If you ask most business owners what they want, nine times out of ten they will answer attracting clients – more of them as quickly as possible.
Yet most small business owners approach this from totally the wrong angle. It’s all about them, the business and what they want.
They don’t focus on the client and their needs and desires.
Two Businesses That Got It Right
Henry Ford is often quoted as saying something along the lines of “If I had asked people what they wanted they would have said a faster horse”.
Which makes sense, most people in his time couldn’t have conceived the idea of a car or owning a car.
Whilst Henry Ford didn’t invent the car, he is credited with bringing it to the masses. Making getting from A to B quicker for more people and in the process attracting customers for Ford.
There are similar stories about Steve Jobs and Apple’s iPhone – he has been quoted as saying that if Apple had asked people what they wanted they wouldn’t have described an iPhone.
However, don’t mistake this as Ford or Apple telling people what they needed rather than giving them what they wanted.
They both DEEPLY understood what people wanted and the art of attracting clients.
In Ford’s case, to get from A to B more quickly, with less physical effort, more comfortably, more warmly, whilst staying dry and being able to take more with them.
In Apple’s case with the iPhone, it was to stay connected.
So what is it that your customers want?
If you’re a photographer it’s not photos, it’s not memories, it goes deeper than that.
Of course, photos and memories are a part of it. However, they are not the deep reason that makes them reach out and book you, or buy more at the viewing.
If you sell cars, it’s going to vary from model to model, brand to brand. Someone buying a luxury Mercedes is buying something totally different from someone buying a Hyundai, or a Tesla…
When you unlock the answer to this then you unlock the secret to connecting with and resonating with your pocket of people. The people you can uniquely serve.
Your aim isn’t to be a little something to everyone in your market. It’s to mean the world to that pocket of people you can serve best.
And when you do that, you will transform your business whilst attracting clients…
Most business owners never truly understand this. It’s one of the reasons that so many businesses struggle.
It can take time and effort to understand what it is that your customers deeply want. It will be one of the best investments you ever make because so few of your competitors will do it.
