What’s In It For Me or WIIFM is quoted numerous times by many experts as being the most important concept to understand about messaging, and I totally agree, provided that you get the other 2 M’s in marketing (Market and Media).
But it will completely fail even with those things in place if you don’t know what is really the most important thing of all: your Audience or Target Market (not a very nice term when you think about it).
Take this post. What’s in it for you? (I know you are still reading of course – thank you 🙂 Hopefully something you can take away and apply and increase your sales. So enough of the fluff, here’s what to do:
1. Know Your Audience. The biggest mistake anyone in business can ever make is to assume ‘everybody wants this’. The fact is that it may be that everybody does want this, but if you try to sell it to everybody you will sell it to no one because your message will be so diluted nobody will see or get it. It is the biggest single mistake you can make in marketing. I know because that is precisely what I did.
2. Segment Your Audience. Great, we know we could probably sell it to most people, so let’s break down ‘most’ into segments. And by the way, if you are saying ‘I already know I can only sell to a select group of people, not everybody, so what on earth are you talking about?’ then understand that you still need to segment your ‘select group’. Note: if you have already done that too, then you should now be making a good profit so thanks for stopping by 😉
3. Target Your Top Segment. Segment your audience according to their demographics. Age, sex, ethnicity, occupation, interests, education and income. Now take a look at those segments and pick a group that fits the majority of your statistics. For example you could end up with the top segment being women aged between 25 and 35 with above average education, unmarried, above average income and in a professional position. Once you have this you can then target that group precisely. They will know whatever it is you are selling is of interest to them, because your message will be talking TO them and them only.
I am going to expand on the above in great detail in the coming weeks, but it is vital the above is done if success is to be achieved, and this applies to every single business no matter whether it is a startup one person business or a global corporation. If you can get across the notion of What’s In It For Me? then you can achieve success.