…Or they can ruin you in 6 months.

The three biggest problems online marketers face are:

1: Not getting new people to join your email list, read your blog or join your social media platforms.

2: Not getting readers to open emails, engage, talk, hang out of social media or share content.

3: Not getting readers and subscribers to buy stuff.

All three of these problems can be solved when you get clear on your avatar and your statement of value (SOV).

Your avatar is your character profile of the exact person you want on your list, visiting your blog and engaging on social media.

In any niche, there can be dozens or hundreds of different prospects.

The mistake online marketers make is not knowing the best prospect to reach who will purchase their offers.

And the solution is to get clear on your ideal avatar. Find the exact person who wants what you are selling, and selling becomes a breeze.

What’s more, your statement of value is also essential to your success, which we’ll cover in a moment.

Your Avatar:

Ideally your goal is to target the exact buyer you seek, talk to them about exactly what they want to talk about and then offer them the exact solution that will fix their problem.

I see marketers all the time who are trying to target everyone who wants to be happy, or everyone who wants to lose weight, or everyone with an interest in golf. That’s a recipe for disaster.

If your avatar is too vague – or worse yet, if you don’t have an avatar – then marketing becomes like trying to swim upstream while wearing your collection of bowling balls. It’s way too much work, you’re going to have to be a very strong, expert swimmer and still you’re just not going to make much progress, if any.

People buy to experience pleasure or to avoid pain. That’s why you should look for a person’s wants, needs, desires, fears, frustrations and problems.

Creating this avatar is going to get you clear on who to target and what to say to them through your content.

In fact, when you’re clear on your avatar, your marketing becomes far easier, you make more sales with less effort and your entire business becomes more of a joy than of work.

Here is an avatar template to use every time you enter a new market or even promote a new product.

Do your research on the appropriate forums, social media groups and Facebook Groups in particular, wining advertising, Amazon reviews and anyplace your prospects hang out to find this information. Facebook insights can be a great place to start.

If you must initially take a few guesses, that’s alright. You can refine your avatar as you go. Guessing incorrectly and refining is much better than not having any avatar at all.

Avatar Template

Basic Info:

Gender
Age
Relationship status
Education level
Occupation
Job title
Location
Interests
Annual Income

Digging Deeper – The following 7 items will all have multiple answers inside the realm of your particular niche.

Wants: What does she want most of all? What is her goal?

Needs: What does she have to have to make her goal happen?

Desires: What are her desires on a very personal and emotional level?

Fears: What is keeping her awake at night?

Frustrations: What is stopping her from achieving her goal?

Problems: What are the problems she faces is trying to achieve her goal?

Desired Outcome: If all goes well, what does her outcome look like?

Example Avatar for a Paleo Weight Loss Product:

Paleo Pam; woman; age 50; married with 2 grown, unmarried children; 4 years of college; office manager at a large dental clinic; lives in Cincinnati, Ohio; loves crafts, television and sewing; $65K income.

Wants:

To know what to eat and what foods to avoid on Paleo.
A plan to lose 50 pounds and keep it off.
Recipes that don’t take a lot of time to prepare, are easy and delicious.

Needs:

Her paleo questions answered.
Encouragement and motivation for the times she feels like giving up.
To feel like she is not alone on her Paleo weight loss journey.

Desires:

To be slim and healthy with lots of energy.
To feel confident, to love how she looks in the mirror.
To be proud of herself and to have her husband be proud of her, too.

Fears:

That this is just another diet failure in the making.
That she is losing her health and her quality of life.
That this is her last chance to finally lose the weight and keep it off.
If she has grandchildren, she might not live to see them grow up.

Frustrations:

She doesn’t understand paleo, what to eat, when to eat.
She doesn’t know where to begin.
There is conflicting information and she doesn’t know what’s right.

Problems:

She’s unhealthy. She’s had a recent health scare and her doctor says to lose the weight now or face dire consequences.
Her weight seems to affect everything about her life negatively.
She’s on prescription meds for her medical condition and the side effects are unpleasant.
Her husband has lost all interest in being intimate with her and she thinks it’s her fault.
Her clothes don’t fit (again) and she can’t bear the thought of once again buying bigger clothes.

Outcome:

Pam has lost the weight.
She looks great, feels great, and her confidence is sky high.
She loves how she looks in the mirror and in photos.
She lost the weight without starving and now she finds it’s easy to keep the weight off, too.
Her husband is proud of her and pays more attention to her. Her clothes fit and she has more energy.
Her health problems have diminished greatly and she’s no longer on medication.

Please note, this example avatar is just that – an example. Please do your own research for your own niche or products.

Do you see how much easier it will be for you to now speak directly to Paleo Pam in all of your content? And can you imagine how much easier it will be for you to sell her the solution she needs now that you understand her better?

And you can even custom tailor your offers to her to make sure she is getting everything she needs from you. For example, if you look at her needs, you’ll see that all three of them could be taken care of with a bonus private Facebook Group where she can connect with others who are just like her, as well as getting questions answered by you or someone who understands Paleo.

The biggest mistake I see marketers making on their avatar is not focusing on URGENT problems. You’ll notice that Paleo Pam needed to lose 50 pounds, not 5 pounds. And she’s having health challenges that are serious.

This is someone who is MOTIVATED to do something about her problem right away. When you show her that you understand her and you have the solution she seeks, she’s not going to balk on price or need time to think about it. She’s going to jump on your offer like her life depends on it, because in this case it probably does.

When you research your prospect, you’re going to see they have MANY problems – so much so that it can become overwhelming to you. Your best bet is to figure out which problems are urgent, identify the exact prospects who have this urgent problem and then find them the solution.

People whose backs are to the wall are ready to buy and buy now. They need a solution right away because without it their problem will only get worse.

But there’s one more step to take:

Your Statement of Value

This is a simple statement that gets you clear on the value you must provide to your ideal avatar. This ensures your avatar feels like their needs are being met by you, which in turn ensures they continue to open your emails, read your blogposts and buy your stuff. Without an SOV your prospects may become bored or leave because you are not serving their needs and interests.

When you couple your SOV with your Avatar, you’ll know how to attract all the right people onto your lists and social media accounts.

Here’s the SOV formula: Your content (website, emails, videos, social media, etc.) gives your ideal Avatar the ability to enjoy their ultimate desired outcome.

You can only complete this statement of value after you’ve completed your Avatar.

For the example Avatar we created earlier, your SOV might be:

FastPaleoSuccess.com gives Pam an easy plan for losing 50 pounds in 120 days and keeping it off so she can have more energy, be healthier, feel more confident and attractive and make her husband notice her again.

This is just an example. If I were really putting together a Paleo website I would put a great deal more time and research into this, but you get the idea.

Your SOV encapsulates and clarifies the mission you are embarking upon with your site, your campaign or whatever it is that you are doing.

And with your SOV and your Avatar in hand, you’ll know exactly what kind of content to create, what to put in your emails and social media posts and how to sell your products.

Making the effort to create an Avatar and SOV will save you a ton of time. No longer will you create content that isn’t suited for your audience or build your list with people who aren’t responsive to your offers. You’ll know exactly who your customers are, how to reach them and what to offer them.

Bottom line: You’ll be able to earn more while doing less because you’ll do a better job of making your customers happy – perhaps more so than anyone else in your niche.