Strategies: Match marketing to customers' needs, desires
— -- If I asked you, "Why do your customers buy your product or service?" could you tell me? If I probed further and challenged you, "And why do they buy from you?" do you think you'd have a really good understanding of their true reasons?
Sure, you might answer, "Because they need what I offer, and I provide good value." Fair enough. But WHY do they need what you offer? Why do they consider YOU to provide good value?
Most of us are so busy producing our products and services, running the day-to-day operations of our companies, that we gradually lose touch with the real needs, desires, and choices of our customers. We don't really understand what's going on with them when they make a purchasing decision.
To increase sales and grow your business, you have to get inside your customers' heads. What are their needs and wants? Not just the obvious ones, but the deeper needs and desires that compel them to make a purchase?
What makes your customers buy? Customers may think they need or want one thing, but sometimes they actually need or want something very different. A sales executive might spend hundreds of dollars to fly first class because they believe they need the extra room to work when what they're really looking for is the status they get from sitting in the front of the plane.
Consider these four kinds of needs and desires that drive customers to buy as you develop your advertising, marketing, and sales pitches:
1. Actual Immediate Need. These are short-term needs that customers must respond to immediately: "I'm hungry on a 30-minute lunch break;" "My phone system crashed and I can't do business." This type of customer will do little comparison shopping before buying.
If your customers are like this:
• Advertise constantly. You've got to be in front of them exactly when they need something.
• Good places to advertise are your local newspaper, yellow pages and buying key words on search engines.
• In your ads and sales pitches, emphasize fast service, convenience and price.
2. Actual Long-Term Need. These are real needs and wants that MUST be responded to, but not necessarily right away: "My car needs constant repair and has to be replaced;" "My company's ecommerce website is too clunky and I'm losing sales." This type of prospect will do lots of comparison shopping before buying.
If your customers are like this:
• Advertise frequently. They're going to spend money soon, and they have to know you're out there.
• Stay in touch with previous satisfied customers; this prospect relies heavily on word-of-mouth recommendations.
• Attend networking events if selling to other businesses. Prospects are looking for someone to meet their needs.
• Make sure you get positive reviews on any website that reviews products/services like yours.
3. Perceived Need/Desire. These are needs a person believes they have, but are not, in reality, an absolute need: "I need brighter, whiter teeth;" "I need fancy furniture for my office to impress clients."
If your customers are like this:
• In your advertising, emphasize the enhanced personal or business status or benefits from purchasing your product/service.
• Emphasize your company's quality and reputation.
• Feature testimonials, big-name clients in your marketing materials to add status to you as a supplier.
4. Unrecognized Need/Desire. These are desires customers don't yet recognize as being a need, often developed in response to the creation of a new type of product or service. Nobody walked around thinking they needed — or even wanted — to carry around 10,000 songs before the Apple iPod was invented.
If you're aiming at customers like this:
• Emphasize how innovative and cutting-edge you and your product/service are.
• Explain what your product/service does because customers aren't yet familiar with it.
• Focus on how ahead-of-the-game your customers will be and how envious their peers will be.
A big mistake is to assume all customers have the same motivations as you (or your immediate friends, family, and colleagues). Do some market research. Ask customers for feedback. Start talking to customers to find out what really motivates them, and then go beyond what they just say to you. Try to get inside their heads if you want to get their money inside your cash register!
Rhonda Abrams is president of The Planning Shop, publisher of books for entrepreneurs. Their newest is Finding an Angel Investor In A Day. Register for Rhonda's free business planning newsletter at www.PlanningShop.com. For an index of her columns, click here. Copyright Rhonda Abrams 2008.