One of the most important parts of marketing is deciding who you want to attract to your business. Please don't say everyone. Do you want shoplifters? People who regularly return everything they buy? The people who only buy the very cheapest thing & then complain when they break it because ?We paid GOOD money for that!? ? Think about your most profitable customers?..



Wouldn't you like more of them? A lot more?..... read on?

In my business , the most profitable customers are home owners who are ages 35-65, drive later model cars, have credit cards, have jobs, buy quality, are fun to talk to, and are not afraid to spend a little more to get a lot more. Why? Because the people in this group spend more with me. It's that simple.

The people you want may be different. If you sell Baby Pictures your market is limited to parents & grandparents of babies.

My criteria for desirable customers seems to include everyone, doesn't it? Nope. I've excluded over half the residents of the county we live in.

And here's a secret about advertising to a select Herd of customers?.you need to exclude some people in the ad. The more people you exclude, the more exclusive your offer will appear to the customers you are trying to attract.

For example; you can say ?If you are happy with the performance of your___then this offer isn't for you?. ?For people with pets who shed..and nobody else!?

?No Lay-a-ways or hold backs at these prices?.

If you sell heaters ?For people with high gas heating bills only!?. Would make a decent headline.

?If you would rather waste your money buying expensive filters, this vacuum cleaner isn't for you?. ? For people who have already wasted money of 5 or 6 cheap vacuum cleaners, and want to start getting their money's worth, read this!? This would be targeting people who are old enough to have bought 5 or 6 vacuum cleaners.

?We need vacuum cleaner trade-ins! Only read this if your vacuum cleaner still runs and is 5 years old or newer? If I may be so bold, that's a great headline if you sell vacuum cleaners. It sounds so exclusive. But think; everyone has a vacuum cleaner. They all still run. With the junk sold in the Big Box Stores, most vacuum cleaners are about 5 years old or newer. What you'll get are also people with older vacuum cleaners who will lie to get in on the deal.

Of course, you will really let anyone buy from you. We aren't fools. We aren't personally prejudiced. But you want to attract the most profitable buyers, if you're paying for the advertising. And one way is to offer them exclusivity to your offer.

And part of Exclusivity is Excluding (notice how the words are almost the same?) part of the population in one way or another.

As an experiment, go to www.match.com. It's a membership website for singles to meet. The personal ads are very instructive. For example; click in that you are interested in women earning $50,000 a year or more between the ages of 45 & 60. You'll get a whole different set of ?likes & dislikes?, than if you go to women 20-30 years old earning less than $25,000 a year. I'm not kidding about this.

People think differently at different ages. They think differently in vastly different income ranges. The best ads (and believe me, these are ads) tell exactly what the person want's and even more importantly, what they don't want. ?No smokers, no unemployed, no separated, ? etc. After the novelty of it being a dating site wears off, it's very instructive