Enhance Your Marketing Efforts With Great ICP Sales

Most businesses think they know who they're trying to reach: ask them, and you'll hear answers like 'marketing directors,' 'young professionals,' and 'cooking enthusiasts.' But ask them for anything more specific - 'where does your ideal customer prefer to shop?' or 'what are their pain points?' - and you may well be met with a blank stare.

Of course, this isn't true for all businesses. There are many sales and marketing teams out there with hyper-focussed sales strategies which have seen incredible marketing success. The difference between the two camps is that one knows the value of a concise 'Ideal Customer Profile' (ICP) and one doesn't. Any guesses which one's which?

Jokes aside, the importance of formulating the perfect Ideal Customer Profile can't be overstated. A great ICP is the difference between driving off-road and driving down the highway, and can help you, whatever your company size, to refine your notions of 'target audience' down to an ideal customer toward whom your marketing and sales strategies can effectively aim.

The bottom line is this: businesses with comprehensive Ideal Customer Profile research outperform those without every single time. Let's find out why, and see how you can turn effective customer data and market research efforts into paying customers.

What is and Ideal Customer Profile (ICP)?

It some ways, the name 'Ideal Customer Profile' speaks for itself, although in a marketing age packed with similar and often overlapping terms it can be tricky to differentiate between them.

An ICP is a description of an 'ideal' customer for your business, and usually encompasses the type of customer, often another business, that your service provides a solution for.

Now, it's important to note that Ideal Customer Profile research is slightly different for B2B sales. That's because you're target audience is other businesses, not individual consumers. That said, the principles behind Ideal Customer Profiles for B2B sales and individuals are very similar. But if your sales team is setting its sights on businesses, they'll need to consider:

• Company Industry
  What industry is your ideal customer in? What are their needs relating to that?

• Company Size
  How many employees does your ideal customer have? Are they upscaling or downsizing?

• Company Location
  Where is your ideal customer based and why does that affect their decision making process?

• Company Revenue
  ‍Are they a small business owner or a multi-national corporation? How much money do they have to spend on external services?

• Company Challenges
  What problems is your ideal customer facing and how could you present a solution?

As you can see, compiling a comprehensive ICP goes far beyond simply highlighting a target market. In order to streamline your marketing efforts and reach valuable customers with a focussed marketing strategy, you'll need to know as much as you can about your Ideal Customer Profile.

How are ICPs different from Buyer Personas?

This is where things can get a little cloudy. Luckily, we're here to simplify things.

Whereas an Ideal Customer Profile defines the types of companies you should be focussing your marketing efforts on, buyer personas are fictional (or rather, semi-fictional) descriptions of the individual people who are buying or may want to buy from you.

That said, a good buyer persona will encompass:

• Background Information
  Where are your ideal customers from? Where do they live? How old are they? What's their job? You get the idea.

• Behaviour Patterns
  How, where, and when do your ideal customers interact with products or services? It's crucial to develop a deep understanding of common characteristics such as these so you can focus your sales efforts and marketing campaigns toward your perfect customer.

• Needs
  What does your ideal customer really need? Customer data will tell you what your ideal customer is looking for and why.

• Pain Points
  What problems are your ideal customers coming up against on their customer journey (problems that may just be dissuading them from making a purchase with a competitor)? If you can identify customer pain points and provide a solution, you'll be giving yourself a competitive edge when it comes to potential customers.

It's important to gain a thorough understanding of these points in order to create marketing strategies that address your ideal customer's needs.

Although there's clearly some overlap when it comes to differentiating the two, an ideal marketing plan will take both an Ideal Customer Profile and Buyer Personas into account to form a targeted approach that reaches all potential customers within your target market.

Why is an Ideal Customer Profile so important for your sales team?

To reuse our analogy from earlier: the difference between forming a sales strategy with and Ideal Customer Profile and without one is the difference between driving off-road and driving on the highway. What exactly do we mean by this?

Well, when driving off-road - or embarking on a sales strategy without an ICP - you're likely to encounter all kinds of bumps in the road, and where you end up may not be where you intended to arrive (if you end up anywhere at all). Highways, on the other hand, are smooth paths towards specific destinations.

Not only does formulating an Ideal Customer Profile make life easier, but it has a plethora of other benefits, too.

Save Money

The cash you spend on acquiring customer data and carrying out market research soon pays for itself when you're targeting specific Ideal Customer Profiles with hyper-focussed content marketing and an optimized sales process. So rather than wasting money on doomed marketing efforts, you know where and when to 'shoot the arrow' to reach your ideal customer more effectively.

Elevate Lead Conversion Rates

It goes without saying that by targeting high-value, qualified prospects with effective lead generation, your conversion rates will increase. This is because your sales teams aren't wasting time on marketing messages to Ideal Customer Profiles or Buyer Personas who don't need your product or service.

Improve Your Product or Service

This may cause some raised eyebrows, but trust us when we say that developing a strong Ideal Customer Profile can actually help you improve your product or service. That's because by gaining a deep understanding of your buyer persona/target customer, you can adapt your solutions to address more specific pain points and create a more competitive product.

Make Demand Generation Easier

We've got a whole blog post on demand generation, so if you're not sure what it is, we recommend giving it a read. But in essence, demand generation means generating interest in your company's product or service. And this is ten times easier if you know exactly what your most valuable customers are looking for.

Make an Ideal Customer Profile with Customer Data

When it comes to making your own Ideal Customer Profile, there's really no better place to start than with your existing customers.

1. Analyse Your Best Customers.
   Delve into what makes your current customer base tick with focus groups, surveys, and questionnaires to find out why they chose you.
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2. Uncover Common Attributes.
   See what your current customers have in common to establish customer needs an potential target markets moving forward.
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3. Find out what your company's perfect customer needs.
   Discover exactly what niche you're filling and why your solutions are the go-to option for your best customers.

Find Sales Prospects with an Ideal Customer Profile

Effective lead generation and sales development relies on many factors, such as multi-channel engagement, reliable data sourcing, and optimization through analytics. One of the things which can help you most, however, is undoubtedly making a powerful Ideal Customer Profile.

By analyzing you current customer data and combining it with customer segment information such as company size, location, and revenue, you can form an image of your Ideal Customer Profile that will help you save money, enhance lead generation, improve your produce, streamline your sales process, and much more.

And if creating an Ideal Customer Profile seems like a big task, there are many B2B lead generation and sales development companies like Leadium to help you formulate an exciting outbound campaigns that'll not only clarify your Ideal Customer Profiles, but improve other areas of your sales efforts, too. For more information on how to drive sales and boost conversions, get in touch with Leadium today.