As you can see, the concept of targeting is pretty simple. Take your product or service and offer it to people who are likely to be interested. But there are a few things you'll want to keep in mind.

Narrow Your Niche

I don't care what you sell; your market is smaller than you think. A large percentage of the population owns a car, but a much smaller percentage is in the market for a new car this month. Many people use an accountant, but far fewer are looking to switch accountants.

If you blast away with the shotgun approach and try to hit everyone, you won't like the results.

You might argue that even if people aren't in the market yet, you should still try to expose them to your advertisements so that when they are, your company's name will be at the top of their minds. This is a really dangerous approach for a small business to take for several reasons.

1. The response to your advertisements (if there even is any) won't be immediate and will be much more difficult to track. You'll therefore have a much harder time determining whether
   What Good Managers Must Do
   One morning at the airport, I overheard an employee talking about her new boss. “He’s a nice guy,” she said. “He makes me feel good about working here.”Like many employees, this young woman is more influenced by her boss’s “soft” skills than his technical skills. His interpersonal skills were what mattered most: including his ability to communicate, motivate and showing genuine concern. These interpersonal traits influence people to decide to quit or stay. When a manager lacks these skills, or actively cultivates their hard-edged opposite, workers who have choices will jump ship or lower their productivity.I experienced this myself when I went into the military service right after college. My boss was a special person—a great boss. An experienced veteran and a former Special Forces medic, he was the type of person who always put the needs of others before his own.One night I pulled duty that required me to stay up all night on New Year’s Eve. It was a night that seemed it would never end. I was tired and miserable. Saturday morning, when I still had several more hours to go, the phone rang. It was Joe, my boss. He asked if I had plans for lunch and that his wife had made something and wanted to bring it over to me. While I don’t remember what food they brought over, it was a meal I never forgot.That one small act of kindness showed me he cared. It
   What's the single most important factor in the success of a marketing campaign? How clever the advertisements are? How good the product or service is? The price being charged?

   If you said "none of the above", then I have to agree with you. The most important factor in marketing is targeting.

   You simply have to know what to sell, and to whom to sell it.

   If you're selling something that doesn't appeal to the people you're speaking to, then you can forget about a good return. Regardless of how good your product is, regardless of how brilliant the advertisements are, and regardless of the price you're charging, if your targeting is off, then your whole marketing campaign will be missing the mark.

   Moldy Grape Juice or Heavenly Elixir?

   If I offered you a bottle of 1995 Domaine de la Roman?e Conti La T?che for $500, would you buy? For the non-oenophiles among us, the Domaine de la Roman?e Conti is a producer of wine in Burgundy in France. They make some of the finest and most highly coveted wines in the world, and La T?che is one of their finest. But at $500, would you buy?

   Some people might, but many others wouldn't. And fair enough. Some would argue that no wine is worth that kind of price. Some people just don't like the taste of wine and wouldn't buy no matter how highly esteemed the wine was. And others, for whatever reason, just don't drink alcohol.

   But if I make my offer to some serious wine-lovers, to people who have no problem dropping a hefty wad of cash on a great bottle, then however many bottles I have available will be gone soon. That's because a bottle of 1995 La T?che for $500 is a steal.

   But it's only a steal to the people who are interested in that sort of thing. So if I want to sell my bottles, I have to do everything I can to make my offer to people who are interested.

   Targeting: The Key to Effective Marketing

   So how do I get my offer in front of people who are interested? That's where targeting comes in.

   If I were to advertise the bottles of wine that I wanted to sell in Car and Driver magazine, I'm sure you'd agree that I'd be wasting a lot of my advertising dollars.

   I'd have a better, more targeted audience if I were to advertise in a wine-oriented publication such as Wine Spectator. This magazine's readers are obviously interested wine, and many of them are probably even interested to the extent that a mere $500 for the wine I'm pitching would have them licking their lips and dusting off the Riedel glasses.

   All this stands to reason. You're obviously going to get a better response advertising high-end fine wine to an audience that is at least predisposed towards wine. But can we do better?

   While Wine Spectator caters to wine-lovers, not all of them will be sufficiently loaded to seriously contemplate dropping that kind of moolah on a single bottle of wine. In other words, I'll be paying for the privilege of advertising to Wine Spectator's millions of readers, when all I really want to do is advertise to the five percent or so who are likely to be interested in my offer.

   With Car and Driver I was way off-target. Wine Spectator is on-target, but I'm using a shotgun. To get the most bang for my buck, I want to find a way to put my offer only in front of people likely to be interested. I want to use a rifle to hit my target and nothing but my target.

   There are several ways I could do this. Obviously if there were a publication geared more specifically to wine-collectors, that would be a good place to advertise.

   Another excellent alternative would be to send a mailing to my existing customers. I could search through my customer database and select only those customers whose buying-history indicated an interest in the wines on sale, and send the mailing to them. If I didn't have a large customer list, I could find additional prospects by arranging for access to a related business' customer list. In this case, a company specializing in wine cellar installation might be a good choice.

   As you can see, the mailing would be going out to a very select group of people. By zeroing in on my target market, I can get the results I need much more cost-effectively than if I either failed to target altogether, or took the shotgun approach.

   And that's really all there is to it. The more you can target your offer, the better your response will be.

   How to Target Your Marketing

   As you can see, the concept of targeting is pretty simple. Take your product or service and offer it to people who are likely to be interested. But there are a few things you'll want to keep in mind.

   Narrow Your Niche

   I don't care what you sell; your market is smaller than you think. A large percentage of the population owns a car, but a much smaller percentage is in the market for a new car this month. Many people use an accountant, but far fewer are looking to switch accountants.

   If you blast away with the shotgun approach and try to hit everyone, you won't like the results.

   You might argue that even if people aren't in the market yet, you should still try to expose them to your advertisements so that when they are, your company's name will be at the top of their minds. This is a really dangerous approach for a small business to take for several reasons.

   1. The response to your advertisements (if there even is any) won't be immediate and will be much more difficult to track. You'll therefore have a much harder time determining whether
      6 Career Killers And How To Avoid Them
      One wrong move can seriously damage your career beyond repair. A flawed plan based upon misinformation, a sudden outburst and petty office politics can all sabotage your career. All the years of hard work and your education and successful planning can be rendered insignificant by any one of the career killers. Young workers especially need to pay particular attention to their behavior, punctuality, attitude and even appearance; although, these less obvious blunders are not left unnoticed. The same word of caution holds true for older workers, but with some additions. Developing a good reputation is as important as keeping it intact.To help you keep your career on track, identifying career killers and avoiding them is essential.The Career Killers1. Setting Small Goals: Your journey is only as far as your destination is. Setting small goals incapacitate you and leave you with regrets much later in life. Setting big goals and having a plan to achieve them gets you noticed, and noticed by the right people.2. Playing Office Politics: This is another wrong path to tread. Strangely, some people have an unnatural affinity to gossiping and playing politics. While you engage in this, the wrong people in the office notice you. And this works against you, rather quickly.3. Procrastination: Procrastination is in some people’s blood. Don’t let it be in yours
      Some people might, but many others wouldn't. And fair enough. Some would argue that no wine is worth that kind of price. Some people just don't like the taste of wine and wouldn't buy no matter how highly esteemed the wine was. And others, for whatever reason, just don't drink alcohol.

      But if I make my offer to some serious wine-lovers, to people who have no problem dropping a hefty wad of cash on a great bottle, then however many bottles I have available will be gone soon. That's because a bottle of 1995 La T?che for $500 is a steal.

      But it's only a steal to the people who are interested in that sort of thing. So if I want to sell my bottles, I have to do everything I can to make my offer to people who are interested.

      Targeting: The Key to Effective Marketing

      So how do I get my offer in front of people who are interested? That's where targeting comes in.

      If I were to advertise the bottles of wine that I wanted to sell in Car and Driver magazine, I'm sure you'd agree that I'd be wasting a lot of my advertising dollars.

      I'd have a better, more targeted audience if I were to advertise in a wine-oriented publication such as Wine Spectator. This magazine's readers are obviously interested wine, and many of them are probably even interested to the extent that a mere $500 for the wine I'm pitching would have them licking their lips and dusting off the Riedel glasses.

      All this stands to reason. You're obviously going to get a better response advertising high-end fine wine to an audience that is at least predisposed towards wine. But can we do better?

      While Wine Spectator caters to wine-lovers, not all of them will be sufficiently loaded to seriously contemplate dropping that kind of moolah on a single bottle of wine. In other words, I'll be paying for the privilege of advertising to Wine Spectator's millions of readers, when all I really want to do is advertise to the five percent or so who are likely to be interested in my offer.

      With Car and Driver I was way off-target. Wine Spectator is on-target, but I'm using a shotgun. To get the most bang for my buck, I want to find a way to put my offer only in front of people likely to be interested. I want to use a rifle to hit my target and nothing but my target.

      There are several ways I could do this. Obviously if there were a publication geared more specifically to wine-collectors, that would be a good place to advertise.

      Another excellent alternative would be to send a mailing to my existing customers. I could search through my customer database and select only those customers whose buying-history indicated an interest in the wines on sale, and send the mailing to them. If I didn't have a large customer list, I could find additional prospects by arranging for access to a related business' customer list. In this case, a company specializing in wine cellar installation might be a good choice.

      As you can see, the mailing would be going out to a very select group of people. By zeroing in on my target market, I can get the results I need much more cost-effectively than if I either failed to target altogether, or took the shotgun approach.

      And that's really all there is to it. The more you can target your offer, the better your response will be.

      How to Target Your Marketing

      As you can see, the concept of targeting is pretty simple. Take your product or service and offer it to people who are likely to be interested. But there are a few things you'll want to keep in mind.

      Narrow Your Niche

      I don't care what you sell; your market is smaller than you think. A large percentage of the population owns a car, but a much smaller percentage is in the market for a new car this month. Many people use an accountant, but far fewer are looking to switch accountants.

      If you blast away with the shotgun approach and try to hit everyone, you won't like the results.

      You might argue that even if people aren't in the market yet, you should still try to expose them to your advertisements so that when they are, your company's name will be at the top of their minds. This is a really dangerous approach for a small business to take for several reasons.

      1. The response to your advertisements (if there even is any) won't be immediate and will be much more difficult to track. You'll therefore have a much harder time determining whether
         Focus On Their Needs not Yours
         "The point is ladies and gentlemen, that greed… for lack of a better word is good." Gordon GekkoSaving money, generating cash flow (creating an atmosphere where the employer can do those two things) are all the employer is interested in. They will not hire you because their bank accounts are swollen and about to burst and they need a way to get rid of the money. Before you try to market yourself to the employer, you need to get focused on their Greed Gland. Business is about profit, pure and simple. Even non-profit organizations have to keep costs down and funds flowing in, to stay alive. So how are you going to do that for them?Will what you have to offer make their life easier, richer or more productive? If you weren’t a solution to some of their concerns, then why would they want to talk to you? When I’m coaching a client on how to approach a company or business, I will ask them to consider what the concerns may be for the manager or owner for that position. Is it generating sales? Is it expanding the client base? Is it keeping costs down by eliminating waste? Or is it creating a strong team that can do all three? Communicate to them how you’re going to do any or all of those things and the position is yours.Go back through your work history and look for solid examples of where you made an employer or manager's life easier. By taking problems off of th
         if I were to advertise in a wine-oriented publication such as Wine Spectator. This magazine's readers are obviously interested wine, and many of them are probably even interested to the extent that a mere $500 for the wine I'm pitching would have them licking their lips and dusting off the Riedel glasses.

         All this stands to reason. You're obviously going to get a better response advertising high-end fine wine to an audience that is at least predisposed towards wine. But can we do better?

         While Wine Spectator caters to wine-lovers, not all of them will be sufficiently loaded to seriously contemplate dropping that kind of moolah on a single bottle of wine. In other words, I'll be paying for the privilege of advertising to Wine Spectator's millions of readers, when all I really want to do is advertise to the five percent or so who are likely to be interested in my offer.

         With Car and Driver I was way off-target. Wine Spectator is on-target, but I'm using a shotgun. To get the most bang for my buck, I want to find a way to put my offer only in front of people likely to be interested. I want to use a rifle to hit my target and nothing but my target.

         There are several ways I could do this. Obviously if there were a publication geared more specifically to wine-collectors, that would be a good place to advertise.

         Another excellent alternative would be to send a mailing to my existing customers. I could search through my customer database and select only those customers whose buying-history indicated an interest in the wines on sale, and send the mailing to them. If I didn't have a large customer list, I could find additional prospects by arranging for access to a related business' customer list. In this case, a company specializing in wine cellar installation might be a good choice.

         As you can see, the mailing would be going out to a very select group of people. By zeroing in on my target market, I can get the results I need much more cost-effectively than if I either failed to target altogether, or took the shotgun approach.

         And that's really all there is to it. The more you can target your offer, the better your response will be.

         How to Target Your Marketing

         As you can see, the concept of targeting is pretty simple. Take your product or service and offer it to people who are likely to be interested. But there are a few things you'll want to keep in mind.

         Narrow Your Niche

         I don't care what you sell; your market is smaller than you think. A large percentage of the population owns a car, but a much smaller percentage is in the market for a new car this month. Many people use an accountant, but far fewer are looking to switch accountants.

         If you blast away with the shotgun approach and try to hit everyone, you won't like the results.

         You might argue that even if people aren't in the market yet, you should still try to expose them to your advertisements so that when they are, your company's name will be at the top of their minds. This is a really dangerous approach for a small business to take for several reasons.

         1. The response to your advertisements (if there even is any) won't be immediate and will be much more difficult to track. You'll therefore have a much harder time determining whether
            Walking Sticks - A Money Making Hobby
            Carving walking sticks wasn't meant to be a money-making hobby for me. I sometimes made them when backpacking, and I had always enjoyed taking my pocket knife to a piece of wood to see what I could make. I just hadn't thought of doing anything more with the hobby.One summer, when my wife Ana and I briefly got into the flea market business, I noticed the occasional vendor selling walking sticks. If the event was more of an arts and crafts show than a flea market, they sold for as much as $50 each. Ana suggested that we could sell them too, so I went to work.I could cut 20 or young poplars in an hour with my "shortcut" saw, and get two sticks out of half of them. My favorite wood, however, was white cedar. In the Cedar swamps near home, it grew straight and died young from overcrowding. Cedar wood remains solid for many years after dying, so I could quickly cut many straight and perfectly dried sticks.There was soon a pile of wood shavings behind the house, as I cut the bark off and carved each stick into various forms. Many were just rounded off on top. Others I cut into a spiral, or pyramidal shape. I put padding and leather covers on some, and drilled out the tops to inset nice stones on others. This is a hobby that lets you really exercise your imagination.I wrapped the walking sticks with leather near the bottom, to prevent splitting, and most also
            kely to be interested. I want to use a rifle to hit my target and nothing but my target.

            There are several ways I could do this. Obviously if there were a publication geared more specifically to wine-collectors, that would be a good place to advertise.

            Another excellent alternative would be to send a mailing to my existing customers. I could search through my customer database and select only those customers whose buying-history indicated an interest in the wines on sale, and send the mailing to them. If I didn't have a large customer list, I could find additional prospects by arranging for access to a related business' customer list. In this case, a company specializing in wine cellar installation might be a good choice.

            As you can see, the mailing would be going out to a very select group of people. By zeroing in on my target market, I can get the results I need much more cost-effectively than if I either failed to target altogether, or took the shotgun approach.

            And that's really all there is to it. The more you can target your offer, the better your response will be.

            How to Target Your Marketing

            As you can see, the concept of targeting is pretty simple. Take your product or service and offer it to people who are likely to be interested. But there are a few things you'll want to keep in mind.

            Narrow Your Niche

            I don't care what you sell; your market is smaller than you think. A large percentage of the population owns a car, but a much smaller percentage is in the market for a new car this month. Many people use an accountant, but far fewer are looking to switch accountants.

            If you blast away with the shotgun approach and try to hit everyone, you won't like the results.

            You might argue that even if people aren't in the market yet, you should still try to expose them to your advertisements so that when they are, your company's name will be at the top of their minds. This is a really dangerous approach for a small business to take for several reasons.

            1. The response to your advertisements (if there even is any) won't be immediate and will be much more difficult to track. You'll therefore have a much harder time determining whether
               Recruiters: Part of Your Job Search?
               Should you use recruiters during your job search?First, let's take one step back.I began working as a recruiter in 2000 and I quickly realized that not everyone knows exactly what a recruiter does or what the protocol is when working with one.Recruiters get paid to help companies find new staff.Recruiters work on jobs that companies can't find staff for and attempt to locate a small number of job searchers to put in front of the hiring manager for consideration for the job.A recruiter needs an open job to work on and obviously then needs to go out and find a great candidate (ie. you!) to fill the position.If you decide to work with recruiters, I usually suggest working with a small handful of them, perhaps 3-4.Keep in mind that recruiters are paid by the hiring company, not the job searcher so I always suggest using recruiters to supplement your job search as opposed to relying on them to find a job for you.A recruiter's job is to fill the job, not to get you a job specifically so keep this in mind.Recruiters – good ones – can put jobs in front of you that you might otherwise not have heard of and can also assist you with preparing for interviews with their clients and can often add value in ways you don't realize the value of, until you get a job through one of them!In
               Target Your Marketing

               As you can see, the concept of targeting is pretty simple. Take your product or service and offer it to people who are likely to be interested. But there are a few things you'll want to keep in mind.

               Narrow Your Niche

               I don't care what you sell; your market is smaller than you think. A large percentage of the population owns a car, but a much smaller percentage is in the market for a new car this month. Many people use an accountant, but far fewer are looking to switch accountants.

               If you blast away with the shotgun approach and try to hit everyone, you won't like the results.

               You might argue that even if people aren't in the market yet, you should still try to expose them to your advertisements so that when they are, your company's name will be at the top of their minds. This is a really dangerous approach for a small business to take for several reasons.

               1. The response to your advertisements (if there even is any) won't be immediate and will be much more difficult to track. You'll therefore have a much harder time determining whether the advertisement is working for you or not. Anytime you can't tell if your money is well-spent, you're dicing with death.
               2. The investment required to effectively achieve top-of-mind awareness is usually enormous. There are cheaper ways to get good results.
               3. People are really good at ignoring advertising. When an advertisement does finally get their attention, it's frequently because the advertisement is selling something that will be of immediate benefit to them. In other words, good luck getting them to pay attention to your advertisements and remember your name when they aren't even interested in what you're selling yet.

               To avoid these problems, do yourself a favor and take dead aim at a much smaller target by narrowing your niche.

               In the above example, we went from advertising a wine to millions of Wine Spectator readers, to sending out a mailing to only those people whose buying-history demonstrated an interest in the specific wine we were pitching. We went from everyone interested in wine to only those interested in high-end red Burgundy. That's a much smaller niche!

               The accountant mentioned above might market to people who are unhappy with their current accountant for one specific reason. Alternatively, she might narrow her niche by marketing directly to one specific type of customer, such as dentists.

               Narrowing your niche doesn't mean that you won't also do business with customers outside that niche, it just means that a given marketing campaign or an individual advertisement might not be aimed directly at them. Instead, your marketing takes dead aim at a much more specific target that is a whole lot easier to hit.

               Determine Your Ideal Customer

               One of the best ways to get your marketing aimed at a smaller target is to identify your ideal customer and market only to prospects that fit that profile.

               This is actually one of the healthiest things you can do for your business. We all end up doing business with customers who are not ideal. In many cases we do business with customers who are far from ideal. These customers are often difficult to deal with, unprofitable, and extremely hard to please.

               Now imagine an influx of your ideal customers. More angels who always pay their bills on time, who revere the work you do for them, and who provide word-of-mouth recommendations frequently. Wouldn't that help your business?

               If you don't know what your ideal customer looks like, think about which of your current customers are most profitable. With whom do you most enjoy doing business? Who can benefit most from your product or service? It shouldn't take long to form a picture of your perfect client.

               Putting It into Practice

               Start taking dead aim with your marketing today. Here are some suggestions:

               Targeting Your Website

               • Review the content on your website. Are you addressing everyone or are you zeroed in on your target market?
               • Make some changes to your pay-per-click advertising. Don't just use the same advertisement for everyone. Instead, create different advertisements for the different types of prospect you're targeting.
               • Experiment with different landing pages. Landing pages are the pages that people who click on your advertisements are taken to. You should create targeted landing pages for each type of prospect in your target market.

               Targeting Your Print Advertising

               • Don't run the same advertisement everywhere. If you're targeting different types of customer, create an advertisement that addresses each customer type directly and then do everything you can to get the advertisement in front of the prospect it's targeted on.
               • If your advertisements reference your website, you might consider setting up different landing pages for the different versions of your advertisements. Doing so would enable your prospects to continue experiencing highly-targeted communication.
               • Experiment with different publications. One publication might have a smaller circulation, but it could be much more targeted for your advertising.

               Targeting Your Direct Mail

               • Break your mailing list into segments based on demographics such as the type and size of business or the income level of the household. Any actual buying-history data should also be factored in. You can then target your mail