This is adapted from a Slack conversation I had with a business owner. They were curious about how to approach market research for content creation. I shared an answer focused on ‘Sales Safari,’ an approach to audience research for product creation, content creation, and marketing.
The main thing that is in the way at the moment is actually validating my hypothesis that [target audience] actually will need or care about the content I want to deliver. Ideally, I’d get to understand the type of content they like to consume, but most of it is will they want all this information or POV i’m trying to get through to them?
You’re on the right track! You want to do a sales safari (copious links follow)!
What’s a sales safari? It’s a term that Amy Hoy came up with for her approach to audience research and product creation. It works best when you have a specific niche that you’re targeting, like German Shepard owners or quilters.
A sales safari is when you go out and look at your audience and the posts they’re making: forums, social channels, tweets, posts, facebook groups, etc. Your goal is to understand what your audience is asking about, talking about, and sharing: the pains and problems they’re experiencing, the solutions they’re seeking out, the advice they’re giving, the language and terms of art they use.
A Sales Safari is a structured way of reading the tea leaves to get ‘say this, not that’ advice on what content to create. End of a sales safari has you easily creating content that makes it seem like you’re ‘reading the mind’ of your target audience.
- https://egghead.io/learn/30x500/sales-safari — good overview by a third party I trust
- https://shop.stackingthebricks.com/sales-safari-101 — amy’s $99 ’learn sales safari’ product (only way to learn it aside from their $2k+ course called 30x500)
- https://shorts.stackingthebricks.com/updating-sales-safari-2023/ — post by Amy’s business partner on how the process changed as social evolved in ‘23
- https://stackingthebricks.com/video-sales-safari-in-action/ — video from Amy showing sales safari in action
- https://stackingthebricks.com/podcast/ep42-what-is-sales-safari-with-eteinne-garbugli/ — podcast interview on their podcast about sales safari
- https://stackingthebricks.com — Amy’s main site on business
That is the process you should go through before you start creating the content for your audience – and it helps especially well . It’ll help validate the need, educate you on what the CXOs care about, and help you refine your understanding of the audience dramatically.
I took Amy’s 30x500 course and learned the sales safari methodology in 2012/2013. It is to this date the single best investment I’ve made in my business or professional development. Untold multiples of that in returns. Amazingly impactful approach. Strong recommendation.
Want guidance applying sales safari and market research to your store’s SEO and content? My SEO coaching can help you put this into practice.
Excelsior!
Kai
