Are You Invisible to Your Target Market?

Are you invisible to your target market? Do they even know you’re alive? This goes back to the idea of money versus time. Because one of the advantages of social media is that if you have more time than you have money, you can spend more time posting and contacting people directly on social media.

If you have more money than you have time, then you can run ads and you can get your ads in front of people without having to sit in front of the computer all day. So there are definitely different ways to accomplish this.

If you want to become visible though, you have to have one or the other. You have to have time or money. You can’t be out of both.

Well, I have no money and I have no time to do this. Well, at that point, you’re out of business.

David: Hi, and welcome to the podcast. In today’s episode, cohost Jay McFarland and I will be discussing the topic of, Are You Invisible to Your Target Market? Welcome back, Jay.

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Jay: Thank you so much, David. This one is tough for me because when you know you have a product that people want, you just know it. And you know if they could just learn about you, that you would be able to sell this product and you just know they don’t see you. It’s a frustration. It really is.

David: Yeah, we’ve talked about this topic before. I’ve talked about this topic in live presentations and probably in previous podcasts, and one of the reasons that I keep coming back to it is that it really resonates with a lot of people in business, a lot of sales people, a lot of business owners, because it is so important.

The idea of being visible or invisible to your target market is going to directly impact your ability to make things happen. And what I find kind of fun about this topic, to the extent that it can be fun, is that a lot of times in the movies or in television, invisibility is generally viewed as a big advantage.

It’s an asset, you know, Ooh, wouldn’t it be cool if I’m Harry Potter and I’ve got my invisibility cloak, and I can do all sorts of things that are cool and fun. But in business invisibility is just deadly. Because, as you indicated, if the people who could benefit from what you’re offering don’t see you, don’t hear you, don’t know you’re there, don’t know you are alive, then you have absolutely zero possibility of selling to them.

So in evaluating that question for yourself, are you invisible to your target market? It’s probably a good idea to really think it through, and don’t assume that you are more visible than you might actually be.

Jay: Yeah, we know about assumptions, right? But I think this is also important because a lot of people will only focus on advertising that gets them leads or some type of returns.

There’s a whole nother level of advertising where it’s just brand awareness. You’re probably not going to generate clicks, but if you can be one of the options in their mind, you know, if you’re a plumber and you’re not necessarily getting a lead every time you send out a postcard or something, but when that toilet finally goes down, if you’re one of the three that they think about, then you’re so much closer. And so that’s a part of advertising that I think a lot of people miss.

David: Yeah, I completely agree. I think another problem that people run into sometimes with this is that they’re trying to be everywhere at all times with everyone. And unless you have an unlimited budget, that just doesn’t work. So you can get in front of a whole lot of people who have absolutely no capacity to buy from you.

I’ve worked with businesses in the past that were running radio ads and they were business to business businesses. And they’re running on music stations, and I’m like, okay, well, it’s possible that there are some business owners or some people who could buy from you who are listening to that station, but the majority of people listening to that ad don’t own businesses.

They can’t use what it is that you’re selling. So you’re paying 100% of the purchase price of an ad on that radio station, but maybe only one to 2% of that audience is someone who could benefit from what you’re doing. So in that case, they have the opposite problem. They’re visible to lots of people, very few of whom can actually purchase.

So recognizing that we need to be visible primarily to the people who have the ability to spend money with us is going to be key.

Jay: Yeah, absolutely. And that takes research and time and tracking. But you work a lot with promotional products, and I used to think, what good is somebody giving out pens or mouse pads or things like that.

This is one of those things, you’ve been holding that pen and using it for weeks and it’s got somebody’s name on it. I didn’t need ’em before, and now suddenly I do. And here’s this pen or this mousepad that I’ve been using, and the phone number’s right there. So it’s kind of like a preemptive strike.

You’re trying to be in their mind at the right time when they actually need you.

David: Yeah, and when is the right time? It’s whenever they’re ready for it. So when you have something like that that is in front of people on an ongoing basis, the likelihood of getting that result is better. If you’re running a radio ad or a TV ad, you see it for 30 seconds and then it goes away.

Or you hear it for 30 seconds and then it goes away. So things like promotional products can be very effective like that. Especially because it’s also extremely targeted. You can send those out physically, just to the people that you want to reach and impact. So you’re not going to have the waste that’s associated with a lot of other media.

So, just sort of circling back, for those who know they need to be more visible to their target market and aren’t. You know, one of the first things that I would suggest is to evaluate who exactly is my target market? Who are the people that I need to reach? Where are they located? What companies do they work in?

Or if it’s b2c, who are they? What neighborhoods do they live in? And are there ways that I can reach them so that I can start to become visible? And then create that level of awareness they’re going to need. I refer to that as entry level awareness. In other words, they don’t know you too well yet.

They recognize that you’re alive. They recognize that you’re taking in air on the planet, but they don’t love you. They don’t hate you. They’re just aware that you exist. That sort of entry level awareness, and it’s a start, but that’s not where the sales happen. So we have to sort of move through these different levels.

We go from entry level awareness to comfort level. I get to the point where I’ve seen you enough, or I’ve seen your information, or I’ve seen your ads, or maybe I’ve met you at a networking function or two, and now I’m comfortable enough with you that I’m willing to place that first time order. And so it’s moving people through these different layers.

Starting out with moving from invisible to visible and then moving through the layers that’s going to ultimately generate the sales.

Jay: Yeah. I love the concept of entry level and we’ve heard the statistic, I don’t know what it is now, but that a customer has to see you or see your brand, you know, three, seven, whatever times…

David: Right.

Jay: Before they get to that comfort level.

David: Right.

Jay: And that can be done in a lot of ways. We talk about social media a lot in this podcast, but the beauty of social media is that you can do a lot of things that do not cost a lot of money. But you can get in front of people. And if you can do things that people will share that can be worth a lot of money. Especially for that entry level awareness that you’re talking about.

David: Yeah, and sort of going back to what we talked about in our last podcast, what does it cost to acquire a customer? This goes back to the idea of money versus time. Because one of the advantages of social media is that if you have more time than you have money, you can spend more time posting and contacting people directly on social media.

If you have more money than you have time, then you can run ads and you can get your ads in front of people without having to sit in front of the computer all day. So there are definitely different ways to accomplish this.

If you want to become visible though, you have to have one or the other. You have to have time or money. You can’t be out of both.

Well, I have no money and I have no time to do this. Well, at that point, you’re out of business. And it’s really kind of sad. But there are business owners and salespeople that I’ve talked to who kind of say that, well, I don’t have time to do that, and I don’t have money to do the ads.

It’s like, well, what are you doing all day? Because if the work that you’re doing during the day is not producing revenue that you could then use to acquire new customers, you’ve got to change those activities. Or if you’re spending time doing things that are not generating the customers to begin with, you need to change the activities that you’re engaged in in order to be able to get customers from it.

So lots of different aspects to that, but starting out with the understanding of, okay, who exactly is my target market? Where are they? What percentage are you reaching now of the people that you could and should be reaching in your market? How many of them actually know you’re alive?

There’s a definitive answer to that. You might not know the exact answer, but you’ll have a reasonably good idea.

Jay: Yeah. And I also like the idea, for entry level awareness. If you have a system that encourages people to give referrals, I don’t think that there’s a better source for entry level. You know, somebody’s at home and they’re talking to their friend and they’re like, “I’ve got a problem with my car.” And their friend says, oh, I use so and so mechanic down the street all the time. If there’s some way to encourage your customers, whether it’s some type of a gift card or something like that, to encourage them to do that, I think that’s a very strong play to get that entry level awareness.

David: Yeah, absolutely. And that really gets to the point of creating value in your communications.

It’s not just about getting something in front of them. What can I get in front of them that is going to create a positive impression that has them go, “oh wow, that’s actually valuable to me.” One of the things that we talk about in our Total Market Domination course is this idea of creating value in your communications.

It’s not enough to create value for people when they’re clients of yours. That’s expected.

If you want them to become clients, you have to create value ahead of time. Create value in advance so that they see that you actually have things that are worth saying, things that could be valuable to them, so that they’ll choose to do business with you rather than someone else.

Jay: Yeah, such a great point. If you’re running a newsletter, if you’re, you know, a blog, if you’re running online videos or something, and you’re trying to entice people to come to you, but you never give them anything of substance ahead of time, it’s going to be much more difficult.

But if they’re like, wow, I can’t believe they’re just offering that up for free, that is really an encouraging factor. because you told them to do something and they tried it and it worked. And so now you’ve created a relationship with somebody.

You’ve never even met them. But you’ve established trust, and you’ve established expertise.

David: Right. They view you as the authority in the market, which is awesome. So as you think about this and you decide, okay, how am I reaching these people? How will I reach these people? How could I reach these people, if I’m not currently reaching the way that I need to?

Then also, how often are they seeing me? Are they seeing me in their inbox? Are they getting emails? Are they getting texts? Are they seeing me on social media? Are they seeing me in the community? Where are they seeing me? How often is that happening? Getting back to your point, do they need to see you more than once?

I remember in the book Guerrilla Marketing, I think he talked about the fact that someone needs to see your message a minimum of nine times before they’re going to be ready to make a purchasing decision. And I remember when I read that the first time I read it, I thought that sounds like a lot. And then I also thought about the fact that most people aren’t even going to see your message most of the times you put it out there.

So if I post something on social media, what are the odds that you’ll even see it? Right? So I did the math and basically said, okay, I’m going to multiply that by three, each one by three. And assume that you’re not going to see two out of my three messages. That means I’ve got to get myself out there 27 times, in order for you to see me nine times so that you might be ready to place an order with me.

And these days, with so many distractions and so many different ways to reach people, that number might even be conservative. So, If you ask yourself, how often are they seeing you? What are you communicating to them? That, of course, is key.

And is your messaging consistent? Is what you’re saying valuable to them? And is it consistent? Are you jumping around a lot and saying lots of different things so they don’t know really who you are or what you’re all about? Because that just confuses people and that hinders the buying process more than it helps it.

Jay: Yeah, I totally agree. And you brought up a point about social media and will they actually see you. And this may be the subject for a completely different podcast, but I’ve learned it’s important to not rely on social media.

It may be a good lead source for you. But they could change their algorithm in one day. And what was working for you, you know, for the last year, now you’re getting nothing. You can’t rely on their system. So that’s why, you know, I think it’s important. Yes, get their attention on social media, but get them onto your property as quickly as you can.

Collect an email, collect contact information so that you can make sure, because when you start sending them an email, now you know they’re going to get it and probably see it. And so, you’ve got to be careful with those social media vehicles as well. Because I’ve seen that happen. Things were going fantastic and all of a sudden, one day you’re like, wait, what happened?

Well, they changed their algorithm and now you’re left out of the game.

David: Yes, and a lot of people do exactly what you said. They figure they’re marketing on social media. That’s all they have to do. And what they’re failing to do, in a lot of cases, they’re failing to do lead generation. Which is the purpose of being on there, to get them from that platform into your own platform as you just described.

Getting you from their customer base into my customer base. Right? They’re already a customer. Well, they’re not really a customer of Facebook. They’re the product. I remember reading that somewhere and I’m like, oh, that’s so true. We don’t pay Facebook to have a Facebook account. And the reason we don’t pay them is because we are not the customer. We are the product. We’re being sold to advertisers.

And so when you realize that, you say, okay, the goal here is to get someone from wherever I’m impacting them, and this could be a billboard, it could be anything to get them from there into my circle, into my world, so that I can then reach out to them as I want to when I’m ready to.

Jay: Absolutely. All right. How do people find out more?

David: Well, you can go to TopSecrets.com/call, schedule a call with myself or my team. Again, that’s TopSecrets.com/call. Love to have a conversation, see if we can help you to accomplish your goals and become more visible to the people who matter in your market.

Jay: All right, I love it. David, thank you so much for your time today.

David: Thank you, Jay.

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