As business owners we are always wondering when and where we’ll find the “mother load”, that one major customer that will keep us busier than we could ever imagine. To face this challenge, we search high and low, continuing to try new marketing ideas, calling on new customers, looking for new and more profitable industries, and sometimes trying to offer new products and services. Do you ever stop and evaluate how often these efforts work out the way we anticipated? Unfortunately they don’t usually produce the results we had hoped for, leading to a loss of valuable time and money. What if there was an easier way that required less effort and produced better results? There is! Follow these three activities which can be easily implemented to any business:

1. Target account planning & target marketing. 2. Evaluating existing accounts. 3. Identifying centers of influence.

Target Account Planning and Marketing

One of the biggest time savers we can pass on is how to properly target the correct prospects. Target account planning is the process of identifying customers that have a need for your product or service. Deliberate and effective target account planning is much more productive than just cold calling to find out who might be a prospect. There are three components to this process:

1. Identify your ideal client. 2. Determine which of those are your best opportunities. 3. Prioritize those opportunities that fit the description of your ideal client.

Once you have identified your optimal customer targets you should move onto target marketing. What’s the difference between the two? Target account planning is geared toward going after single accounts, one at a time. If your business requires more volume, it would not be practical to target each and every consumer. For high volume customer businesses, the planning activity that should be conducted is a target marketing campaign. The process is similar to target account planning, but on a larger scale.

With target marketing you want to determine your ideal market, find out where those people are likely to be reached, and develop a very focused marketing program to create enough interest that your potential customers will visit your store, Web site, etc. For example, if you sell customized children’s books, you would probably develop ads for children’s or toy magazines versus the business section of your local paper. The trick is to market to a focused group that would have a need for your product or service and not to every one possible.

Evaluating Your Existing Accounts

The easiest person to sell to is someone who has already purchased from you in the past. Many people overlook the simple fact that people prefer to do business with those they know and trust. The best way to evaluate your existing accounts is to list out all your customers and the products and services they have purchased from you in the past. Then look for opportunities; for example, is it time for a new or upgraded product? Would a particular customer be interested in other items you have to offer, etc.? Make a list of all of these opportunities and then start contacting those customers. You will be surprised by the amount of business you can generate.

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