Especially when starting out, it’s hard to get your mind around the fact that prospects and clients aren’t really interested in you and what’s important to you. It’s all about them, as far as they’re concerned. Sure, you might get lucky once in awhile and manage to run across somebody who not only needs your services but also shares your aesthetic values. But that’s a rare condition.
Consider a small company that sells the latest fad, whether it be some odd-looking doll, an electronic pet, or the latest fashion accessory. You don’t really imagine that the seller of those items has dreamed about selling chia pets for her whole life, do you?
Don’t Fall in Love with the Product
Successful retailers and wholesalers don’t get enamored with the product. Through experience and research, they determine which products have a high likelihood of success. Those are the ones they sell. When the next unique toy rolls along, they are just as happy to ditch the last one whose sales are slipping, to take on a rising star.
Who Is Your Customer?
When you’re trying to market your services, consider your target market. What’s the typical demographic of the owners of the types of companies you’re targeting?
If you’re targeting punk rock bands, by all means, create an edgy and dark logo, website, and company image for yourself. That’s exactly the look that will resonate with your target market.
If you’re marketing to service business entrepreneurs who sell professional services, medical services, design or creative services to the general public, create an image that will reassure those people that you understand their businesses.
It’s Not About Talent, It’s About Perception
You may think that your image should be irrelevant. Your talent should be obvious to the target customers. Yes, they may certainly recognize your talent but still not believe you will be able to create something that expresses their particular business vision.
We all gravitate to things and people with whom we are comfortable. That usually means “people like us.” It’s not that people aren’t willing to branch out and try something new, but when they’ve invested time, energy, and money into an enterprise, they sometimes lose the courage to take too many risks with somebody or something that appears to be very different from them or their business.
That’s why word-of-mouth referrals are so important. If you’ve got powerful and well-connected champions who are willing to refer you to their friends and associates, your image may not be all that crucial.
But when you’re still trying to build up a network of reliable repeat customers, you need to meet the expectations of the target market.
Do a Split Run Test
If you really don’t believe that your image makes that much of a difference, I suggest a split run test. Marketers are fond of testing different scenarios, copy, websites, and ads to see what works best. This one’s easy.
Run this website design test:
- Create two websites: one that is the cutting edge site you like and one that is more conservative and conventionally professional.
- Use the same copy on both sites, but host one site at www.yoursite.com/a and the other site at www.yoursite.com/b.
- Now, using either article marketing, SEO, word-of-mouth, direct letters, postcards, or a combination of marketing techniques, publicize your website addresses equally to two sets of people from the same market:
- If you want to build websites for engineering firms, send letters or postcards to engineering firms you find listed in the Yellow Pages.
- If you want to do marketing for construction companies, send letters offering your services to all the construction companies you can find in the Yellow Pages, online, or in trade directories.
Just make sure that you send half of the prospects to www.yoursite.com/a and the other half to www.yoursite.com/b and ask visitors to fill out a brief questionnaire or poll. Offer to give them a free estimate, report, or other incentive, and get their email addresses.
You’ll easily be able to match up visitors with the original lists. Whichever site gets the highest number of responses is the site design you go with. Simple as that.
(For simple polls, check out PollDaddy or other free poll services.)
Just remember, first impressions do count.
{ 0 comments… add one now }