5Wstories

Rob 2019-12-12: Knowing your market is about telling stories.

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For titles or sub-titles.

Imagine meeting someone and them saying to you:”I see that you are part of XXX segment/demographic, do you want to buy my product, here’s a list of features?”…

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…yesss, probably not, it sounds rather ridiculous, doesn’t it? But in a funny way rather a lot of startups seem to feel this would work!

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I see lots of presentations, and all to many don’t even present their market stats, the minority who do rarely can tell stories about their customers. I am really impressed by people who know their customers sufficiently well that they can tell stories about their customers, and I would encourage you to include the 5 W’s:

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Who is the person, a real person, with a forename, with some information about them (job, demographic, age etc)

 

Where is the person, either physically, or logically (search page of Amazon with XXXX keyword is OK by me), but if the physical location is important, let’s have it.

 

When can be the time of day, when an event is happening etc, is there any urgency?

 

What do they want, in their words (they are unlikely to say I must buy an XYZ ltd Widget)

 

Why do they want it (what problem does it solve, or what value does it give)

 

So I really suggest getting out there and talking to potential customers, listen to their stories, hear their language, and ask enough questions so that you have a “full house” of W’s!

 

I’m looking forward to hearing your stories….