A Day in the Life of Your Ideal Client

One of the most memorable days I spent at The Coca-Cola Company was following a woman around a grocery store in Korea.

It was mid-morning, and she had fed her family breakfast, sent them off to work and school, tidied up around the house and was now shopping for dinner. After that, she would return home, carrying the load of groceries with her as she walked back to her apartment, and continue with her day.

How did we know this information? We collected it. Sometimes we followed the intended audience – moms, teens, busy adults – around stores to observe shopping patterns. (Did they walk up and down the aisles or go straight to their destination?) What else did they purchase when they came in for our products?

And sometimes we asked them directly: how often do you shop? Do you drink a beverage with your dinner? Do you keep soft drinks in your refrigerator? Do you make ice in your freezer?

The answers to these questions might surprise you, as they often surprised me. Learning about the shopping habits of Korean moms, Scandinavian teenagers and American yuppies was more than just an academic exercise.

It had immediate application to our business.

Freshness in food is highly valued to Koreans, so they shop every day. We at Coke therefore had daily opportunities to market to Moms, the “gatekeepers” of Korean homes. We could put signs along her route and in the store. We could put ads on morning TV or radio.

As for packaging, we knew she walked to the store and lived in an apartment nearby, so we didn’t stock oversized 2-liter bottles in the grocery store.

Once we had this information about the intended audience, we wrote it up into a valuable one-page document we called “A Day in the Life.”

Beginning from the time she awoke and, possibly, turned on the radio and heard our jingle playing, we traced the activities of the typical consumer and her family. The intention was to see where, in the course of her day, we might get our marketing message or our product in front of her. We couldn’t know how to do that unless we had a clear idea of how she spent that day.

Small Business Owners: Use “A Day in the Life” to Find Your Ideal Client

Recently, I was discussing a networking plan with some colleagues. One was sharing how difficult it was to find her intended audience. Her current networking wasn’t producing much of a return on her time invested, but she knew her ideal client was networking somewhere. How best to find them?

I told her about “A Day in the Life” and suggested she profile a typical day for her ideal client. That way she could decide where to put her marketing messages – or herself – in order to interact and overlap with her target market.

Now, this story will require some research on her part; she’ll basically need to trace the path of a single person from the time they wake up to the time they go to bed.

“A Day in the Life of Peggy” (your perfect client) opens with a description of her typical morning. You may find that once she’s at work, she opens her email and finds a message from you. What does she think? What action does she take? (You’re writing it, so say what you’d want to happen.)

At lunch she tells a friend about your email, and they make plans to discuss your service later in the day. After work, she attends a networking event and bumps into you. How coincidental, she thinks. I was planning to call.

As you trace the story, you begin to think of new and different ways to encounter your clients.

This exercise is especially useful if your clients are somewhat unlike you. It helps you to picture what their life is really like, not just your assumptions.

For instance, you may work in a corporate headquarters but market to stay-at-home moms. You may be a home-based business but your brand is for executives who travel a lot. Even if you are 52 and your target market is boys aged 9-12, you can figure out the best ways to reach someone if you can picture a day in their lives.

Here are some questions you’ll want to answer before you write your own “Day in the Life” profile:

• How does my ideal client spend his morning? (In a daily commute? By car or public transportation? Listening to his iPod or reading the newspaper?)
• Which newspapers, magazines and web sites does she read?
• What events do they attend?
• What groups do they belong to?
• Which TV and radio stations do they prefer?
• Where along the way do they, or could they, encounter you or your marketing message?

For example, if you have a luxury inn, your ideal guest might encounter you while reading articles on a web site he found when searching for “honeymoon locations.”

If you are a tax accountant, you might attend a women’s group frequented by business owners.

If you teach children’s art classes, you might do demonstrations in a clothing store during August, when moms are getting kids ready to head back to school.

How do you know which places you should be in? Profile your ideal clients. Ask them the questions above. Consider how your current clients found you.

It’s frustrating to do so much work on crafting an excellent marketing message but not know how to get it in front of your audience. Write about a day in the life of your ideal client, and I know you’ll discover new ideas that can get their attention and build your business!

Photo by Sam Pullara

Related posts:

1. Client Attraction Myths (and the Reality)

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