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In this issue:
• Marketing Article: Find the Prospects You Want: Targeting Your Customers
• Marketing Article: Niche or Die

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Find the Prospects You Want: Targeting Your Customers
by Patricia Fripp

Who are your ideal customers - and how can you position your business so they'll choose you first? Marketing expert Patricia Fripp shares the 4 basic questions to ask yourself before your next campaign.

Successful marketing means that you identify prospective clients and position yourself in the market so they choose you over your competition. When I sit down with clients who want to position their marketing, I seek the answers to four basic questions:

1. Who is your potential client? Who wants to buy or could be stimulated to want to buy? Who is in a position to buy what you sell? What geographical and financial factors affect this ability?

A good way to identify future clients is to listen-really listen-to those you have now. Their comments, especially negative ones, will help you tailor both your product and your approach to other prospects.

2. Why will they want to buy? What emotional and physical factors will influence them? I just worked with an East coast psychiatrist who ran a practice with ten other psychiatrists and wanted to position herself. Our conversations quickly disclosed that her community was predominantly upwardly mobile professionals. Many of the women had delayed having children. Due to fertility drugs, a high percentage of families had twins, triplets, or more. We decided to focus her practice on these families, the first practice in the area to do that.

How did we do this? First, we realized her potential audience was geographical, that is, in her community rather than regional, national or international. These prospects had distinctive demographics. By appealing to a unique aspect, we hit on her core group. She's now hugely successful in her practice.

3. What angle should you take? How is your product or service unique? Why is it perfect for your target audience? How is it different from everyone else's? How will it fulfill your core group's needs in a way that no one else can?

This is called "positioning yourself in the market." (Remember how Avis advertised: "We try harder.") As an example, when other advertising consultants do presentations, they talk about budgets, print versus TV, soft versus hard sell. I position myself by emphasizing that you start by targeting your audience, positioning your product, and creating distinctive selling propositions. Lots of mom-and-pop businesses, confronted by super stores, can't compete or even survive unless they find a unique niche to fill.

4. How are you going to sell? We all know people with great ideas, products, and inventions. They spend a fortune developing this product, but it sits there because they have no idea what to do with it. Is there a system in place to put your product in the customers' hands and return their money to you? Or do you need to create one? Market to your core group, and position yourself among the competition. That's million-dollar marketing!

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Patricia Fripp, CSP, CPAE is a San Francisco-based executive speech coach, sales trainer, and award-winning professional speaker on Change, Customer Service, Promoting Business, and Communication Skills. She is the author of Get What You Want!, Make It, So You Don't Have to Fake It!, and Past-President of the National Speakers Association. She can be reached at: PFripp@Fripp.com , 1-800 634-3035, http://www.fripp.com

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Niche or Die
by Mindy Gibbins-Klein

Lately I've noticed a worrying trend. Despite the fact that ‘niche' has become a new buzzword, I still hear people – especially coaches and consultants – speak about their business in vague, general terms. I know why they do it; I used to do it myself. You think that if you present a broader range of services and talk about many things, then people will think of you for a wide variety of work and you won't miss any opportunities.

I truly believe that just the opposite is true. I used to speak about all the things I was involved in and a contact actually said it was confusing and I was hurting his brain. Nice.

So, what are the benefits of niching?

1. Clarity. You get very clear about what you are doing and where you are going. This helps you see things more clearly and make decisions more quickly.

2. You get better and better at what you do. Without having to worry about everything else, you can focus on one main thing and become a real specialist.

3. It will actually help others remember you. Have you ever been to a networking event, picked up a bunch of cards and then looked at them a few days later? I'm willing to bet there were some cards that just left you cold. What the heck did they do? Those were the vague, general ones. If you give people one thing to remember, chances are they will.

What are the financial implications of choosing and articulating your niche?

1. You become the expert. People begin to look to you for information, knowledge, dare I say it: wisdom.

2. As the expert, you will be quoted more often and given more business referrals. You will stand out from all the other people in your industry who are not articulating a clear message.

3. You will have to say ‘no' to all those other things that come into your sphere. I know it is tempting to get involved in exciting new projects, but if they are not core to your business, you need to be ruthless and filter them out. Being a specialist will bring you far greater rewards than being a jack of all trades, master of none.

4. And finally, you will be able to put together outstanding information products. My clients who have put the time into developing their clear, specific messages are producing amazing books, CD's, website material, speeches and much more.

My friend Reg Athwal recently said, “Choose a niche, then go narrow and deep.” He was talking about becoming a real expert and specialist in one thing and getting to know the small but loyal market that will look to you to provide that product or service. I would take that one step further and say that if you are not going narrow and deep, you are probably digging a big, wide hole for yourself.

Go unleash your niche! (apologies to the Americans who make ‘niche' rhyme with ‘rich')