{"id":3876,"date":"2011-01-14T01:38:57","date_gmt":"2011-01-14T09:38:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/?p=3876"},"modified":"2011-01-14T01:38:57","modified_gmt":"2011-01-14T09:38:57","slug":"creative-customer-profiling-ideas-for-2011","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/creative-customer-profiling-ideas-for-2011\/","title":{"rendered":"Creative Customer Profiling Ideas"},"content":{"rendered":"

There are really only two questions that every small business owner needs to answer:<\/p>\n

1) Who is my ideal customer?<\/p>\n

2) What’s important to them?<\/p>\n

Once you’ve answered these — marketing should not only be easier, I promise it will be more fun and WAY cheaper than you think.<\/p>\n

Creative Tips to Profile Your Ideal Customer<\/strong><\/h2>\n
    \n
  1. Profile a real person.<\/strong> Find a customer you love working with and start your profile there. \u00a0Find out what magazines they read, what their hobbies are, the kind of music they like, etc. \u00a0It helps to start with a real person and work your way outward toward larger populations.<\/li>\n
  2. Create a magazine cover for your ideal customer<\/strong>. \u00a0Go and get yourself a sketchbook or poster board. \u00a0Then go through magazines that your ideal customers read and pull out pictures, ads, bits of copy that resonate with what you’re offering.<\/li>\n
  3. Pile of Files:<\/strong> Another of my favorite methods to profile customers is to literally walk over to a file cabinet and pull a customer file. \u00a0Look at it and put it on a pile. \u00a0Then pull another file and take a look at it. \u00a0Would you put it on the same pile as the first or a new pile. \u00a0Don’t think too much about it – just decide quickly – immediately. \u00a0Now go on to the next file and follow the same process. \u00a0You’ll find that you have intuitively created piles of customers that you feel belong together. \u00a0All you have to do is connect the dots as to why they are all together.<\/li>\n
  4. Draw your customer’s experience.<\/strong> You don’t have to be an artist to do a great job of this. \u00a0Simply put yourself in your customer’s shoes and draw out how they might experience your product. \u00a0For a great example, take a look at the web site for one of my favorite books, Back of the Napkin.<\/em> Draw out what their problems look like and then draw out your solution and the benefits.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    I’ve decided to pull the last step out of the list and describe it separately. \u00a0Once you’ve profiled your customer, you’ll be ready to map out what they want, what you offer, the benefit and then ask yourself the most important question — What if we…. or what else can we….<\/p>\n

    I’ve pulled together an “Ideal Customer Worksheet”<\/strong> that you can use to start the profile process for yourself.<\/p>\n

    You can do this profiling process on your own or you can include your whole team. \u00a0The benefit to including your team will be that everyone in your organization will have input into the process and will be on the same page when it comes to creating new product or service offers for your customers.<\/p>\n

    Give this process a shot and let us know how it worked for you.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    There are really only two questions that every small business owner needs to answer: 1) Who is my ideal customer? […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":128,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[180],"tags":[428,429],"yoast_head":"\nCreative Customer Profiling Ideas | QuestionPro<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"There are really only two questions that every small business owner needs to answer: 1) Who is my ideal customer? 2) What's important to them? Once you've\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/creative-customer-profiling-ideas-for-2011\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Creative Customer Profiling Ideas | QuestionPro\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"There are really only two questions that every small business owner needs to answer: 1) Who is my ideal customer? 2) What's important to them? Once you've\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/creative-customer-profiling-ideas-for-2011\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"QuestionPro\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/questionpro\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2011-01-14T09:38:57+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Ivana Taylor\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@questionpro\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@questionpro\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Ivana Taylor\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/creative-customer-profiling-ideas-for-2011\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/creative-customer-profiling-ideas-for-2011\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Ivana Taylor\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/5a547e9ba0ad62a9ffa6f12466a7a244\"},\"headline\":\"Creative Customer Profiling Ideas\",\"datePublished\":\"2011-01-14T09:38:57+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2011-01-14T09:38:57+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/creative-customer-profiling-ideas-for-2011\/\"},\"wordCount\":482,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/#organization\"},\"keywords\":[\"Essay\",\"Marketing Strategy\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/creative-customer-profiling-ideas-for-2011\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/creative-customer-profiling-ideas-for-2011\/\",\"name\":\"Creative Customer Profiling Ideas | QuestionPro\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2011-01-14T09:38:57+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2011-01-14T09:38:57+00:00\",\"description\":\"There are really only two questions that every small business owner needs to answer: 1) Who is my ideal customer? 2) What's important to them? Once you've\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/creative-customer-profiling-ideas-for-2011\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/creative-customer-profiling-ideas-for-2011\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/creative-customer-profiling-ideas-for-2011\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Uncategorized\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/category\/uncategorized\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":3,\"name\":\"Creative Customer Profiling Ideas\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/\",\"name\":\"QuestionPro\",\"description\":\"\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/#organization\",\"name\":\"QuestionPro\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/questionpro-logo.svg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/questionpro-logo.svg\",\"caption\":\"QuestionPro\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/questionpro\",\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/questionpro\",\"https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/company\/questionpro\/\"]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/5a547e9ba0ad62a9ffa6f12466a7a244\",\"name\":\"Ivana Taylor\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/d23fe73ba92b9a95ce057e280755df6b?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/d23fe73ba92b9a95ce057e280755df6b?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Ivana Taylor\"},\"description\":\"Ivana Taylor provides DIY Marketing advice, marketing trends and marketing how-to tips and strategies for small business owners and CEOs.\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/author\/thirdforce\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Creative Customer Profiling Ideas | QuestionPro","description":"There are really only two questions that every small business owner needs to answer: 1) Who is my ideal customer? 2) What's important to them? Once you've","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/creative-customer-profiling-ideas-for-2011\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Creative Customer Profiling Ideas | QuestionPro","og_description":"There are really only two questions that every small business owner needs to answer: 1) Who is my ideal customer? 2) What's important to them? Once you've","og_url":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/creative-customer-profiling-ideas-for-2011\/","og_site_name":"QuestionPro","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/questionpro","article_published_time":"2011-01-14T09:38:57+00:00","author":"Ivana Taylor","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@questionpro","twitter_site":"@questionpro","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Ivana Taylor","Est. reading time":"3 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/creative-customer-profiling-ideas-for-2011\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/creative-customer-profiling-ideas-for-2011\/"},"author":{"name":"Ivana Taylor","@id":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/5a547e9ba0ad62a9ffa6f12466a7a244"},"headline":"Creative Customer Profiling Ideas","datePublished":"2011-01-14T09:38:57+00:00","dateModified":"2011-01-14T09:38:57+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/creative-customer-profiling-ideas-for-2011\/"},"wordCount":482,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/#organization"},"keywords":["Essay","Marketing Strategy"],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/creative-customer-profiling-ideas-for-2011\/","url":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/creative-customer-profiling-ideas-for-2011\/","name":"Creative Customer Profiling Ideas | QuestionPro","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/#website"},"datePublished":"2011-01-14T09:38:57+00:00","dateModified":"2011-01-14T09:38:57+00:00","description":"There are really only two questions that every small business owner needs to answer: 1) Who is my ideal customer? 2) What's important to them? Once you've","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/creative-customer-profiling-ideas-for-2011\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/creative-customer-profiling-ideas-for-2011\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/creative-customer-profiling-ideas-for-2011\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Uncategorized","item":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/category\/uncategorized\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"Creative Customer Profiling Ideas"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/","name":"QuestionPro","description":"","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/#organization","name":"QuestionPro","url":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/questionpro-logo.svg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/questionpro-logo.svg","caption":"QuestionPro"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/questionpro","https:\/\/twitter.com\/questionpro","https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/company\/questionpro\/"]},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/5a547e9ba0ad62a9ffa6f12466a7a244","name":"Ivana Taylor","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/d23fe73ba92b9a95ce057e280755df6b?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/d23fe73ba92b9a95ce057e280755df6b?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Ivana Taylor"},"description":"Ivana Taylor provides DIY Marketing advice, marketing trends and marketing how-to tips and strategies for small business owners and CEOs.","url":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/author\/thirdforce\/"}]}},"featured_image_src":null,"featured_image_src_square":null,"author_info":{"display_name":"Ivana Taylor","author_link":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/author\/thirdforce\/"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3876"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/128"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3876"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3876\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3876"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3876"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.questionpro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3876"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}