by Marc McNaughton

There are two ways you can market your company. You can:

1. Broadcast your message to the winds, hoping the right people will see it. This works best for companies that sell to end-consumers.
2. Select highly-specific targets. This works best for business-to-business marketing, especially where your firm has an established sales force.

Since The McNaughton Group specializes in business-to-business marketing, we're going to focus here upon the latter, targeted, method.

Before you can even begin to do targeted marketing, you need a list of targets, right?

This list is your Dream Team.

Your Dream Team is the list of target companies with whom you most want to work. They're Mt. Everest. They're the clients who will add most to your own success. If you win business from companies like this, your own business would grow financially and in the direction that promotes future success. How many do you choose? In my own experience, the number should be no fewer than three and no more than ten. Five seems to be the magic number; the best compromise between a list that is too big to focus upon and one that puts all your sales eggs in too few baskets.

Think about your own Dream Team. How do you select them? I use the following six criteria in selecting my own:

1. Their business is one that actually uses significant amounts of your type of product or service.
2. Their requirements are a good fit for your own capabilities - especially if they could make use of your profit centers to directly improve their own sales or bottom line.
3. They have a stable business already, but are 'hungry' to expand their sales, too.
4. They pay their bills on time (there are ways to check this online for most larger companies).
5. Their name and materials will be good for marketing your business to other potential clients. Done right, this can be an ever-expanding network of good referrals/references.

   And then there's the magic sixth criteria, which can make all the difference in the world:

6. Their product or service is something you personally find interesting or are passionate about.

Don't underestimate the power of that last one - you'll be a lot more motivated to work to your best with these people than someone who sells something you don't care about!

Assemble your Dream Team very carefully. It takes a little research, but you probably have plenty of contacts in your industry who can give you the information you need.

If you'd like help implementing this idea for your own business, please contact me.

See the Questions Archive.