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Not All Customers Are Equal — Which Are Yours?

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Not All Customers Are Equal

Models and Masterminds logo 20080

When we talk about clients or customers, we often mention them as if customer means “one who buys.” But not all customers are equal. Look at the depth and breadth of consumer offerings. Take in the business services and products. You’ll soon realize that customers come in more than one kind.

You can fly Southwest. British Airways, or take a private jet. You can buy M&Ms in all sorts of special packages and colors. You can turn almost anything into a refrigerator magnet now. But if you go to “In and Out” in California, you’ll only get a burger.

Traditional business models outline three:

  • Top of the Line Buyers
    Elegant, elite, one-of-a-kind, cutting edge. Stand in line, pay higher price, doesn’t mind a few complications or an occasional bug. These are the folks who stand in line for the first iPhone. Folks in this group go on vacations to places that other folks never see. Sell one for $$$$$/each
  • Service and Fit
    Value beats price. Relationships matter. Service is remembered. They look for their values as well as their size. Google is making this group larger as it makes it easier to find what we want in a world wide inventory. Sell more for $$$/each
  • Volume Shoppers
    Go for the discount. No frills. Don’t spend on what we don’t need. Lowest price. Generic is the same thing. They’ll give up service for speed and low price. Sell boxes and boxes for $/each.

When you decide on your product or service, think about which customer you serve. If you’ve already got an offer out there, should you be looking more closely at the customers you are reaching?

Not all customers are equal — which are yours?

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz!!
Models and Masterminds starts the week of June 16.

Traffic, Readers, Colleagues — Are They Customers?

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Reaching Customers in the Offline World

The Living Web

As I put together the SOBCon materials for Models and Masterminds course, I’m thinking about the folks we call visitors and whether they’re really customers.

When I first started my writing blog, I had one reader, a friend who likes to read. Then I joined a “click traffic group” and as long as I clicked other blogs I got a related number of pageviews. Those clickers became the first visitors to my blog. I’m fairly sure few actually read anything.

At day 21, a comment appeared. Shortly after that a few folks started coming back. I had regular readers. Then I had 10 subscribers. I even knew who some of them were. When page views reached 1000/day and comments were plenty and regular, I put up some ads. I thought I’d make some holiday money.

I was confused.

I hadn’t really been looking at who was visiting my blog.

Traffic, Readers, Colleagues — Are They Customers?

When you look at the people who visit your blog, what do they do and how long do they stay?

  • Traffic – If they come in swarms following a link or bookmark and leave in a few seconds flat, it’s traffic. If someone stumbles a page and thousands come only to go away, isn’t that the same as people visiting a store because they were downtown to watch a parade? Traffic is noise unless convert it to readers or customers.
  • Readers – If each visitor reads 1.5 pages or more, you’re building a community of readers. If an audience is your goal, you’ll well on your way. If selling is what you’re about, you’ll need to convert readers into customers. Readers ignore ad that sit in the sidebar. To sell to readers, talk about what they want. Be helpful in solving their problems with products and services that naturally draw from the content you discuss.
  • Colleagues – Being helpful and solving problems can convert readers into customers. But look closely at your audience. Are they potential customers? If you run a “trade” blog — one that discusses the ideas, trends, and people in your industry — your discussions might be with an audience of colleagues not potential customers. Colleagues are unlikely to buy your products and services, at least not long enough for your business to thrive.

We can build a thriving blog that knocks everyone’s socks off, but it can be an investment of love and time that has no customers.

In a world where mostly bloggers read blogs, it’s a good habit to watch our audience. Unless we’re selling specifically to bloggers, our businesses will grow faster if we connect to customers outside the blogosphere.

How would you help a new blogging business connect to customers in the offline world?

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz!!
Models and Masterminds begins with offline connections to customers.

Bad Strategy Deserves Bad Poetry

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Bad Poetry Night on Successful Blog

If you’ve got some bring it over.

I’m watching more than one company do everything they can to tell their customer to go away. Too many companies leave today’s customer sitting alone, while they try to think up “strategies” that will bring them new ones.

S-T-R-A-T-E-G-I-Z-E

Finding Ideas Outside of the Box logo 2

They said the latest thing
and I came to realize
This company couldn’t strategize
They chased trends
like fireflies

Like kids loose in a candy store
they search every candy drawer
and shake every magic door
pinning hopes on that one big score

They’re on the corner preaching
to customers who don’t their need teaching

They see the world with tiny eyes
and let their wishes hypnotize
They can’t even spell strategize

No wonder they always talk about customers with fear.

Strategy in the hands of those who can’t spell it is even worse than a really bad poem.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

GAWKER Design: Curb Appeal as Customer-Centered Promotion

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The Qualities of Great Curb Appeal

Great design is branding that whispers. Like a house with fabulous curb appeal, a uniquely-inspired stained glass window, or the fine lines on a fabulous car, design is promotion that draws you nearer. It entices customers or readers to come closer–to see for themselves what’s being offered.

Don’t think for a minute that looks don’t count. First impressions tell customers that a business understands who their customers are and that the business knows what their customers are looking for. GAWKER understands curb appeal and uses it to deliver customers to their own front door.

Product is the what and the how. Product is the content and the quality that gets customers coming back. But whether it’s a blog, a bistro, or barometer, product is nothing if it never gets to a customer. If no one comes to read it, or dine there, or buy it. Then how can you say that the product is good?

That’s where design–curb appeal–comes in. Design is the why and the romance. Like quality product, good design starts with the customer. It tells the customer what this product is and who it’s for. Design done well makes the promise that the product keeps. It says, “Come here, and try this. You won’t be sorry.” If the product is quality, you’re not sorry. You’re delighted you tried it.

Gawker and the Curb Appeal Checklist

GAWKER passes a Curb Appeal checklist with flying colors.

  • The name of the product, GAWKER, is big, bold, and colorful. GAWKER speaks to the audience that the product is made for. Cover all but that word–GAWKER–and you still know this blog is not meant for your grandmother’s golf team or your little brother’s playschool. GAWKER looks and sounds slightly irreverent and obviously self-content.
  • All things on the page speak to 21-34 year old, mid-high to high income professionals. GAWKER shows their achieving, metro-readers an environment they’re comfortable with, one that says, “you belong here with us. We speak the same language. We do the same things.”
  • Even the ads make readers feel cool. As the New Yorker pointed out, you won’t see pharmacutical ads in GAWKER, because all GAWKER readers are “young and beautiful.” At least, that’s how they want to see themselves.
  • In other words, you can tell by looking, that GAWKER has one BIG IDEA–CELEBRITIES ONLY–Content and Customers. You’ll read about them and feel like one too. No confusion here. Customers know right away whether this is their gig or not. GAWKER doesn’t waste your time if you don’t want what GAWKWER”s got.

In terms of the curb appeal the closer a reader gets, the better GAWKER looks. GAWKER has mastered brand-niche marketing.

Promise and Product Perfectly Wed

As a reader, I find exactly what I expected–the jazzy, snarky, celebrity gossip that makes me feel like a slightly smarter, sharper celebrity than the folks being talked about. GAWKER passes the test because everything they do says they know who their customers are. That knowledge shows in every detail of their product. The promise and product are perfectly wed.

The key to GAWKER-level design is knowing your customers so well that your customers can see themselves in every detail of what you do. Top-notch design and product-driven packaging require complete attention and constant awareness of customervalues and customer needs.

When was the last time you checked in with your customers about the curb appeal of your blog or business? Are you sure your product and promise are perfectly wed?

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related articles:
Blog Promotion: Checking Out Curb Appeal
Five Design Basics to Never Forget
Blog Design Checklist
Great Photo Resources to Support Readers

Business, Blogs, and Niche-Brand Marketing

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Just the Facts

These are the facts.

  • The blogosphere is doubling in size every 5 and a half months.
  • On average, a new weblog is created every second of every day.
  • Municipal Wi-Fi Networks are becoming a reality. Anaheim, CA; Arlington, VA; Brookline, MA; Chicago, IL; Denver, CO;, Miami, FL; Minneapolis, MN; Grand Rapids, MI; New York, NY; Philadelphi, PA; Pittsburgh, PA; San Francisco, CA; Tempe, AZ; and others are already planning or building Wi-Fi networks to be ready in the next 2-3 years.
  • The Technorati Filter By Authority slider gives readers the power to filter out all but the most important blogs in any niche. Will other Search Engine follow?

Business Meet Blogs, Blogs Meet Business

Sounds great. Doesn’t it? Bloggers read blogs. I’ll have more readers. Right? But those readers will have more blogs to read. With new blogs coming at such a stunning rate, it’s reasonable to think that blogs in the Magic Middle might be pushed aside as younger, shinier blogs appear. It’s also fair to assume that readers will limit the searches to only important blogs, leaving me out. What’ll I do to capture their attention?

Niche-Brand Marketing

The wisdom of the Long Tail–that as business moves on line, less and less of what is offered needs to be “one size fits all” and delivered via giant outlet–leads me to niche-brand marketing. I review this list often for my blogs and for my business, or Liz Strauss Consulting wouldn’t be consulting much longer.

  • Define a niche for your business. Choose a niche you truly care about. Find a place to stand. Don’t try to be all things to all people. Do one or two things that play to your strengths and passions. Do those things better than anyone else.
  • Find out everything about the customers in your chosen niche. First and foremost, make sure that said customers exist. Then don’t just get information. Fall in love with everyone of them. Figure out how to crawl into their skin and feel their pain. Know their loves and their wishes. Find their needs and desires. Learn to read what they’re not saying.
  • Define your brand through your customers’ world view. In reality, you don’t define your brand, your customers do. When you understand your customers intimately, find a way to state your brand–what you and your customers stand for–in less than one sentence. Write those words everywhere your customer will see your name, your blog’s name, or your business name. Let them know you mean it.
  • Use your brand to test every decision you make–large or small. Be your brand. Live it. Make your brand show in every detail, every action, every move you make. If you live your brand, and test every decision against it by asking, Will this help my customers see my brand? your customers are more likely to buy into the brand you’ve chosen on their behalf.
  • Be authentic; never skimp on quality; never go against your brand; and you will set the standard. You won’t just be different; you will be unique, irreplaceable. Authenticity cannot be “knocked off and done more cheaply.” Attempts to copy you will only be poor facsimiles. Quality and authenticity are the birthplace of brand loyalty. Customers will know where to find the real thing. Once they find it. They stick with it.
  • When your customers recognize that you care about their needs, value them and the relationship that you have with them. Relationships will always be everything in any human endeavor. Never lose sight of the fact that you and they are people–not users, not clients, not numbers–but folks with thoughts, feelings, and ideas that make you and your business better.

Why Customers Love Niche-Brand Marketers

We are a fascinating species. When we don’t know where to go, we’ll go where everyone else goes. But give us one reason to come to you, and you’ve made a customer–a reader–possibly a friend forever.

We think that people who think the same way we do are smarter than other people. So when you choose a niche that we care about, we think that you’re highly intelligent. We trust your judgment in other things too.

When we find someone who tries to solve our problems and who values us. We’ll go out of our way to do business with you. It’s just not that often that we get that kind of service.

That’s how small niche-brand marketers get to be great niche marketers one customer at a time. That’s how I plan to make this a place where I can put down roots. I want want to be here for a long, long while, making relationships with some really great people.

How about you?

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related articles:
Chicago Goes Wi-Fi . . . What Does that Mean to Business?
Marketing Strategy ala Mickey Mouse
GAWKER Design: Curb Appeal as Customer-Centered Promotion
Why Doesn’t Pete Townshend Need to Do Promotion?

Blog Improvements by Chris Garrett

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haqmmer 3

Chris Garrett offers a great post on Quick and Easy Blog Improvements over at Performancing. He features Sumeet Jain’s in-depth NoFollow article and gives hands-on, “use-right-now” advice that’s well worth checking out. I’m particularly taken with Number 4 which says:

Show your most popular or best posts – a new visitor to your blog needs help in deciding if this is going to be a blog they want to return to. Show them your best and brightest content. There is code available for WordPress and it is really easy to do on Drupal using the statistics module, others will have plugins or you can hard code it into your template.

I like a guy who cares about readers.

Thank you, Chris.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related articles:
No More NoFollow
Blog Construction–What’s Your Function?
Five Design Basics to Never Forget
Editing for Quality and a Content Editor’s Checklist