How to Get Replies from Your Dream Customers

Every chance you get to talk to your ideal customer is an opportunity to make your product or service better. Especially when you’re just starting to build something.

Because when you get a chance to talk to ideal customers, you can get more clarity on:

• Their biggest problems
• What they’ve tried to fix them
• How much their problem is costing them (or their business)
• What they want in a solution

And more. This information is pure gold for any entrepreneur.

But what can you do if you’re struggling to find ideal customers to talk to?

How To Find Ideal Prospects To Talk To

That’s the question a Creator MBA student asked me in a recent event.

“I want to talk to more prospects to learn about their challenges. But when I reach out, I don’t get much of a response. What kind of message would you send? ”

What a great question, and it has a two-step answer:

First you have to find your ideal prospects.

Then you have to send a compelling message that warrants a response.

Let’s dive in.

Part 1: Finding Your Ideal Prospects

While LinkedIn is great, I think X (Twitter) advanced search is the easiest way to find people who are talking about your niche and asking questions (that your business can hopefully solve).

But you’ll never see those questions unless you’re connected with (or following) the right people.

For example, if you’re building a product or service that is related to on-page SEO, it would be nice to know who is talking about that on X.

I’d run a simple search: “On-page SEO” min_faves:50

This search will surface content that has the phrase “On-page SEO” and has a minimum of 50 likes. It’s a great place to start.

As you can see in the example above, Hridoy Rehman comes up a few times in our search. Sounds like he’s someone that talks about on-page SEO. If that’s your niche, this is the beginning of a treasure map.

Next, I’d click into who Hridoy is following.

Looks like a lot of other folks who are also talking about SEO! I’d follow each of these people. They may not be your ideal prospects — but the people who follow them and engage with their content will likely be.

You’ll have to start monitoring content and engagement among these folks to learn about these people and find out what they’re about.

Part 2: Reaching Out To Your Ideal Prospects

So next, I want you to set up alerts for these accounts. And when their content comes out, skim the comments.

Is anyone asking a question that indicates they could be your ideal prospect? If so, that’s the exact type of person you want to learn from.

Shoot them a message like this:

Hi Megan —

Saw your question on Hridoy’s Tweet this morning about the best way to measure if your SEO is improving month-over-month. ← Relevancy

It’s a bit easier than you might think. You can set up Google Search Console and it will give you automatic insights every month. ← Expertise

It’s kinda tricky to set up if you’re not familiar with it, but I’d be happy to do it free of charge. No sales pitch. In return I would love a few minutes to ask you some questions (I’m building a new SEO business and you’re the ideal customer). ← A no-brainer offer

If you’re swamped — no worries! Just figured I could solve this pretty quickly so you wouldn’t have to deal with the headache. ← An easy out if they’re not interested

Cheers,

Jim

This short note does 4 things well:

1. Has relevancy because you’re speaking about a question they asked.
2. Shows off a bit of your expertise by answering their question.
3. Makes them a ‘no-brainer’ offer to do it for them in exchange for some time.
4. Gives them an easy out if they’re not interested.

It’s a great cold DM, IMO. Hard to ignore, as the recipient.

In Summary

I hope this little lesson gives you the game plan (and confidence) to attack your cold outreach in a more strategic and productive way. Because finding and engaging with ideal prospects is one of the most important things an entrepreneur can do to improve their products or services.

As you give this a try, I want you to keep these things in mind:

1. Use X advanced search to find people discussing your niche and asking good questions.
2. Follow the right people and those they engage with to identify potential ideal customers.
3. Set up alerts for these accounts and monitor comments for questions that indicate someone could be an ideal prospect.
4. Reach out to them with a personalized message that demonstrates relevance, expertise, and offers a no-brainer solution in exchange for their valuable insights, while giving them an easy out if they're not interested.

Try it this week with 3-5 people.

You’ll gain valuable insights from the folks you talk to, and your product or service will surely benefit from the conversations to come.

And if you’re interested in learning more strategies like this one, check out The Creator MBA.

The Creator MBA is my new flagship course - a comprehensive guide for building and launching successful online businesses. It’s designed to help you avoid common pitfalls (like sending cold DMs that get ignored) and to help you leverage effective strategies to grow your business.

And that’s all for today.

See you next week.