Her name is Meghan. She’s 32, lives in Seattle, and vacations in Vail, Colorado. She’s started her own sustainable clothing line which she designed all on her own. Meghan is married with no kids but trying for their first. They have 2 dogs, both Australian Shepard’s that she loves to take running or on long hikes. She has a dream to change the world. Sustainability isn’t just another word for her but a lifestyle and she’s learning to implement it in her life and business. She knows that the old “American Dream” is no longer working and instead has a dream all of her own filled with community, fair trade, and fashion that gives you confidence in yourself and the difference you’re making. Meghan isn’t afraid to spend on her business as it’s already profitable and is only going up from here. She love’s Magnolia Journal, Domino, and Adventure Journal magazines. She doesn’t have a ton of time for tv but still loves a good home design show or something happy. Documentaries are also high on the list. Who is the mysterious Meghan? She’s nobody. She doesn’t exist. She’s my ideal customer.
If you haven’t already created an ideal customer profile, you need to start there. Download my free guide here and get started on yours. Once you have your customer profile all clean and pretty in front of you, you might be wondering, “okay, now what?” So let’s break down how you use this.
Content Creation Based On Your Customer Profile
You now know your client inside and out. You know her hopes and dreams, her passions, and her pain points. Yeah, that’s an important one. What problems is she having that you can fix? You’ll need at least 3 of these in your profile to talk about in your marketing and to create content off of.
Let’s start with Meghan.
- She has an amazing business but she needs more growth and doesn’t know how to take the next steps to build her business.
- She lacks confidence in her decisions when it comes to her brand strategy and needs someone to help direct her on the right course.
- Most of all, she’s so deep in her brand that she can become too close or blind to the things that aren’t working and needs an outside opinion to give her clarity.
Based on these three pain points I can start creating valuable content in my newsletter, social, and blog to help ease these pains. Of course, fixing the pains means hiring me. So it’s just the first step. To do this I create a list of topics I can cover that will help serve her and her business. I’ll create this list based on conversations I have with my real clients and see what they’re asking, or think about questions I was asking when I first started my business. You can even go onto Google and type in one question to see what other commonly asked questions pop-up.
The second way to create content based off your customer profile is to focus on the things they’re interested in. Meghan loves Magnolia Journal and home design, she loves the outdoors and being with her dogs. That’s three categories I can include in my social content. Posts about our home renovations that we’re working on, posts of my photoshoots out in the mountains or our day trips to get some hiking in and of course photos of my cute pup (who doesn’t want to see the hilarity that is a West Highland Terrier)?
These are all things I know that she’s interested and will create value for her even if it’s just a smile or a moment of connection. These are all simple ways to use your customer profile
Advertising Based on Your Customer Profile
Nobody wants to waste money on their ads, least of all a small sustainable brand like yourself. Being intentional with your advertising is key to making your money go further and knowing your audience will help you.
To start, whether you’re running Facebook Ads or have a print add in a magazine the audience is always the deciding factor of whether or not this ad will work.
For Facebook, you get to create your audience. This means uploading your newsletter list and creating lookalike audiences, or starting from scratch and choosing their location, age, gender, and interests. The idea is to not have HUGE audiences to ship your ads to but instead highly targeted audiences that match your ideal client. So if you were a yoga studio you wouldn’t just want ads to go to people who like yoga, that’s way too big of an audience. Instead, you niche down on what their other interests are. Are they passionate about sustainability? Do they eat vegan? Are they luxury shoppers? What kind of car do they drive? What magazines do they subscribe to? Do they have a family? All of these questions can help you fine tune your audience so that your ads are reaching the right people and converting.
The same goes for print publications, influencers, and partnerships. What does their audience look like? Does it align with your customer profile? You need to look at age, location, gender and interests and if it aligns then by all means start using your budget to advertise with them.
Product Development
A customer profile doesn’t just help you market your business but expand your business. The better you know your customer the more you’ll be able to see their needs and fix their pain points. Your customer might have one pain point that’s on theme with what you solve but you don’t actually do that. This means, it’s time to expand your business and create a new product.
For example, if you sell homemade soaps but you learn that one of the biggest problems your customer has is dry skin then you could create a lotion bar to sell along side your soap bars. Or in my brand I saw that customers who were updating their marketing were always in need of photography, so it made sense with my skills as a photographer, to add that in as another product I offer–Lifestyle Brand photography
You don’t need to reinvent the wheel. Simply listen to the problems your favorite customers are asking and pay attention to what’s needed in the market. If you can easily add it into your business, it’s a great way to expand your revenue and continue serving your customers.
Clarity is the Key To Connection
Whether it’s you getting clear on whom you serve or your customers understanding who you are, clarity is what will change everything for your business. Creating a customer profile with questions, archetypes, and real live examples of people you’ve worked with will only help you more when it comes to building content and connecting with your audience. These two things are what will create customer for life, which is what we’re all after.
Get clear on whom you serve and your brand strategy will become clear too. If you need extra support with using your customer profile, you can always sign up for my FREE 30-minute strategy call. We can walk through your customer profile and come up with new ideas on how you can connect with them. Sign up today!
