traits.

I was in real estate previously. House buyers could be a young first-home buyer, a seasoned investor looking for another rental property, or a property developer who wants to knock it down and build apartments, all interested in the same property. These are all three distinct buyer personas without yet delving into financing, how many properties they have looked at and other characteristics you can use to categorise a buyer. You want to make these as specific as possible.

Why businesses should use Buyer Personas

Buyer Persona help business to define the people who buy, or might buy, products like the ones they sell. It helps us to emphasize with customers and understand their daily routines, the challenges they face and their decision-making process. We can then do a better job of acquiring and serving them. You cannot position the ability of your product to solve a person’s problem or meet customer needs without knowing anything about these people. Their backgrounds, demographics, goals, challenges, personal interests…

As a business, you want to attract the most valuable leads and customers to our business, right? We want to reach the people most likely to become long-term customers and advocates. Knowing who these people are, and their similar characteristics enable marketers to tailor targeted marketing to these people. It gives direction to marketing strategy.

People prefer to purchase from brands and people they trust. A way to build this trust with people is to try to understand them and their problems. Creating buyer personas, and continually using them to guide your decision-making helps keep you focused on the needs of your customers.

For small businesses, it helps you tailor your experience. For example, you could be offering music lessons from a website. After a while, you could realise that your best-paying customers are middle-aged men wanting to learn the guitar. You would then focus your copywriting, blog posts, video tutorials and other content on this group of people.

By grouping similar customers into persona categories, it helps us more effectively tailor our marketing to target these market segments. It gives marketers the confidence that they know what matters to their target audience.

“It’s an archetype, a composite picture of the real people who buy, or might buy, products like the ones you sell.” (Revella, 2011)

Better Marketing ROI

One of the benefits of using Buyer Personas is that you have a better return on investment. It helps you make better decisions o such as what channels you focus your marketing on. Your marketing becomes more personalised to these individuals, and you can target a more specific market segment. This yields a better return for cost-per-customer as your advertising directly to people most likely to be a customer.

Customer-focused marketing

Having Buyer Personas help us gain a deeper understanding of a buyer’s purchasing decision. We need to know who we are speaking to, so we meet their needs and create an experience that resonates with each of them.

Often there is a conflict between rational decision making based on needs and pricing, and other emotional factors which could be at home, at work, for play. Anything. We like to pretend everything is rational. Having buyer personas helps us uncover some of these factors. Going through this process helps you understand your current customers a lot better, and you may realise your most profitable customers are not the type of person you thought would be your customer at all!

Shopping bags - female shopper

Target your most profitable customers

Inbound marketing is about creating marketing content that encourages engagement between you and your ideal customers within the channels they feel most comfortable. Buyer Personas give our ideal customers a human story and help us focus and define our marketing content for these people. The tone, style and delivery specifically designed to best communicate directly with each persona type. Use quotes from your buyer personas to bring them to life and have a think about what keywords and phrases to associate with each group.

For example, if you do an E-Newsletter, you can have 5 different variations suited to your different persona types, instead of the one generic email for everybody. You could also run ten different Facebook adverts for the same product, with assorted styles of adverts, targeting different personas. Some could be video-based, and some text and image.

Other uses for Buyer Personas

The process of building buyer personas is valuable. It forces you to ask questions about your business that you never have before. You will notice things you have never thought of. This information is not just relevant to marketers – it can inform everything from writing more effective copy to developing better products. Align this information across the organisation. 

It is important to know how these people might use your website, for example, becoming “user personas” for your web developers. It is important to use these personas across your organisation and marketing funnel. Buyer personas can also help your sales team build rapport with potential customers, through better understanding what the prospect is dealing with and coming prepared to address their concerns.

Customer support teams can use personas to better serve your customers. When they understand their problems better, your team can empathise with them. You can create scripts and dialogues around common issues. Product development can use buyer personas when building product roadmaps. Personas will help them identify and prioritize changes to your offering based on what your customers need the most.

Creating your buyer personas

Every business owner should have at least one buyer persona in their head - they know who their best customers are. If your business has somebody in charge of marketing, then you should have data to analyse where your leads have come from for your most profitable customers, and who they are. To find more of these people, you need to understand them. Analyse your best customers.

Inbound marketing is adapting the content to the “buyer persona” who came naturally and voluntarily to the company. …The “buyer persona” plays a central role, since if it’s not identified correctly, the entire marketing strategy will become a fiasco. (Patrutiu-Baltes, 2016)

Interview these people if possible, and they will become your first buyer persona and your strongest. 

What would the buyer personas for luxury cars be?

Collecting Data Online & Observation

Observation of online behaviours is a powerful tool to understand how people work. Observe communities where your customers interact and discuss ideas related to your products or services, such as social media, forums and groups. You can also collect information from some people who visit your website, by giving away something for free such as an eBook. This is gated content. Ask questions that can form important persona information. Even from the people who do not end up being your customer, you can find out what type of people are researching your services. 

Understanding buyer motivations

Buyer Personas provide a framework to sort and analyse buyers. When you create these personas, consider their behaviour patterns, motivations, and goals. The more detailed you are, the better. But not so much that you get bogged down in finer details and characteristics. The most common mistake marketers make is trying to create a persona for every characteristic a customer has ever had. It is more about the common goals – looking for similarities in patterns, common frustrations and shared personality traits. 

Some of the buyer motivations you can explore are:

Priorities: What are the main problems or objectives that they dedicate time and budget to. What is their overall view of the world? If one of your products addresses one of their priorities, then they are one of your most important buyer personas.

Success motivations: what tangible or intangible rewards do they associate with success? What is the underlying reason for consumption? This is where emotions and irrational decision making often occurs. I want this sports car because it makes me look wealthy.

Perceived Barriers: What creates uncertainty in the mind of a consumer to become one of your customers? Why would they question whether you provide their solution? It is something behind the scenes - perhaps the wife will not let them, or vice versa? 

Buying Process: We need to understand the process our personas take from researching and exploring options to selecting a solution. We need to understand their process for each step of the buying process. Where do they research, how much do they research, who is the decision-maker in the household? Then as a business, we can try and provide resources along the way to help with the process. 

Decision Criteria: What are the criteria for making a purchase decision? Who makes the decision? Is it based on price, features, convenience? How are alternative brands/products evaluated? What is most important when it comes to decision-making. We want to understand not only the people who purchased but those who chose a competitor or nothing at all.

First home buyers - real estate buyer personas

Demographics and other persona characteristics

Once you have been in marketing long enough, you start asking yourself the “W” questions subconsciously. Again, it is important to be asking these questions about your Buyer Personas.

Who: what is the biography of your ideal customer? Where they work, and what their responsibilities and commitment to family goals are.

What: describe their goal for consumption. Is it part of a greater goal? Is it a family goal?

Where: Where do they hang out? Any clubs or communities they are in, online and offline.

Why: The goals described under “What”, why are these important? What are the deeper motivations?

When: Where are they in the buyer cycle? Are they ready to purchase or just starting to research?

Content: What forms of content they enjoy consuming? Videos? eBooks?

Channels: The best channel to start a conversation with these people, what social media they use?

Trust touchpoints: Identify the biggest issue that consumers want a solution for, and what their preferred content and channels are. You can them aim to intercept them here to build trust.

Pain touchpoints: identify any objections that your buyer personas may have to your brand along their buyer journey related to your brand, content and the channels you use.

Shopping in a hardware store

Managing your buyer personas

Buyer personas will evolve as your business does, and as the world evolves as it rapidly has with the introduction of smartphones around ten years ago. Your buyer personas will not stay relevant forever.

How many buyer personas do you need? 

There is no correct answer for how many buyer personas you “need”, as it will differ from business to business. If you are a niche brand in a niche market, you might have 3-5. If you are a large brand with numerous product lines, then it could be 20 or more. First, there should be clear differentiators between each one of your personas. 

When a buyer persona is too vague it means you are wasting your time, and just remove it. If 5 buyer personas make up 90% of your business, then focus on those five. If you cannot identify specific purchase goals and buying behaviours and patterns, then it is not worth producing a persona. Have the same attitude with your existing list of personas. If your list is getting uncontrollable, you need to be as objective as possible with your personas.

If you launch a product to a new segment of the market than you currently target, you will need to consider the distinct characteristics that purchasers of that product might have and how they differ from your current personas. Once you start getting data from purchasers to decide whether it warrants a brand-new persona.

Negative buyer personas

Why advertise to people who will never be one of your profitable customers? When your company segment out the people who do not make you money, the customers you do not want, you can become more profitable cost per customer. 

Think about who you do not want as customers but tend to get leads for? Make a profile for this person, and make sure you do not target them with your marketing. Try and stay away from platforms they populate. Not all business is good business.

That is it for another week.

Check out the blog on my website for more articles around marketing strategy and branding.

https://brandyourselfbetter.com/blog

I hope you enjoyed the content and learnt something new,

Dan