OMG Kara, you’re inside my head! Well yes & no! I am often told that I have gotten inside of a client’s head. They are amazed with how I do it. I promise it’s not magic & that you don’t have to study psychology for 3 years like I did. To know your clients better than they know themselves is a skill you can learn so you can get inside your client’s head.

Listen

The easiest way to get inside your client’s head is to listen to them. We have 2 ears but only one mouth so that we can listen twice as much as we speak. Clients will tell you a lot about  themselves, your business, & how they come together if only you give them the space and make them feel valued.

Ask enough clients and you will see trends & patterns forming. Look at the questions being asked, do they keep recurring. Look at the comments posted, can you see similarities. Pay particular attention to the complaints and compliments as these can be hard to come by.

Ask

Ask your clients for feedback, how you help them, what their biggest issue is with your industry, what holds them back from using people in your industry more. Honestly, just ask. You don’t even have to set up a fancy poll or questionnaire. I actually find my best results come when I ask people to answer one question by replying to an email. That’s it, just one question. Just hit reply. It’s simple and it doesn’t take a lot of time.

Here’s the thing about asking, if you don’t ask the answer is ‘no’, if you do ask the answer can always be ‘yes’. So stop putting words in your clients’ mouths by being afraid of them saying ‘no’ to your request. In the main, most people just want to help. Good, bad, or indifferent – they want to help.

unhappy-customers-quote-bill-gates

Research

There are a few ways to research the issues. First of all there are forums and groups. Type your field of interest into google along with forum or group and have a read. You can also ask questions to provoke a deeper understanding.

Head on over to the website www.askthepublic.com and ask. There you will be presented with a number of options/questions/concerns for you to answer.

Look for book reviews in your industry and see what questions or problems they raise in the reviews and use these to help you answer your clients.

There is one last way to get inside your client’s head – profile them

Profile

The key piece of data that business owners avoid is listing their clients’ fears, beliefs, & goals. These are the driving forces of their behaviour. You need to understand them in order to best service their needs.

Why?

People move towards pleasure and away from pain. If you have information to drive them in either direction – use it. If you show them that you understand these they will be looking over their shoulder and wondering how you got inside your client’s head!

closer-to-clients-quote

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