A 10-step exercise for services professionals to evaluate clients...Fly fishing -- it doesn't work, does it? When I first watched someone fly-fishing, they released
line and fling it far out into water. No sooner had fly hit water was it being reeled back in. Even today, I still don't understand how this method catches any fish. Yet it does. The results had an opportunity to occur because line was pitched.
Fly fishing looks like so much more work compared to worm, bobber, sitting on a camp chair, day dreaming, an occasional inconsequential conversation, sipping on a beer (okay root beer for family friendliness), relaxing and waiting for bite. The energy is more comfortable yet results less active -- maybe, maybe not.
If you talk to a fly-fisherman, they claim there isn't anything better. And same is uttered from a by-the-seat- of-the-pants fisherman as well (cute description huh?).
Doesn't this sound like one marketing pitted against other.
What makes two different? Technique? Yes. Water type -- salt or fresh? Yes. Type of fish? Yes. Equipment? Yes. Supplies? Yes. Or is it bait? Yes.
The right answer is "all of above."
You can also throw in temperature, weather, and time of day. Everything depends on right combination in right order. You don't want to toss out fly before line. Well, I guess you can. But you miz-as-well kiss it goodbye.
Or as my Grandmother used to say: Don't throw out bath water before bath.
Marketing is not any different than fishing. If you are tossing out wrong hook to right fish, they are not going to bite. If you have right fish and hook, and wrong technique, maybe a prayer or two will work. The results might trickle now and then. Yet, not results you need.
This is why marketing experts emphasize importance of knowing your target market. If you don't know who you are trying to catch, you are forever going to be trying different lures, hooks and techniques. Eventually, wearing you down and keeping you chasing next best thing to come along that just might work.
You can't catch flounder in fresh water or blue gill in salt.
Stop throwing out fly without line. Start knowing what bait they like to eat, what line spooks them, what is their timing for buying, and especially what type of fish.
Start with this exercise for service professionals:
Start exercise by hand to get "feel" of it. Then move process into a spreadsheet to continue its growth and your clarity.
Step 1: Grab a blank sheet of paper. Turn page sideways -- landscape.
Step 2: You are going to making many vertical columns so write small.
On left, create first column. Record name of each one of your clients that you remember off top of your head. Keep it simple and write just name you remember. It could be just their first name, company name, or a nickname or label you privately gave them. Don't be kind be truthful.
Step 3: Second column, title it "M/F." You guessed it, "male or female." Now, proceed down column and write answer.
