What is it? It sounds cool. If you’re a total business nerd like me, obviously.
If you’re not, well, then this post probably isn’t for you!
Hyper targeted profiling is a sales term that we use to refer to the process of extensively defining the attributes of an ideal customer or partner. This results in the creation of an Ideal Customer/Partner profile, which informs the researchers who create the lists of companies to reach out to.
Yeah, you don’t hear about partner profiles very often, do you. They’re very important but more on that another time.
Why should you care about these bad boys?
Well, they’re the difference between cold outreach working and failing miserably. Seriously, if your Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) is rubbish, no-one will reply positively to the cold outreach emails and messages you send.
(tell me you’re not considering cold calling…)
Your branded content will also suck, and people will frown when they see more of it coming.
Why is this so, you ask?
Let’s take cold outreach for example. The rookie mistake is to send very long, very waffly or very boring introductory messages that get deleted before the recipient even finishes reading the first line.
I call it the Jehovah Effect. You don’t need to hear them out to know you’re going to regret opening the door – or in our case the email or LinkedIn message.
Hyper targeted profiling solves this problem, and many others, by switching the focus from you to them and giving you enough detail to work with that you can actually send interesting outreach messages that get a reply.
Strangers couldn’t care less about you, your track record, who you’ve helped or what you’ve done. They do care about their own problems, goals, desires, challenges and advancing their career, so that’s what you need to focus on.
A shitty ICP typically focuses on industry, number of employees and revenue. It’s not enough, and some companies think it’s good to cast a wide net, so you’ll hear things like “yeah we’ve got a really strong ICP, we want to target IT companies with 10 – 10,000 employees and revenues of 50k to 500m”.
Okay I’m exaggerating a little but you can tell these guys have missed the point entirely. What can you possibly lead with, that’s going to pique the interest of two companies, one doing 50k p/a and the other doing say 50m.
You can’t, so you have to make it vague and waffly.
Our ICPs include at least 15 attributes and usually come with at least one A4 page filled with notes and insights on how to sell to the very well defined companies included. It informs all types of messaging and content – you really can’t do without it!
If you’re still winging it with a shitty ICP and feel like you’d benefit from a more structured approach to growth, just book in a call and let’s have a chat.
