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Are You Suffering From Wide Net Syndrome?By Debbie LaChusa
Early on in my marketing career, I was a media buyer in an advertising agency. And I remember when I used to buy radio air time, we would always buy specific demographic groups. One demographic group that was fairly common was "Adults aged 25-54 years old." Now, I didn't know nearly as much about marketing back then ... But even as a twenty-something-year-old, this did not make very much sense to me. Why? Because at the time, both my father and I fit into this category. I was on the very young end and he was on the older end, but we BOTH fit into this demographic group. I remember mentioning this to one of my radio sales reps. I pointed out how very different I was from my father and asked how we could possibly be lumped into the same target group for marketing purposes. Not only were our tastes in music and radio listening habits completely opposite, but our lifestyles were different, our buying habits were different, you name it ... it was different! Just think for a minute about your father and I think you'll get the picture. This is just one example of Wide Net Syndrome. And it is a fairly common problem among small business owners. It's when they don't clearly define who their ideal clients are. They may not pick a group like Adults aged 25 to 54, but they do pick groups like 'business people,' 'women' or 'overweight adults.' When you pick such a broad group, it's really tough to get a clear picture of who you are talking to. I think the reason so many people suffer from Wide Net Syndrome is because they mistakenly think that if they put their business out there in front of a large enough group of people, someone is bound to bite. But what really happens is, NO ONE bites because they just don't relate to your marketing. You're not speaking TO them. Your challenge this week I encourage you to narrow your net. Pick a specific group of people to go after. A group you can get to know and understand very well. This will allow you to speak directly to them and their concerns in your marketing. Do this and I think you'll be amazed at what happens to your results.
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