It’s impossible now to presume everything about your customers just because you know their age, sex and postcode. In a digital world, that enables ever increasing possibilities and choices, people are no longer constrained by location, age, or gender, and they are not so easy to put into a box either.

It’s far more helpful to think holistically about the people you want to serve. To consider not just their problems or needs, but to understand what they value, and how they think and feel.

Five questions to ask yourself about your customers

1. Who are they?
Not age, sex, income, no, much more than that. Tell their story as if you were about to create a new character for Breaking Bad.

2. What do they care about and what do they value?
Time, money, convenience, belonging, generosity, giving, people, planet, freedom and security.

3. Who do they trust?
People, brands, networks, platforms and on and on.

4. Where do they spend their time, online and offline?
Think about where they choose to belong, and how do they engage there.

5. Where do they spend their money?
Why?

The businesses that succeed tomorrow, will be the ones that invest time today to work out how to be able to say, “we see you” to their customers.

Image by John Fraissinet.