The 4 Fundamental W’s That Define Your Customer

Successful businesses know their market. Walmart excels because it caters to people who want the lowest prices. Apple has fans line up for days before the new iPhone releases because Apple makes technology simple. So the most fundamental step for any business is to identify the audience of their product or service. The process of identifying the customer and what the product represents isn’t just for you, but for your entire team to know to the “T.” This is called your customer avatar, and in this post, we take you through the 4 W’s of identifying the customer, their need, and the way you’re going to thrive as a business.

Who is your client?

The first thing you want to define before doing advertising is your customer avatar. This is your archetypal customer – your product may be the best in the world and you want everyone to have it, but you need to first identify your perfect customer because if you serve everybody, you serve nobody.

Once you know who this person is, you can write stories that appeal to them. It’s not enough for a sales page to simply list the benefits of a product, you want to angle towards a certain buyer – the person you had in mind when you created your product. You can, of course, have multiple avatars down the road, but each will have their own story and write up, so it’s important to define one individually.

This is information you can hand off to other members of your team and provided you did your work, they will know exactly the right customer. They may even know people in person who fit the description. So really dive in deep.

If you haven’t yet, write out who your customer is right now. Is it male or female? What are their interests? Do they like camping, sports, are they more a family man? Do they ideally have children? If so, how many kids do they have? Does your customer have debt? Do they run in the rat race or are they a fat cat? What are their values? There’s nothing too descriptive for this.

If you’re using Facebook advertising – a topic we’ll get to with “Why” – you can hone in on users who have these exact interests attached to their profile. So yes, you might be cutting off the majority of the world when you start to specify your customer, but chances are that out of the billions and billions of people in the world, thanks to your specificity, you’ll be able to find those perfect customers who align with your product 150%.

Where does your client hang out?

Once you have an idea of who this perfect customer is, you need to identify where this person hangs out. So let’s say you’ve identified a middle-aged father who works in the corporate world and wishes he had more time for family. The next question is where does he spend his time? And this applies both on and off the internet.

Chances are a father who wants more family time won’t be seen on the golf courses, bars, or in cigar lounges. Rather he would be found at the schools, family-friendly restaurants, and Chuckee Cheeses’.
After his kids are in bed, he likely spends time with his wife – but doing what? If they watch movies together is it romantic comedies or adventure?

Now think about online presence, too. Does your avatar focus a few hours on stock trading to bolster his income? If so, he’s probably on stock trading websites and reading financial news. If he has even a modicum of tech know-how you can bet he uses the regular social media, and here you want to specify what channels of social media. If he’s a family guy focused on more family time, your customer probably isn’t on Twitter, although he may be on Linkedin from time to time due to his corporate background. Most likely he’s on Facebook for the social aspects, he may even use Instagram to post pictures of his kids. This is relevant not only for interest but planning your ad strategy.

This is more the same diving into the details we disccused previously, but regarding location. It may seem arduous, but you can use these interest to target your customer with laser precision once you start advertising.

What does your customer want?

Simply put, where is your customer now and where do you want to take them with your product or service? For the guy who wishes he had more family time, extrapolate on why – he wants to be happier of course, but how come? Does he want to be the father he never had? Consider the benefit and angle it the right way.

If your product was a cup of coffee, you wouldn’t want to pitch it to this man as “get more done during your work day”, because he’s not concerned about that. The proper angle would be “keep your energy up while you’re at home”, where he would see the coffee as an asset to his family life.

Why Does your Customer Want it?

Next, consider the negative side; include what he might lose if he doesn’t find more family time? He may not be able to see his kids grow and miss their life events, their kids might not know their father, etc. In this scenario, the negatives become quite heavy, but that’s what makes your product so compelling and important! The more you’re able to articulate the why in your advertising, the more your customer will trust you. Likewise, speak to them like it’s 1:1, a personal conversation.

At this point consider imagery as well – if something symbolically represents your customer situation make sure to mark this down. In terms of Facebook advertising, less text does better, so the more you can convey the customer’s need using imagery the better.

As a word of warning and reminder, make sure to stay exclusive to this one avatar. Often times clients may try and bridge the gap between two customers they see and make their avatar and copy more general. In doing so, you may gain a few people in the crossover, but you’ll lose the people who otherwise would have been compelled by how directly your product spoke to them. This is not a marginal loss, as the quality of customer between the two is drastically different. The customer who identifies with your brand fully will buy and be around for the long haul, likely buying more down the line. Whereas the other general customer you acquire may ask for a refund, and because the brand isn’t completing their image, they may easily walk away to a competitor

Your Homework

If you take the time to detail the who, where, what, & why of your customer, you’ll be on your way to a successful business. This is the make or breaks for all advertising, so it shouldn’t be rushed through. Take your time and do it right. Once you’re done, you’ll be ready for the next step of our 101 of marketing: the funnel. If you want us to let you know as soon as the next step is released, share your email below and you’ll be the first to know.