subject: Understand Your Customers Will Hear [print this page] Know your customersKnow your customers. Know their level of education, where they live, what they do with their free time, how much money they make, what they value, which cultural backgrounds they come from, and where they work. Once you have a profile of your customer base, you'll be able to assemble a toolbox of appropriate information and language to reach them.
Understanding your customer will help you speak to them in a more effective manner. This will help your messages to be positively received in the context of their lives. Everyone functions with a particular set of personal paradigms; when you know the lenses through which your customers view the world, you know how to communicate with them.
Figuring out how to communicate with consumers is one of the most difficult tasks of any business owner. This is of particular concern to those who use the written word to advertise through article marketing. Writing just any old article won't do you any good. You must learn how to speak to the specific audience that will encounter your articles on the web. By using several simple communication techniques, your likelihood of reaching these potential customers will increase tenfold.
Most importantly, make sure to use language your audience will understand when writing articles. This is especially important in cyber space since you don't have the advantage of leveraging your stunningly good looks or overwhelming charisma. Be sure to speak at the level of your customer. Determining that level can be difficult, especially early in your company's development. That is why it is important to do a significant amount of market research.
In the same vein, you must be careful to avoid sounding condescending through your writing. It is, however, important to consider that something that comes off as condescending to one person may appear completely natural to another. This is why it is necessary for you to study your customer base and know who you are talking to. Once you establish an acceptable voice and vocabulary, you'll hit the mark with your customers every single article.
Sometimes it can help to come up with a specific author persona for yourself. Decide who you want to be when creating these articles. Before you begin writing, create a list of qualities you think would most resonate with your target market. Maybe you want to appear scholarly and somewhat elite for a well-educated, economically prosperous audience. Conversely, you may want to create a more casual, hip tone for a younger audience. Either way, listing the characteristics of the author can help keep you on track during the writing process.
First and foremost, giving readers honest and well-researched information is perhaps most important. Presenting false or misleading information is one of the fastest ways to lose readers and customers. Always check your sources and make sure that they, themselves, are trustworthy. You don't want the falsehoods of one author to lead to the demise of your own credibility.
Similarly, be up front and specific in your article marketing campaign. This means that the main issue of the article be mentioned in the first paragraph of each article. This point should then be backed up by subsequent evidence throughout the piece. Readers don't want any surprises. They want interesting and informative information delivered in a coherent manner.
Finally, give readers something they can take away with them, whether that's three great tips, a couple of resources they might not have thought of, or an invitation to download a free e-book.
By researching your customers and following the general rules of communication, you are sure to reach virtually every interested consumer that comes across one of your articles. Establish a voice in your writing from the get-go and you will be heard be many interested ears.
