Market segmentation with a twist of Sales

Recently I have been working on different ideas for improvement on Sales strategies and from my experience now I see that sometimes there are things we miss out in the whole process. Here is something that I consider important and necessary in Sales - Market segmentation. A thing that is mostly used in Marketing rather than Sales. However I do believe it can help a lot to Sales people and here is my little twist of the whole theory, that has helped me in my Sales practice.

What is Market Segmentation?

Definition - dividing all possible customers into groups based on different criteria: education, income, age and etc. Usually it is used in Marketing to create a good marketing plan, to position a company and a product for relevant consumers, but not so often to train Sales people to use it.

Here are the 4 most commonly used segmentation groups:

1) Demographic segmentation.

2) Behavioral segmentation.

3) Psychographic segmentation.

4) Geographic segmentation.

Now for me, when it comes to Sales any kind of division or example of placing people, companies, factors, industries or whatever you may think of that might be useful to know about your clients/customers, is segmentation. Why?

Creating your own groups of all of the above and fitting them into something that matches your model of work and your company’s services and business, is more important, than matching the theory itself.

I am not saying theory is wrong of course, as it has proven throughout the years and it was created by people with much more experience than me.

But think about it this way: any kind of grouping or structured information that will give you a better way of knowing your clients is important. So we go to my next point…

Why do we need it?

In Sales one of the most important things is to get into the head of your client. To know where to find him, to know what is his/her interest, to know what are his values and what triggers his/hers “yes” at the end. Segmentation is something that gives you the option to anticipate all these things. There are researches that show behavior of certain groups and knowing that is priceless.

The more knowledge you have about your potential clients, the better chance you stand in finding them and understanding what will make them choose you.

How do we do that?

Think about your business for a while and start asking yourself questions about it? Simple questions like:

Are you in B2B or B2C?

Are you selling services or goods?

What exactly are your products?

Who do you imagine will buy them? Countries? Companies? Men? Women?

Start searching online for potential clients and see what they like, how they react on various information and what they choose at the end. We are in the age of Social Medias and everyone is releasing so much information, we sometimes do not need research agencies to do that for us.

Look around – who is visiting where? Who works in your company?

Separate your current clients into groups, see if there are similar features between any of them? Age, location, hobbies and whatever you think of?

At the end you will see the whole puzzle will clear out. You will see a frame of at least a few groups and from your own experience you will know who they are and where to find them. After that is easy, you already know your customers well.

As a conclusion

I know my article is not the typical full of theory and facts post about such a topic as Market Segmentation. But I do believe the standard segmentation for Sales, where you research, make a profile and divide products based on the segments, is not the only way. Market Segmentation as I understand it is very useful for Sales people and it has helped me a lot in the past. It gives us an insight about what makes our potential customer’s mind do a “click” and choose us over someone else. At the end this is what is important, right?