You’ve done all the research and prep-work. You’ve launched your marketing and sales strategy. But the expected sales aren’t pouring in. It’s time to ask yourself, “Am I selling to my target market?”
Sometimes the act of weeding out what isn’t working gets us back on track.
By removing targets who are not yielding results, your team will
- Save time
- Become more efficient
- Focus their energy on targets who are more likely to convert
Four Ways to Tell If You’re Selling to the Right Market
In a broad sense, we’re talking about product-market fit. But even then, you need to segment and discover the most appropriate targets for your product or service.
Here are four great questions to ask yourself when determining whether or not you’re selling to your target market.
1. Do we speak the same language?
If your audience seems confused by the industry-specific language you are using, it’s often a sign that they might not be a good fit.
In this case, you would want to let go of those targets and look for prospects who use the same terms, processes, and technology as your current customers. If you cannot easily educate your prospect about the solution you’re offering, you’re wasting your time. You need to move on.
2. Does your target have purchase authority?
Targeting the right types of businesses isn’t enough. You need to reach the right people within those businesses.
If you’re reaching someone who doesn’t have the authority to make a purchase, your best result is that they pass your solution on to someone who does have that authority. If they do, your odds of success will significantly increase. However, always try to target the person in the business who does have the authority to purchase your product or service.
3. Is your solution addressing a priority?
Your solution should be a high priority for the people you target. What is their pain? What is their challenge? Which thing is what they need most right now?
If your solution doesn’t solve a meaningful challenge or isn’t a priority, then it will be difficult to sell to them. On the other hand, when your solution is a priority for this possible customer, you’ll attract them and gain their trust. This indicates you’re less likely to be chasing down non-productive leads.
4. How is your customer turnover rate?
Turnover is natural, but if you’re constantly losing newer customers, there are likely underlying issues you need to address.
Obviously, if you’re winning a large number of new customers, it’s time to celebrate, as your initial sales process is clearly highly effective. But if you are then losing those customers, your initial process is maybe targeting some of the wrong people.
So – by looking at who you are losing, you may discover who you should be targeting.
In our experience, defining your target market is a constant process.
Re-evaluation is necessary to see how things are going and whether or not your strategy is paying off. But there’s more to it than that. It’s also important to understand that as your business evolves and grows, your ideal targets are likely to change too. You weren’t wrong. You just need to review and adjust.
At 360 Consulting, we know that analyzing your targets isn’t just a way to improve lagging performance. It’s something you should be doing regularly to keep your business healthy.
And still – sometimes – you will find things stalled or dead, or you have to learn from a lost opportunity. It’s part of the sales life. But targeting the right market to start with is a sound basis to work on.
Our passion to help you multiply your sales beyond your expectations is what gets us out of bed in the morning! We’re ready to work with you to better understand your business and help you to break those sales records. Give us a call today!