A few hours ago I finished reading a very thought provoking post entitled “Why Create an “Ideal Reader”? at findableblogs.com. The practice put forth here can not only serve well to the average blogger but also to just about anyone involved in the business world, from entrepreneurs to sales reps. It has to do with pinpointing your ideal reader or in a broader sense, your target market thus allowing you to have greater focus in both your writing and your overall branding strategy. With your ideal reader in mind you can now criticize, edit, publish or discard content accordingly. Know what the “customer” will respond to is the first step in creating a successful product, whether that product be your writing or your entire brand. So I decided the spend a bit of time trying to visualize my ideal reader and here is what I came up with.
My “ideal reader” is named Ben. Ben is 25yrs. old, very entrepreneurial in spirit and lets it shine through in his current 9-5. He is not at all unhappy in his position as a product manager for a local manufacturing company but he sees it only as a stepping stone to future aspirations. He has not quite achieved his goals at this point but has a particular vision of life that he is constantly working towards and is in the early stages of laying a strong foundation. He has a very interesting idea for a social networking site in an untapped market and spends a great deal of his time developing. He understands the current and future influence of the internet/technology in relation to business and life in general and enjoys learning about and understanding it’s applications. He also understands the need for a product to be both functional and visually pleasing and is therefore very interested in all things design. He is a sponge for knowledge soaking in anything and everything related to his choosen field of interest scouring various news sources and blogs for inspiring information. Although he does not subscribe to any one particular magazine you may find titles like Inc. or Computer Arts lying around his desk. He actively participates in a number of social networking sites staying logged in for what may be far to many hours of the day. Failure to him is only a setback and not an end but a learning experience. Years from now he sees himself passing on his knowledge to an audience eager to learn from his experiences. In the end he feels that no opportunity was wasted and he put forth his best effort in achieving his life’s work.
Ok so that may be a bit broader than she suggest in her article but I believe that I did a pretty decent job of narrowing down my ideal reader. Please note that it is not my intention to write for an all male population, Ben could just as easily be Cindy. She is also very much like Ben which makes them quite good friends but unfortunately very incompatible otherwise.
I want to extend a thanks to Sarah Lewis at www.findableblogs.com for her article, I think I may have just learned something about my own blog.
