Is Marketing To Who Your Best Clients Are Enough?

In marketing, one of the first things you are taught to do when you have a product or service that needs promotion is define your client. Who are the people who are going to buy this item from your company? There are many details that get mapped out at this stage:

• Age
• Gender
• Marital Status
• Income
• Occupation
• Hobbies
• Number (if any) of Children
• Location
• Social Network Usage
• etc...

This is an excellent way to find out who your best client actually is. But is that the best way to get them to buy your product?

Writers and Social Interaction

            As a writer, I struggle with social interaction. Not in the sense that I’m awkward and don’t have the ability to relate to others – no, social interactions just take too much energy. A social event often has to be special or involve my closest friends for me to be interested.

            Many other writers are this way as well. This is because we are introverts. I would have never guessed this about myself. I am confident at public speaking and don’t mind teaching or leading others regularly. Two years ago, I was teaching a weekly adult class at church, speaking monthly at a prison, and creating teaching materials for a class I taught new-hires at work. That doesn’t sound like the typical life of an introvert. But what I learned was that introverts aren’t necessarily anti-social, they simply use a lot of energy to be social. They need lots of alone time to recuperate after social events.

            Extroverts, on the other hand, gain energy by being social, and being alone and reflective uses a lot of energy. Most people in American society are extroverts, and there’s a lot of misunderstanding between these two groups.

            Even the most introverted among us has social needs, however. And everyone, introverted or not, needs to stretch outside their own comfort zones and create relationships with others. This is especially true with writers and marketers, who rely on relationships to gain clients and market their work. So what's an introvert to do?

Take Care of Your Body to Boost Your Mind

As writers, or really as professionals in most settings, we spend a lot of time sitting in an office behind a computer screen. We focus largely on mental work, and our physical bodies are often neglected. Unfortunately this leads to a huge variety of health problems. Obesity, heart disease, and even diabetes can be caused simply by sitting for long periods of time with no breaks. An article from Women's Health also noted that regular exercise after sitting may not be enough - you actually need to take breaks from your sitting time if you want to take care of your health. Even a walk to the coffee machine or water cooler would be an improvement.

Many of us would make the excuse that we simply don't have time in our busy day to get up and move around. We get into creative flow - or we look for creative flow - and we don't want to interrupt that by distracting our minds with something else. We think that sitting still and focusing makes us better writers and better employees. However, studies have shown a strong link between a sedentary lifestyle and mental health issues, such as depression and anxiety.

As writers, or professionals of any sort, we can't afford to be plagued by these physical and mental issues if we want to produce our best work.

Writing When You're Stumped

The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog. 

Sometimes the content requests you receive from clients - or need for yourself - will leave you stumped. What is there to say about brown foxes and lazy dogs? It's so cliché - hasn't it been said before? What new do you have to add?

At times like these, you may need a boost of inspiration to get started writing. Here are some steps that can help: