What Are Your Right People Really Buying?

Do you know what your right people are really buying?

If your pitch isn’t landing its mark, maybe you need to take a look at what you’re really pitching. Are you selling an item or a service, or are you selling a promise? What’s your customer really after?

The difference between making a sale and not making is sale is understanding what your customer really wants to buy.

The first step is knowing what you’re selling.

Photo by House Of Sims courtesy of Flickr Creative Commons

What Are You Really Selling?

Do people buy water or do they buy refreshment? Or a way to wash herbs out of their teeth during their dinner date at a cozy little ristorante?

Do people buy babysitting services or do they buy assurance that their kids will be protected in their absence?

Do they buy toys for their kids or do they buy them fun and happiness?

Do they buy hostess gifts or do they buy social approval and acceptance in their crowd?

Do they buy novels or do they buy transportive mental and emotional experiences?

You’re Selling Both And

These dynamics work at a subconscious level. Nobody goes into a bookstore saying, I want a transportive mental and emotional experience. They say, I need a new novel. I want to read something.

But what they’re after is not the act of reading. They want the experience that a well-written novel on a topic they care about can create for them. They want to get emotionally invested in characters they can relate to. They want to observe human dynamics that help them make sense of their own relationships.

So yes, you’re selling novels. And you’re selling an experience your customer is craving. {And that’s what they’re really buying.}

This is where nichification comes into play. Two people can be selling the same widgets, but they might be selling them to very different groups of people for very different reasons.

For example, Wig Shop A sells human hair wigs to drag queens downtown. Wig Shop B sells human hair wigs to female chemotherapy patients in the suburbs. Both stores are selling human hair wigs. But Shop A’s customer is buying fabulousness. Shop B’s customer is buying a feeling of normalcy and conventional femininity. Maybe even a measure of privacy. Hence, the marketing tactics of these two wig shops are going to be wildly different: different strategy, different approach, different voice in the copy, different design of marketing pieces, and probably vastly different store interior design and staffing. And you betcha each shop’s customers are in totally different mental and emotional places when they’re buying those wigs.

What’s The Value of Knowing What You’re Really Selling?

When you know what you’re really selling, you can tap into your right people’s mindsets. You can begin to access their mini universe in insider ways. You have an edge that bigger businesses don’t have. You’re closer to the source.

If you’re really good, you might even figure out what your right people are always secretly craving. And you can infuse whatever they’re jonesing for into your content. Lace it through your blog posts. Whip it into your sales copy. Reference it on your packaging. Put a bow around it so they know you’re paying attention. {People love to buy from people who pay attention to them.}

Best of all, when you know what you’re really selling, you can make better offers that tap into deeper needs, all stemming from what your right people are really buying.

For example, if you teach yoga classes targeted at obese people, you have a sense that larger people may sometimes feel self-conscious and uncomfortable in classes where the show-off students are bendy, reedy, size 2 women. So what your customer really wants to buy is a welcoming, non-judge-y place to get her yoga practice on among other women who also have some “lovely lady lumps” {to quote Fergie}. {By the way, I speak from experience here with the body image issues. I’m far from a reedy size 2.} What else might your customer be interested in? Other group fitness activities oriented for plus-sized people. Nutritional counseling for those who’d like to drop some weight. A personal stylist who specializes in dressing the size 14+ body. Or maybe information on a fat acceptance group.

My Right People Are Buying Connection & Direction. How About Yours?

I’m selling connection. I’m a copywriter. This means I write the words for people’s websites, brochures, and press releases. But I’m not really selling words. What my typical client is really buying is connection with her right people — online, in print, and in person.

I’m also selling entrepreneurial direction, or self-directedness. I coach creative entrepreneurs who want to clarify their vision and hone their niche. My typical client knows what he’s passionate about, but he needs some guidance and support in getting from here to there.

What are your right people really buying? And how can you use this understanding to meet new layers of your right people’s needs?

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