Narrow Your Focus to Grow Your Sales (Part 3)
If you’ve been following our “Narrow Your Focus to Grow Your Sales” series you know that by narrowing your focus you can customized you business to make it super attractive to a narrower segment. Because of that customization you can gain a significant advantage over competitors who have not made those customizations. In Part 2 we talked about using stories of what prospects actually do to elicit the kind of feedback that can lead to the customization ideas that yield great results. Today we explore how to choose that ideal niche market.
What is your business best at? What type of prospect could walk into your business and you would be 100% confident that you could help them? Each of those could lead you to your target market. One great tool that can act as a guide is this simple Venn diagram with three domains:
- Work that you love to do
- Work that you are great at
- Work that pays well
The intersection of these three circles is your ideal engagement.
Once we’ve identified a target market, we need to define their buying criteria. Unfortunately, prospects can’t usually provide this data in response to direct questions. Imagine asking a middle-aged guy to describe his ideal hair-cutting experience … would he have even imagined a place like Sports Clips? As we said in Part 2 the best ideas come from observing clients and prospects as they work with a service provider. While you are observing them, ask yourself:
- What bothers you about this?
- What is great for you about this?
- How can we make this experience more customized to your concerns and motivations?
Fortunately, you are probably working with many of your target clients right now, so you can conduct this research by listening to your own clients and observing them as they buy other services or products.
What if some of your clients are not be your target clients? Maybe you are attracting too many small clients, or clients with problems that you aren’t excellent at solving. This is a more difficult challenge! Once you identify what you’re doing that’s attracting these less desirable clients, you can stop doing it. Many times, what is attracting the less desirable clients may even repel the more ideal clients.
This doesn’t mean you a have to turn business away from these less ideal clients. But as you seek new ones, act in the way you believe will attract the more ideal client.
Lastly, align your processes to that ideal market. Having identified some unique customer needs, make an effort to consistently and regularly communicate that insight and how you are different to the marketplace. Don’t be afraid to say, “Where other firms like us do things this way, we do them this other way.” Be different.
If you are successful in honing in on path to your target market, it can pay big dividends for your business. As the percentage of your prospects that fit that ideal profile go up, you will be closing more business – more profitable business, that is. You will have more confidence going into meetings with prospects, knowing that your expertise can help them. Ultimately, your sales process will become more efficient so you are spending less time selling and more time leading your business. Now that’s a target worth aiming for!
Brad Farris is a small business advisor with Anchor Advisors, Ltd. in Chicago, Il. Since 2001 Anchor Advisors has been helping creative professional firms to grow, by helping them clarify their purpose, get the most from their people, keep their eye on key performance measures, and implement consistent processes
Brad Farris is a small business advisor with Anchor Advisors, Ltd. in Chicago, Il. Since 2001 Anchor Advisors has been helping creative professional firms to grow, by helping them clarify their purpose, get the most from their people, keep their eye on key performance measures, and implement consistent processes. Brad is also the author of The Business Owner’s Champion: 6 Practices to Build your Nerve and your Business.
