Are You Wasting Your Time Trying to Market To Everybody?
One of the most common mistakes business owners are making is trying to market to everybody.
The problem with this is that if you market to everyone, you’re marketing to no one.
Ultimately, this marketing mistake comes from the belief that the more people you’re trying to reach, the more chances you’ll have to hit your target at some point. But this is more of an illusion than an actual fact.
When you are trying to appeal to everyone out there, your message is bland and weak. You’re not appealing to anyone specifically because you’re trying to be broad enough to speak to everyone. In turn, you’re not heard by anyone.
Think about it, what specific social media groups are you going to join?
What niche do you belong to? What is your expertise?
How are you going to pick your blog post topics?
What keywords are you using to attract potential buyers?
And the list goes on.
But the worst drawback to this is that the broader and unspecific you are the less money you are going to be able to charge when you do find an interested client or customer.
If you are too broad in your marketing message, you are going to attract what we call the “price shoppers,” people who purchase a product or service solely based on price. Those of those people will actually favor a good price over premium service.
This is not the type of audience you want to attract to your business if you are a professional, because at the end of the day they’ll cost you more of your time and energy than they’ll bring real money in your pocket.
While you’re trying to make do with price shoppers, you’re wasting the time you could be using to reach out to the big tickets.
The ideal client that doesn’t shop bases on price, but who is looking for the perfect service for them.
Believe me they are out there.
But I get it, I’ve been there and done that, and I’m here to tell you that you don’t want to make or keep making that mistake because it will only worn you out.
And keep in mind that price shoppers often turn out to be more demanding and time consuming than clients who are ready to pay for premium service.
That has happened to me enough times to know that it’s true.
With this in mind, the question you need to ask yourself is…
Who Needs your Services?
As a matter of fact, the interesting thing is that it doesn’t really matter who needs your services, but what really matters is who wants it.
What do I mean by that?
Well, as a life coach, I know a bunch of people who really need my services, but do they want it?
No. For the most part they don’t.
How do I know this?
Because once in a while I offer 20–30 minutes of my precious time for a free consultation, and do you know what those people do?
Nothing.
That’s right, they do nothing.
They don’t even take what they badly need when it’s offered to them for free.
That’s why research shows that people rarely buy what they need, but actually buy what they want.
That person who can’t afford coaching still may have purchased a $400 mobile phone with an $80 per month contract. Why?
Well, not because they couldn’t get a cheaper phone with a cheaper contract, now do they?
No.
But because they really want that phone, more than they really want to change their life for better results.
Willing Clients that can’t afford your Services
As far as people who would love to hire your expertise, but are short on cash, you may want to think twice before convincing them to hire you.
Why?
Because it would be a struggle for you to prove to them that you are worth it. Even if you know you are.
If they or you don’t feel that you’ve helped them as much as expected, there’s a lot of guilt that may be setting in, and you might regret having tried to convince them to purchase your services in the first place.
For example, when I write blog posts promoting my Captivating Business Blogging for businesses, I often get comments from readers telling me that they have hired freelance writers who did a terrible job for them.
Of course, they did.
You can’t expect a writer at $5 or $10 per article delivering the same job than a writer at $100+ per article, now do you?
A $10 dollar article might not be awful, but it will still be $10 dollar article.
Some of my blog readers want a good writer, but can’t afford it.
Because of this they are not my target market. I can’t afford to write $10 articles for this specific market.
My market as a freelance writer, is high premium ticket jobs, for businesses who don’t even looking into low paying jobs platforms to find a writer for their blog.
On the other end, if you’re going to sell a premium service, there’s something you are going to need doing which is…
Develop Trust
Now those who both need and want your services will need another very important factor, and this factor is trust.
They will need to trust you one hundred percent.
As a business owner, it’s your job to connect with people who can afford your services, want your services and are ready to make the necessary changes they hiring you for.
Both clients who hire me as a life coach and those who hire me as a writer will need to make some type of changes, so that applies for basically any kind of services you’re selling.
By looking for this type of individuals and connecting with them, you can build a relationship with them so they will trust you enough to hire your services.
If you are coaching people, and I mean any type of coaching such as business, fitness, personal etc., you don’t want to appeal to people who are not ready to change.
Your client needs to be able to afford you services, want your services, but also want to do the work you are going to instruct them to do.
A friend of mine who was a blogging consultant for new bloggers, just moved on to doing something else. One of the main reasons she wasn’t motivated by what she was doing anymore was that her clients were not doing their part. So, as a result, she was frustrated and felt that she was failing them while she really wasn’t.
I see this happening too as a life coach as well. Some people are not just ready for change. Yes, they badly need coaching, but they are certainly not ready for it.
This is why you need to appeal to your ideal client, not just a client.
I don’t just want an extra client anymore. I want my ideal client.
What type of client I don’t take anymore?
· The client who’s not motivated enough to reply to my email the same day they receive it.
· The client who doesn’t have an open mind.
· The client who I can tell is not going to follow through.
· The client who doesn’t have the right mindset (yet) to hire my type of services.
· The client who seems to know better than I do.
· The client who is not open to listen to simply advice.
· The client who didn’t really understand in what business I’m in.
· The client who’s looking for a price deal…
What is my ideal client?
· The client who doesn’t shop for price.
· The client who’s motivated from the get go.
· The client who’s positive about their future.
· The client who’s open minded and ready to learn new things.
· The client who trusts in my expertise, and doesn’t try to tell me what to do.
· The client who has a positive/success mindset.
· The client who’s open to change.
· The client who’s ready to make that change.
If I were to market to the first list I would be wasting my time and money, because I wouldn’t be able to help anyone that fits that list. Not only as a life coach, but even as a writer.
On the other hand, as soon as I get a client that fits my second list here, everything goes smoothly and both my client and I are satisfied with the results we get.
In Conclusion
Stop wasting your time to market to everyone out there. Not everyone is interested, not everyone is your target market, and most of all not everyone is your ideal client.
There is such thing as a bad client or customer. And when you find one you need to learn how to recognize them, and move on to the next.
This will save you time, money and your sanity.
And it will free you to make room for your ideal client who not only needs your service, but wants it and can afford it.
There are out there. I can promise you that.
