Are you saying the right things to the right target audience?

How are you getting in front of your Target Audience? Do they know your expertise and value?

Did you see what we did there? We didn’t say “customers” or “prospects” we used “Audience”.

Because if you ONLY speak to whom you think will BUY from you, you’re missing the boat on advocates, influencers, donors, supporters and collaborators and late customers.

Unless you hire a sales team, sales director and administrate a marketing strategy to support sales, you MUST focus on Audience Development to grow your business with minimal labor, resources and time. And truly, you should be focusing on building and influencing audience to support your Sales Program as well.

Audiences are people whom you’ve captivated or engaged for some span of time with some interesting thing, offer or thoughts. When you focus on providing value and being useful in your customers’ worlds, you are being visible, being of value, being of influence, accessible and responsive – WHERE and WHEN your audience needs you so that they access you and engage you as an expert or a supplier, on their terms.

“On their terms” translates into more loyal customers, more collaborative relationships, less price sensitivity, more trust, advocacy and support.

Keys to Audience Development:

Be a part of their world – Be visible and vocal in places your audiences are hanging out – online and off line, your personality and value should be aligned with your company and your offerings.

Don’t exist in a vacuum – Be a part of their entire solution, understand their journey, their experiences and the bigger industry and recognize and solve the bigger problem for them wherever possible.

Educate – Help them make better buying decisions. Not just information, educating them provides insight and transparency into your products, industry and market. Help them be informed and you build influence in to their decision making process.

Humanize & Relate – Telling your stories and your customers’ stories helps people relate to you and builds trust and credibility. Your authenticity removes barriers to customers and lowers their perception of risk.

By using corresponding tools and resources, you can scale your messages and means to reach a much larger audience than your physical constraints would allow. The internet is the Waffle House of resources and information. It’s never closed and always available with a menu to suit your appetite.

Don’t miss opportunities to develop and expand your business by only pursuing “buyers”. Develop your Audience for greater, more profitable growth potential and long term, loyal advocates and clients.

Until next time, keep kickin’ butt!

-sks