Peter Winick argues that consultants waste time targeting clients by demographics like company size or job title when actual buying decisions come down to psychographics: risk tolerance, openness to ideas, and whether someone operates from scarcity or abundance. You find these traits only through real conversations, not LinkedIn searches.
Hi there, it's Peter Winick. I'm the founder and CEO at Thought Leadership Leverage, and here's the idea that I'd like to share with you today, and that's this: far too often what I see in my work with thought leaders and experts, consultants, advisors, etc., is that when they're looking to speak with clients, they think demographically. However, more often than not, a client is buying psychographically. What do I mean by that? Yes, you might say that I work with technology companies that are newly funded between X dollars and Y dollars. You might say that I'm working with a function, right? I work with CMOs, and that's all fine and dandy, and that's demographics, right? We can do easy searches on things like LinkedIn to find people like that. But the psychographic issues, the things like someone's risk tolerance, someone's openness to a new idea, is someone a lifelong learner? Do they come from a scarcity mindset or a mindset of abundance? They don't show up so easily on searches, right? You get that information from having real conversations with folks and getting into their head a little bit and understanding what drives them and what motivates them. So my thought, my suggestion is, are you positioning yourself to succeed when engaging in those conversations from a psychographic perspective, or are you only focused on the demographic? Thoughts? Reactions? Love to hear them. Thanks, Peter.
