Marketing Mojo: How to make marketing that attracts the right customers

Photo: iStock.com/onurdongel

You’ve been there from the beginning. You attracted the first customers. You created a culture that made them happy. You handpicked team members who believed in that culture. Everything was clicking.

Over time, new challenges popped up. You tried to keep the culture alive, but somehow it faded. If only you could get that magic back and your people surrounded by the right customers. This is a marketing problem, and it can be fixed. It won’t be easy because marketing is never easy. But, it turns out there are free tools that will help you.

#1 Create buyer personas to target the right people

My residential design-build business attracted its share of high-end customers. It also repelled people with similar and often much greater disposable income.

The difference is the buyer’s persona, which is more than personality, demographics and pain points. It’s tendencies, habits and ways of seeing the world, otherwise known as a worldview.

Marketing that hits the mark for a buyer persona communicates one thing: This is for you. It speaks to buyers’ worldviews and sparks the changes they are seeking in their lives.

We value marketing that activates strong emotions. It moves us to action. This is what makes buyer personas a powerful marketing tool.

I spoke with the founder of the Buyer Persona Institute about how to create these marketing assets. You can listen to the interview here.

#2 Use the empathy map to give them a remarkable experience

When people rave about companies, they tell stories. The products and services are often the supporting cast. It’s usually one aspect of their experience that is so remarkable they have to share it.

Of course, the same is true when people have an unsatisfactory experience. This is why negative online reviews should always be taken to heart.

What if I said you could understand your customer so well you can talk his talk, think his thoughts, dream his dreams and feel his fears?

You can by employing the empathy map to sharpen your awareness of your customer experience.

Use a flip chart or wall-size Post-it note to create your empathy map. Divide the page into four equal quadrants and name them (in no particular order): seeing, thinking, feeling and doing.

Start with the first potential customer touchpoint. This may be a website visit, submitted form or call to the office. What is the buyer seeing, thinking, feeling and doing — or should he or she be?

Use sticky notes to capture ideas within the respective quadrants for improving the customer experience. I like to imagine the perfect experience and close the gaps where buyers are currently getting hung up.

Continue your evaluation through the entire buyer’s journey and even after that buyer becomes a customer.

#3 Craft a brand story that communicates that experience

Your core marketing message is a promise to the customer. It should capture what differentiates your business from every other.

The brand story makes it come alive. It’s more than a story, even more than a narrative. It’s everything people say, feel and believe about your business.

Marketing nowadays is a handcrafted conversation with buyers. It reflects who they are and what they believe — and changes it.

That change is what attracts the right customers.