Know what keeps your clients awake at night.
Mar 15, 2022
Do you know what keeps your client awake at night? Getting clarity on this will bring you clarity in all that you create in business and it will also bring money in the door.
As a forced entrepreneur - and by forced I mean I had so many barriers to employment that entrepreneurship was the only viable option, I definitely did it all wrong before I did it right.
If you were one of those people who knew that you wanted to be a business owner and knew what you wanted to bring to market; know this, that wasn't me! I was desperate. I would have gladly taken a job in the first five years to get out of the misery of pounding the pavement without making a penny.
Figuring out what I would sell was not easy. I knew it would be knowledge but what knowledge - would I teach women how to be successful in trades, drawing on my time as a journeyed mechanic? Would I teach people how to write drawing on more than 3 decades writing letters as an advocate for others. What would I sell in a space where I didn't even want to be?
What really drove me was the low hanging fruit. I needed money in the door after just emerging from bankruptcy and beggars can't be choosers. I offered tax services because it was easy to learn and taxes aren't optional. It was in the tax business that I found my client. They were business people but not just any and all business people. They were business people who weren't making enough money. They had a sense of urgency - the wolves were in the kitchen. CRA was sending them letters; they had put their last penny at risk. They needed more money in the door to save their marriages and to get some sense of security. In the early days this worked well for me. I helped them get back on side. I introduced them to the right people and sometimes that included a trustee in bankruptcy.
Then I evolved and grew and wanted a different client - I wanted clients who were willing to pay what I was charging.
I shifted - I took on clients who had a desire to make more money but who had an "ability to pay". The avatar evolved as I evolved. Later as I learned to offer small courses, I took on clients who wanted to add a small course or coaching program to their offerings.
I often meet new entrepreneurs who are like me; for some reason, maybe barriers to employment - disability, criminal record, immigration etc. They've picked something to teach but they have an urgency to make money and the client they are loyal to is the one with cash in hand so to speak.
I was lucky to find myself serving the business community . it worked out well. It's so important from a marketing perspective that you answer the question "what keeps your client up at night"?
If you're trying to serve everyone, you'll likely serve no one. That is a recipe for disaster.
I'd love to hear from you. Who are your clients? Do they immediately jump up and say "that's me" when they read your sales copy? Or are they asking "what does he/she do?"
