I was working with a client last week on defining her clients. As we were talking, I was telling her about profiling, and what fell out of my mouth was, “You need to profile your ideal client. You know, the way the FBI profiles serial killers.”
Yes, I love reading thrillers, in case you hadn’t guessed. But I realized there was a good bit of truth in what I said. When profiling, law enforcement professionals look at a lot of categories, including age, marital status, education, types of jobs, make and model of automobile and a host of other criteria.
Have you looked at your clients and asked those types of questions?
In what age range does your average client fall? Teen? Young working professional? Baby boomers? Retirees?
What about level of education? Is your offering going to resonate better with someone who has a college education? Does it matter?
You can ask yourself the same questions the FBI asks. The answers will help you refine your thinking. The profile itself won’t define the message you send to your network, but it will help make it more specific and targeted.
Come back tomorrow when I take a sample profile and use it to develop specific triggers to use when asking for referrals.
And if anyone wants to share their profile, please feel free to leave it in the comments. You never can tell when a reader of this blog might know someone who matches.
