Do You Know Your Customers’ “WHY”?
Monday, September 7th, 2009Do you, as a marketer, take time to find out what’s important to your customers or prospective customers?
Do you know their ‘why’?
Why do they do what they do?
Why do they think what they think?
Why do they feel the way they feel?
I think today, more than ever before, marketers must take care to learn AS much about their customers as possible … and address their needs and wants in a way they can see that you care about them, as people.
Just because you may have the latest and greatest widget, in your opinion, because it does so many more things than your closest competitor’s widget, doesn’t prove people will want yours more than your competitor’s.
The reason may be they believe all the bells and whistles on your newest widget just get in their way — they’re more of a nuisance than a help. Or, maybe they think (right or wrong) that the more gadgets on the widget, the more there is to go wrong!
You needed to have discovered what else they wanted in a new widget BEFORE trying to tell them how much they should want/need it, right?
Times are a changin’ with the advent of social media, depressed economy and a return to basics. So now, people are driving the market, instead of the market driving the people. That’s old school.
It’s imperative to ask your customers/prospects what they want and why it’s important to them. Very BIG companies, like ‘Big Blue,’ go down with a BIG thud, giving way to a company (like Dell), who gives the people what they want when they want it.
All of your marketing communications, your advertising and your social media presence need to have an ‘ask, not tell’ tenor to them. You need to listen to their needs and discover their ‘why,’ to be successful.
One way to do this is to create a two-way forum on your web site. They ask, you deliver. People will tell you what they think — just ask them!
Maybe a contest? That’s also a great way to get folks to participate in giving you information about why they want what they want.
Figure out what makes them tick — and satisfy their reason for wanting what they want.
Find out their ‘why.’
To making a difference,
Carolyn Permentier
