What Are They Really Thinking? Part 2

(Written by guest contributor Alan Bechtold)

This is a continuation of last week’s article on getting inside the minds of your customers and prospects.

There’s another speedy, convenient online way to find out what people are really thinking. The results will never be as scientifically quantifiable as a well-prepared survey, and you’ll have to wear some armor over your own emotions while you do it – but you’ll also find out what people are really thinking about almost any subject imaginable, so you can easily gather information to use for marketing into any niche. Just check out the news.

Yes, all the motivation experts tell us to avoid the news like the plague. After all, most news is negative and we’re supposed to insulate ourselves from negative thinking.

This is valid advice for the masses. It is not valid advice for serious marketing warriors who are determined to ferret out the thinking that’s really going on in their respective markets so they can tap into that thinking and re-direct it properly for maximum sales.

Buck up. Put on your emotional blinders to what’s in the news and study it. Look for trends. Watch for interviews with real on-the-street people telling what they think and feel.

I use online news media for this mostly. CNN, MSNBC, FOX, it doesn’t matter. If you’re promoting a local business, you’ll want to focus on the local television and newspaper websites in your area.

Look for blogs. Almost every news website I’ve seen has blogs where readers can respond directly to the day’s stories, and to each other. This is what they’re really thinking – the meat you’re looking for.

Search Google and you’ll most likely find a lot of specialized blogs with news and comments from people in whatever niche you’ve decided to sell in. It doesn’t matter whether they’re specifically news blogs or not. If they’re active blogs in your niche, read them often. Make notes about the trends you see in the thinking that’s going on.

A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum…

Then there are forums. They’ve been around since long before blogs first sprang up and there are still tens of thousands of active forums you can find, focused on every niche imaginable – and a bunch more on subjects you would never imagine.

Just search Google for “(Your Niche) Forum” and you’ll see a lot of them.

Sign up. Start reading. Reading blog and forum comments is almost the same thing as sitting in a bar, at the table next to a prospect and three of her friends, where you can listen in and hear exactly what they really think about every subject that comes up during their conversation.

It’s about the best market research you could ever find – and it’s all free and easy to access right from your computer, wherever you are.

Then What?

Now that you’ve gathered your intelligence and finally know what your target prospect is really thinking, you next turn it into a conversation. Pull together the comments you’ve found that zero in on your target market’s inner thoughts, then string those comments together as if they were a monologue, spoken by your most promising prospect.

You’re familiar with monologues, right? They’re what every comedian does. They’re how all the late-night talk show hosts start the evening.

Your monologue most likely won’t be funny – but it should be welded together into a single train of similar thoughts. Look especially for objections that might apply to what you’re selling. Look for solutions they’re seeking and wish they had now. Especially focus in on any fears or worries they express.

All of this can be great fodder for your own sales messages. It can also help you create products and services to meet your target market’s real desires. They’ll respond well because you’ll have met all of their objections in your sales messages leading them to your solution.

New Caves to Mine at Every Turn

This same process is amazingly effective as you’re just preparing to enter any market niche. You can do this simple research, take a survey, then monitor news sites, blogs and forums, and hone in on what people want most now – especially the people you wish to target with your marketing.

It can lead you to undiscovered pockets of pent-up desire and buyers just waiting to hear about what you’ve developed that meets their innermost needs.

They might be surprised you even knew they wanted what you’re offering, but they’ll always be even more surprised that you knew what they were thinking about it at all, and that you stepped up to the plate with just the solution they were waiting for.

That’s what I call meeting your prospect’s expectations even before they knew they had them!

It’s also a recipe for success in any market niche, regardless of what you choose to sell.