Question for Marriage Minded Singles – Who Is Your Target Ideal Prospect?

April 28, 2010 / April Braswell / 24 Comments

Marriage Minded Singles: Identify Your Ideal Prospects to Target Them for Marketing and Selling Efforts

While as a dating coach one of the behaviors I recommend to singles just getting into the swing of dating either after a social dry spell or dating again is that you date a lot and date a variety of singles.  In a manner, by doing so, you are breaking out of a social rut as well as your mental frame and definition of yourself.  Sometimes the package of what you want and need in a marriage relationship does not present itself in quite the way you have in mind.  So many single then married women will attest to their dear love wasn’t quite what they had been looking for but was everything they had really hoped for.  So, they did have an idea of what they wanted.  Just the packaging of the person is sometimes pleasantly unexpected.  By getting out and dating a variety of other singles, you stretch yourself socially.

Well, that is a good initial exercise.  The same holds true for business owners responsible for their own business development and sales as well as for the front line sales people who sell the services or goods of a company.  When you are first starting out, you need to talk to a variety of people about your business and what you do.  You drink a lot of coffee, sip many glasses of wine at chamber of commerce mixers, and sip fizzy water galore in order to get the word out initially about your business.

However, after a few months of doing this either for the business person or the single, you have enough stretching and experience under your belt that it is now time to focus your efforts.  You should have had enough experience of what works and what doesn’t work that you start to be more discerning.  As a single, what that means is you flirt with many people, but you neither pursue nor accept just any date.  As a business person that means that you shake hands with many but do not pursue the networking conversation with everyone.  Additionally, not everyone who applies to become your customer qualifies to do business with you.

As a business person, when I am speaking before a business association and ask the small business owners present, “Who is your client?  Give me an example of 3-5 profiles of your typical client.”  If they cannot do that and respond it could be anyone then I know for sure they aren’t doing enough business.  If you cannot tell me a few examples of your target ideal prospective (T.I.P.) client then you don’t recognize them.  If you are not choosing and discerning based on the criteria of your T.I.P. either in business or romance, eventually you are wasting your time.  In business the expression is, “If anyone can be your client than no one is.”

In marketing terms, who are your niche markets?  Let’s be real.  You cannot be an expert at servicing anyone and everyone.  One of my criteria for accepting dating coaching clients applications is I ask a number of questions about their relationship motivation.  They have to want it.  Many people may “need” my help, but if they don’t want it and value it, they won’t take all the actions necessary for actual success.  I won’t waste my valuable intellectual property of those who don’t want it.  The other side about that is it would be annoying to the other to thrust advice upon them which didn’t solicit and don’t want.  I mean, unsolicited advice is always a bit annoying isn’t it?

On the dating front, after a time of dating, you will start to develop a list of a few essential characteristics for your T.I.P.  Mature singles with good discernment, that list isn’t  “Not divorced.”  Instead, the attributes start to reflect the person’s character – “generous spirit”  or “kindness” – as well as “financially stable” – and relationship skills valuing “good communicator of their emotions, wants, and needs.”  As that list refines and reflects real people and not a protect-my-wounded-heart list than their chances of finding lasting love and getting married increases exponentially.

What about you?  In business, love, and romance, what are some of the characteristics and attributes of your T.I.P.?

Happy Dating and Relationships,

April Braswell
Marriage Minded Singles Dating and Relationship Expert

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April Braswell

April Braswell is internationally recognized as America's Midlife Dating and Relationship Mentor and the award winning expert columnist at DatingAdvice.com. Bringing over 40 years of Sales and Marketing expertise, April is a the trusted Small Business Consultant and Coach to Leading Executives and Emerging Leaders. Author of best seller, Get Swipe Right. April coaches marriage-minded men and women to find and attract love, your best life partner. Life Love Love relationship. Love after 40 and 50. Photos appear by licenses with iStock. All rights reserved.

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Comments

  1. Wow. It is interesting to read how testing out clients and mates is parallel. I am really in the beginning states of determining my TIP, both in business and personally, so I’m not sure I have a list yet. But I am inspired by your post to make a preliminary list for both!

    Michelle

  4. This is an excellent exercise for both singles looking for a partner as well as business people.

    The act of thinking this through- who are my ideal clients? forces us to think in new ways and look for commonalities.

    Seize the Day,
    Rob

  6. Arpil I like your adivce here.

    I never thought that I had to stretcha little bit socially after a rut.

    I am in a rut right now and feel I need to get out of it.

    time to go and drink a lot of water and start meeting more people.

    michael

  7. You’ve hit the nail on the head again April. You have to know the client/date you’re looking for.

    In my business, I weed out anyone that is looking for a “discount.” Those people are never going to be happy. They don’t value what I bring to the table that helps them with their problem. I’m looking for the person that wants “maximum experience.” That is what separates Disney World from a local country fair. You’re going to walk away from Disney world with a whold different set of experiences than you’re going to get at the fair.

    Tim Van Milligan, helping you Make Money Online, God’s Way!

  8. target ideal prospective, I like that term. Dating is really a science and an art.

    Robert Kaufer

  9. Hi Tim,

    thank you for stopping by and reading my dating advice and tips blog. That is a great analogy to compare Disney World and the State Fair. “Maximum Experience” could also be a fun double entendre in my world. lol. However, yes, that is precisely the point.

    Thanks for commenting!

    Happy Dating and Relationships,

    April

  10. Excellent advise April!…In both business and relationship you need your ideal target..you also need to work to find what fits best in a business/raltionship…because you can’t hit the target you don’t aim at.

  11. April,

    As always you give great advice. Chamber of Commerce is a place I’d probably not go to promote my business but I’m thinking about it now!

    I used to belong to the Business and Professional Women (BPW) local chapter and really loved it. We got several new gym members that way. Also, the weelky business meeting groups are a good choice but you have to work it and be there every week…and of course I can’t think of any names right now.

    Sabrina Peterson, NASM CPT,CES
    Corrective Exercise for Every Body

  12. April, real good post. I used to belong to a leads group and one of the excercies we would do is define our target client and then share that with the group, so that we could be on the lookout for leads for each other. It forced us to take a more focused look at our own targets!
    Sonya Lenzo

  13. Good advice. I had a friend in college who was in a relationship with her high school sweetheart who wasn’t going to college. After she had been away for a while he proposed and she said she’d think about it. Our girl group was shocked to say the least as we all wished to be proposed to someday! But this gal was smart, like you April, she told us yes she loved the guy but he wasn’t what she wanted for her life. She had a goal of a stable marriage with financial security and she didn’t feel he could provide that for her. She really thought more strategically than the rest of us girls at that time.

    More people should define a target ideal prospective for themselves. I think marriages and relationships would be better all around.

  14. This is excellent advice in so many ways.
    In copywriting, the legendary John Carlton teaches exactly what you shared here.
    Before you write one word of sales copy you have to know who you are writing for—who your target market is.

    The way you tie it into dating is perfect because if we aren’t sure who we’re looking for, we’re bound to keep wandering around aimlessly when the type of person we want is three blocks away doing something they enjoy doing.

    Michael
    The Success Secrets

  15. hmmm…T.I.P for romance would be someone named Steve. I dated 3 steve’s in a row and couldn’t have planned it if I had tried. So I got the the name right but 3’s a charm when I finally got the man right.

    On a different note, I have a client who is trying online dating on a free site called plentyoffish. He wants to try a pay site because he feels the people signing up will be different…what do you think as the dating expert?

    Jen B
    The Harwood Group – Tinnitus, Chronic Illness, Fears, and Anxiety

  16. You make a good point in the last paragraph about basically look for what you want instead of looking for what you don’t want in a relationship.

    Shane

  17. You always talk about going on lots of dates and it made me think of a question – what happens if you start dating and the first person you date is your T.I.P. and you fall for them and don’t want to date anyone else. Aren’t people’s feelings hurt when you date someone else even if it isn’t serious? If I was single and met a guy, and he asked me out on a date, and we went out and had a nice time, then I saw him out on a date with someone else a few days later, I would be offended. I would be hurt and assume that he wasn’t that interested in me if he’s already moved on to someone else.

    Lisa McLellan
    Babysitting Services, Nanny Services, and Nanny agencies

  19. I have never heard it put as T.I.P. before but it works. I need to know what I am looking for in clients like you say if not I do not have the amount of clients I want but I get the ones I dont want.

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