When starting your own business an important question to answer is “who is your target client?”. Who are you servicing and who is going to work with you or who are you working with? In other words who is your “ideal client”?
Below I’m describing the thought process that I had with multiple people over the last few years. These people were business coaches, industry partners, employees, friends and family. This is the result of pondering over something over and over as it just didn’t sit well with me until it did! Only just recently, and although I wish this moment of clarity had come to me a while back, I am so thankful it came to me when it did. To me, this proves again that ideas and clarity only come to you when you’re ready for it!
Who do we work with?
For the longest time I would answer this question with: We work with Sole Proprietors, Not for Profits and Corporations. Well that means pretty much everyone, no? And I know pretty darn well I can’t work with everyone. So I went on a journey to answer this question more specifically.
The next question was asked. Who is the ideal person you want to work with? We like to work with people who understand the need of bookkeeping, people who are somewhat tech savvy, and people who want to learn about cloud accounting. Ok that’s a bit better, but still probably 90% of the population…. Uhmm why is this so hard?
Next suggestion was just pick an industry you like best. Well pretty much all our clients are in different industries and that’s what I like! I like the variety and so does the rest of the team!
I had to “walk away” from this question as the obvious answers kept popping back up in my head but nothing new. I just told myself it was ok to serve everyone and to keep the door open for anyone who wanted to work with us. Why not? Well, because it doesn’t work.
Last try! The lightbulb moment!
Recently I started working with a new business coach for a real specific need. She started with this question: what industry do you like to work with? I told her I couldn’t pick one for the reason explained above – it’s more about the environment and less about industry for me!
Let’s try this, she said: what do most of your clients have in common with Day2Day Books? Ok – Now we are talking!
- All of our clients are located in small mountain towns
- All of our clients are looking for the same work life balance as we do
- All of our clients are mountain enthusiasts – they love the lifestyle
- Most of our clients’ businesses are impacted by the seasonality that comes with having a business in a mountain town!
YES! That was it! I was so excited when I said this and even now when I write this out. This is exactly who I want to serve. This is exactly why I started Day2Day Books in the first place! My goal was and is to provide professional bookkeeping services to small businesses and to create local / professional jobs in small towns. To work with like minded people, to offer a work environment that’s hybrid and flows with the seasons and people’s business or personal needs. All this time I was already doing what I wanted, I just had a hard time connecting the dots and formulating what that was. But not anymore, I know exactly who we love working with!
If you recognize yourself in this article and you want to either with or for Day2Day Books, please contact us via inquiries@day2daybooks.com, we can’t wait to work together.