Am I the only one? Really?

I get it though. It gets a bad reputation because we see so much bad marketing out there. The kind that makes our skin crawl and make the “ew” face. The kind that intrudes and feels stuffy, sales, and all around icky. It’s enough to make us want to not do it at all.

5 steps to magnetizing your ideal audience - belong magazine blog - female entrepreneur marketing

The trouble with that is that you need marketing.

Marketing is how people find you and how those people become clients and customers. And if you do it right, you even magnetize yourself and your business to bring in the right people.

I’ve now built two businesses and rarely hear from a customer or client that isn’t the right one, because I’ve utilized a few key principles to market well and keep the main thing the main thing … and that’s my people.

**Here are my five tips for how you can do it too.**

1 / know your audience well.

Sometimes we get too eager to get ourselves out there that we don’t care who we talk to. We just want everyone to hear what we have to say. The trouble is that not everyone wants or needs what we have to offer, and they shouldn’t. Because you don’t want to work with just anybody either.

Instead you need to be intentional about who you aim for in your business. Who do you most love helping and working with? What is the audience for your product or service? Get to know them well. Their hopes, dreams, wants, and needs will help you focus on a message that speaks to them.

2 / go where they are.

Have you ever shown up to the wrong party? I certainly have. I was all decked out in my Christmas sweater when we rolled up to the wrong house and missed our party all together. And I see this happen all too often with people and their marketing.

Many times business owners will go where they want and not where their audience or customers are. That means your message and marketing are falling on deaf ears. You want it to be a no brainer, and that means you have to be in the right place. So figure out where your people go, what they do, and where they hang out online and be there. That’s where you’ll start connecting best.

3 / help them with their biggest problems.

When it comes to marketing, often times we focus on what we do and not on our customers. That’s an issue, because, frankly, people only care about how something affects their lives. And you want to be a solution—not just another thing to avoid or that gets lost in a see of other messages.

To do that, you need to speak to their biggest problems in every piece of content you create. But don’t just point out the problems and leave. HELP THEM SOLVE THE PROBLEM. If you do that and create real results for their lives, they will trust you and remember you when it comes time to buy. So make sure your message reflects them and not just you.

4 / create systems for deeper relationships.

It takes time to build up relationships and confidence in you and your products, but you can put systems in place to invite them deeper and deeper into relationship with you all along the way. It’s all a matter of continuing to build trust by serving and over-delivering.

This is what we like to call in the online world your sales funnel. You create an intentional process for people to walk through and each step creates more trust and results for your customer. This can look like getting them from social media to your website then on your email list and beyond that onto your list of customers. You can even automate some of these steps making it even easier for yourself.

5 / be yourself.

There are times when we get caught up in being what our clients want that we forget that one crucial piece of the puzzle—our personality. This is that place where people move into that “salesy” and “pushy” voice because they think they need to be like everyone else. The truth is that by being yourself, you’ll attract the people who want what you have.

So in every way you can incorporate your voice and your personality—your copy, your visuals, and even your products. You need to find what’s unique and special about you and your approach to their problem that the right people think only of you to help them when they’re in a bind that you can assist with. But if you’re pretending to be someone else, it always falls flat and people don’t respond. SO JUST BE YOU.

Marketing becomes much simpler when you keep these five things in mind. Doing so not only helps you attract the right people, but it also helps you repel the wrong ones. That way you’re not constantly getting complaints or on the phone with those who aren’t ready or the right fits for you.

The best part is that marketing becomes another way you serve others, and that’s why you got into business for yourself, right? To serve people with your unique gifts and on your own terms. Good marketing makes that possible and even easy.

If you want to know where to start with creating the content that makes you magnetic to your dream clients and customers, I’ve got a guide that can help you with that by learning from Jesus’ example and help you implement all you learn immediately to create content that captivates and compels so you can build relationships and your business. You can pick it up here.

Kate Boyd is a business coach and strategist who helps faith-focused entrepreneurs who are called to pursue a God-sized dream to squash their fear, gain strength from their faith, and align their passions with powerful strategy through personalized coaching that allows them to create the income that empowers them to impact lives every day and create the life of freedom they crave. You can find out more about Kate at http://kateboyd.me or join her community of dreamers + doers on Facebook at http://kateboyd.me/dreamers.