Clarifying the target customer is the first step in building a scalable sales and marketing strategy. It's also critical for startups striving to launch and grow in an evolving, competitive market. The strategic process begins with building an Ideal Customer Profile (ICP), a detailed description of the individual most likely to benefit from and want what the company offers and become a loyal advocate.
For early-stage companies, in particular, the process of building an ICP can feel antithetical to the goal of building reach for a product or service. But as the saying goes, "If you serve everyone, you serve no one." Rest assured, a singular ICP does not mean a company can't have other target audiences or customers. It merely identifies the one audience or customer that is the best fit for what the business offers – whether because of their demographic, their pain points, or their decision-making processes.
Ultimately, an ICP will help a startup concentrate its—often limited—time and resources. Focusing on the 'best fit' customer will also likely yield a higher return on investment because it helps the company allocate resources effectively, targeting marketing campaigns and sales efforts toward the most receptive, responsive audience. And the company will have a reliable baseline for tracking how well it performs as it evolves and scales, providing insights necessary to refine its revenue operations.
While homing in on a singular ICP may seem daunting, it can be fairly straightforward. It demands focus and patience to identify and iterate the details. Begin with the details you think you know about your target audiences, then hone them.
Include company size, location, industry, and decision-maker titles to define the target market. This process includes identifying the type of company (industry, size), decision-maker roles, and any relevant demographic details of your ideal customer.
Understand the target audience's problem-solving approach, buying process, and pain points. Consider their decision-making process, value drivers, and pain points to begin to tailor messaging and outreach approaches.
Understand your ideal customer's problems and describe how your product or service uniquely solves them. Doing so will inform your central value proposition and help to make sure it resonates with your ICP. It is critical to understand the specific problems your ideal customers face and how your product or service uniquely solves them.
Once you have built the profile you think is your ICP, expect to spend two or three quarters assessing and honing the profile. You don't need to conduct an expensive market research project to learn what you need to know.
Choose the highest probable segment that has plenty of prospects, that has the ability to pay, that has shown that the segment needs it, that you have a repeatable process and go after exclusively that particular ICP for two to three quarters. Learn that whole entire process, and you can always expand your ICP once you can get the engine going on that. (Christy Johnson, GP and Chief Performance Officer, BIP Ventures)
Once you've built the ICP, it should be the center point of your go-to-market (GTM) strategy. Used properly, it should equip you to attract the right customers, convert leads more effectively, and achieve sustainable growth.
Precisely targeting leads based on the characteristics of your most valued customers can improve their quality and accelerate the conversion process. The marketing and sales teams (often limited in size and capacity for startups) can more efficiently allocate time, budget, and energy toward the most promising opportunities—those individuals who are most likely to have a genuine need for what the company offers. Once leads are in the funnel, an ICP provides a helpful framework for qualifying leads. And, perhaps most importantly, targeting lead generation efforts to an ICP raises the chance of higher conversion rates, long-term customer satisfaction, and retention.
The ICP is vital for creating efficiencies and effectiveness in the sales team. It should guide how the team identifies, prioritizes, and targets qualified high-potential prospects. Doing so leads to more relevant, compelling sales pitches that address specific pain points. These conversations tend to be more persuasive because they are more personalized and appropriate to where the prospect is in the decision-making process. Ultimately – and importantly – a well-made ICP is shown to increase conversion rates.
The ICP should inform content creation. Consider the questions they ask and challenges they have, then create content that proactively answers those needs. It will show the target audience that you're listening, you understand them, and you care about their needs. The more the content marketing channels (e.g., website, blogs and assets, digital marketing, social media) resonate, the stickier your company becomes. You'll be more successful with pulling the customer into and through the sales process.
As the company works to strengthen its market position, showing up in a way that shows target customers you understand and are responsive to them can be a powerful competitor differentiator. If the ICP informs a core value proposition that directly and crisply addresses the most critical pain points of the target audience, the company is likely to be more appealing than its competitors. Detailed customer and market knowledge can also inform continuous market research that helps to refine offerings to keep them relevant and more satisfying to customers. The marketing and sales campaigns around those offerings can also be more concentrated and tailored to the most promising targets. And from a customer satisfaction standpoint, knowledge of specific pain points helps responsiveness, which leads to better experience and higher loyalty rates.
Tactically, an ICP aligns sales and marketing teams around a shared understanding of the target customer, fostering better collaboration and coordination. Both teams can use the ICP as a basis for measuring success, ensuring that marketing efforts generate valuable leads for the sales team. The shared performance data allows both teams to iterate strategies and tactics in a coordinated manner, keeping the company in line as it scales.
Strategically, leveraging an ICP positions a startup to sustain a deeper and more useful understanding of their highest-value customer, enabling them to differentiate their offerings, marketing, and customer experiences in the marketplace. Every aspect of the business is evidence of that knowledge and alignment. One result is a brand that resonates deeply in the market and sustains an identity that stands out and captures strong affinity. The other result is a company well-positioned to grow, gain traction, and scale in material and measurable ways because the performance metrics are meaningful and specific.
Getting everybody in the entire organization grounded... If you have an ICP, everybody knows what it's after. Everybody knows what good looks like. It’s the coordination between what's happening between sales and marketing. ICP grounds everyone on who it is we're going after and what those people value. (Christy Johnson)
As we noted at the start, while it's natural to want to capture multiple segments and more potential customers, doing so can spread a company too thin and keep the customer base too generic. It's wiser to build a company with a well-defined ICP at the center. The profile will likely evolve over time. As you learn and grow, you can expand your ICP to reach new market segments.
To every extent possible, leverage data—especially from your 'front line' teams (sales, customer support) to build, monitor, and adapt the ICP as the company scales. New information will arise, the company will release new products or services, new competitors will emerge, and market dynamics will change—these are reasons to refine the ICP. Remember, your ICP is your North Star. With it, you can navigate the complexities of the market with greater focus and purpose, increasing your chances of success as a company and across the teams working to grow it.
Watch or listen to the Extraordinary Pursuits Podcast discussion with Christy Johnson for even more expert guidance and action steps.
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