Thursday 21 April is the official ‘Get to Know Your Customers’ day and this year we’ve put a handy guide together for small and early stage businesses to help you on this vital part of your business journey.
Your customers are the most important part of your business and the key of all your marketing activities. If you don’t know who you are selling to then you will end up diluting your marketing messages and spreading yourself too thin. One of the most basic and important marketing principles was summarised very well by Seth Godin, who said “Everyone is not your customer”. Every business is different, with different products, services and therefore different customers. It is key to identify these niches, in order to develop your business successfully.
One of the best ways of getting a better idea of your customers is to create a Persona. These are a fictional representation of your customer, and you can create multiple, both good and bad. They are based on marketing research, anecdotal evidence and a bit of educated guessing. Think about demographic data, interests, buying habits and concerts when putting these together, as they will immensely help you with your marketing activities.
Marketing Research is also a great way of getting to know your customers on a personal level, as well as being able to gather more in-depth valuable data that you won’t be able to just get from your personas. Some good methods of researching your customers are focus groups, questionnaires and surveys.
However, it can be even easier than this in the social day and age. Social media platforms can allow you to get in touch with your audience on a very personal and engaging level, albeit more informal than the above. Social media provides businesses the opportunity to talk to and engage with their customers directly through polls, questions, competitions and other interactive elements.
You should be able to see how all these strategies can help you find out more about your ideal customer, how to talk to them and how to use this information for your marketing strategies.
