The actual nuance of identifying a Single Target Market – 2

Marketing, messaging, niche, segmentation, single target market

When you do the exercise of narrowing down a segment based on different attributes or use cases, as I listed in the previous post on this topic, you keep eliminating a lot of the other areas which could divert your attention.

Then once you have been able to come down to the narrowest market (single target market) and figured out the economics of reaching out to that market, you can start working on the messaging.

Messaging is a very complex topic and by just reading a few lines here will not show you the gravity of the work that needs to be done to work it out. However by narrowing down, you can now put yourself in the shoes of the person whom you could be talking to. Once you are in her shoes, you can start thinking about what would go on in their mind related to what you are offering. Since you have too only think for this one person, life becomes much easier and you can create more targeted messages.

Sometimes the things you sell, don’t directly feature in the mind of the person, so you need to go one stage upstream and then create the messaging. Like no one, would think of outdoor – wedding – catering, until there’s a marriage that is taking place in the family. So in such cases your message will need to be focused on how it will get moulded with the marriage discussion going on in the mind of. the person you are targeting and then place the idea of an outdoor wedding. Since if they won’t think of an outdoor wedding, they can’t think of an outdoor – wedding – catering.

You cannot create powerful messaging without entering the mind of the prospect. And the best way in my opinion is to get down to a single target market.

Till next time then.

Carpe Diem!!!

My fascination with Marketing

Assumptions, Marketing, psychology, segmentation, single target market

I have been involved with marketing directly or indirectly for a very long time. Inspite of that, I keep getting fascinated with things that get thrown up when you start analysing something from the basics of marketing.

Last couple of days I have been involved in doing some deep thinking on two of our product / service lines which have not been moving. Whenever something doesn’t move, my first emphasis is always to identify what’s wrong with the database / market. More than 50% of the problems in marketing can be resolved if you have identified the market clearly and then gone about getting the database accordingly.

So one challenge was with a set of partners that we had been trying to court and the other was related to a service offering. When I got down to analysing why the partners were not responding to our messaging, it slowly dawned on me that those companies would not have customers who could need the services we offer.

As an allied example – If you are a carpet cleaner and people you are sending the message to are not responding, then you need to figure out if those people actually use carpets. If they don’t use carpets, then even the best message won’t get you an order. On the other hand if you go to a neighbourhood where you have houses where you can be sure that people will have carpets in their houses, then even a mediocre message will get you some traction.

However since we get so bogged down with transactions, fighting fires and managing teams, we tend to forget the basics. So we start with one assumption and then another gets added and then we forget how many assumptions have got stacked up. But when I do get down to doing work from the basics, there are so many things which get thrown up.

Marketing is 50% maths and 50% psychology / human behaviour. So you can’t miss on the maths, because your survival is based on the maths. On the other hand figuring out the psychology of what will get people to buy is critical. So starting with the smallest unit of the addressable market helps with addressing both the issues well.

Marketing also has immense leverage because it can help your business grow dramatically if managed well. That’s another reason, why I am fascinated with marketing.

Till next time then.

Carpe Diem!!!

The actual nuance of a identifying a Single Target Market

Marketing, segmentation, single target market

I keep writing a lot about the SIngle Target Market. Its a term I learned from Dean Jackson. I have known about segmenting and niching but breaking down a market by usage was something which appealed to me.

Now why is it important to drill down to a Single Target Market . Once you have been able to figure that part out, you can then work on the different media you can use to engage this person and then work on what is the message you will send through the different media.

To show a practical example. We were targeting companies for selling our services. Now you can choose partners in different ways. We first did a segmentation by OEMs. If they were selling a specific OEM’s product, then we thought we could make them a partner to sell add on services from us – but these partners could be in different states, they could be of different sizes – single person companies, large companies and everything in-between. They could be owned by men, women, public listed or private. So we decided to put the limit on minimum number of employees and maximum number of employees to segment further.

As we kept on going deeper we found even more characteristics that we had not even noticed when we did the general rule partners of OEMs.

So one rule of thumb that I have figured out , to identify a single target market , is to figure what other attribute exists that could make this data set smaller till it can’t be made any smaller. Then figure out how you can combine based on the usage and expand from there once you see success with one usage area.

Till next time then.

Carpe Diem!!!

A spectrum of people to be targeted

lead generation, Marketing, single target market

Once you have chosen a Single Target Market to focus on, you need to find ways of addressing that market.

In any market there will be a spectrum of customers- At one end you will have people who are reactive, they are in pain and they need a solution now. At the other end of the spectrum you will have people who are progressive and proactive and want to take measures before a problem occurs. And in between are people at various degrees between getting into pain and getting to become progressive after observing something.

Generally its a good idea to target the people who are in pain first, because they can give an order immediately. Immediately is a relative term – depending on the sales cycle of what you are selling. If you were caught in a hurricane or cyclone and your roof has blown away, then you need to get the roof fixed immediately as in yesterday. On the other hand if you are in B2B , immediately could mean a roll out in 3 months.

But how do you identify someone who is in pain in your market. Most people who want an instantaneous answer would always search on Google. So if you can advertise on Google with the exact same terms that the customer would think when in pain, then they could come on top of Google search and get business.

As I had in my post yesterday however, you have got someone to raise their hand by clicking on the link but if you don’t capture their email address, that advertisement will go waste the person visits your website without giving their email. You need to figure out a way to address this.

Similarly for the other end of the spectrum – the progressive or proactive folks. They will also go on Google or in case of B2B, they will ask their subordinates to find out things. Those subordinates will also first go to Google. So what will they those folks think when they have to do some thing proactive in their category. Again put out the paid advertisements with respect to that.

But first focus on the people in pain, because you can get business faster. Once you delight the customer, then you can do even more business with referrals and other things.

Till next time then.

Carpe Diem!!!