You never realize how much STUFF you have until you have to move it. We all have closets, drawers, and other hiding places that keep our stuff organized and out of sight, Simply go to any closet or dresser and lay out all the stuff on the floor and you will see what I mean. Now imagine doing that for every closet, dresser, and shelf or bin in your home or office?

In the process of prepping my home for sale (which finally sold last week), I already moved my desk and cleaned out the office closet. That was a major purge of labels for business cards, CDs, plastic CD cases, and tons of stuff that is just not used anymore. They all had a “someday I'll need this,” status when they were stored, but they went to a “why did I keep this?” status when faced with the prospect of putting it in a box and moving it to a smaller house 1000 miles away.

My goal is to fill up an 8'x8'x8′ container with all the stuff we need to take. That has been almost a year journey to empty out a 3500-square-foot house with 40 years of collected stuff from Kim's and my 60 years of life each. We are in the final phase of selling the furniture, and I just sold my desk. That means I'll be moving all my office equipment again to move the desk out while still running a business.

More or Less

When it comes to marketing a business, people often conflate, more, as a good thing. Clients often ask, “How can we get more traffic to our website?”, or “How can we create more engagement on social media?”. That “MORE” often comes with a cost. It takes money to drive more traffic to your website, emails, or social posts because traffic is a commodity that often costs in the form of advertising.

There is no easy way to assure even the most targeted ads are attracting the kind of customers who have the need, budget, and desire to work with a company that is new to them. Companies try to reach the broadest audience possible with the idea that the bigger the reach, the better the chance of finding that perfect new customer.

I have found that this can be effective to reach a bigger audience, but when you look at the actual cost of acquiring new customers, it can often become a big waste of time and money. So how do we find new buyers if we don't want to spray and pray our advertising dollars?

The Money Is In The List

When social media was just starting out, experts were touting “Build Your Audience”. All the email gurus talk about “Build Your List”. Many affiliate marketers would not even talk to you unless you had an email list that had 5000 people on it. Social media people would not want to be interviewed on my podcast unless I had a following of 10,000 fans & followers. Linkedin marketing gurus want to you hit your 30,000 connection limit.

I am here to tell you that I tried all of that, and yet the results were less than stellar. You can collect names like Pokémon cards, but keeping people on your lists when all you do is sell stuff is like playing a game of Whack-A-Mole. ´

Social media has limited what people see so you are lucky if 2% of your audience ever sees your stuff without buying ads. Email is getting harder to deliver with spam blocking software. Most lists are considered doing great if they get 20% opens and 5% click-throughs. So people keep sending more with the hope that more will see it.

This has caused me to re-think my methods and I can say I've removed a lot of stress, wasted time, and clutter by purging.

Less is More

What do you think is easier? Could you convince 10 people to spend $1,000 per month? Or could you sell 1000 people to spend $10 a month? Most people believe that it's easier to get people to spend $10 per month, but did you notice I said convince 10 versus sell 1000?

Both will have attrition and will require you to continue to replace those dropping off the programs. But there is one key difference that stands out to me. It's much easier to communicate with 10 people than it is to engage 1000 people. People will only keep buying what you have to sell if they continue to find value in it.

Those 1000 people will be a mix of some who find value while others are just forgetting or ignoring the $10 monthly charge. The 10 people will only pay $1000 per month if they find value in what you are providing. It's kinda hard to ignore a $1000 a month (or more).

You May Only Need 10

I often work with businesses that understand ROI. I ask them, “What does one customer mean to you in the case of sales and additional income?” Usually, one customer equates to thousands or tens of thousands in sales. So we work hard at attracting a few new prospects. Then we communicate with them in the hope of turning 10 prospects into 1 new customer.

The beauty of focusing on only 10 at a time, is you can communicate with two people per day, 5 days a week, and reach every single person with a personal exchange of ideas.

It's so much easier to maintain an authentic, profitable relationship with a smaller and more focused audience than trying to please 1000 differing personalities, situations, and needs.

I understand every business has different products, services, and audiences, but I think it's worth looking at how you can get the same or even better results with less. I'm not suggesting taking all your client's files, placing them on the floor, and purging the ones that are not profitable (like I did with office supplies). I am suggesting looking at your business, your time, and your methods to see if you can simplify your process by building relationships versus building audiences.

Final Thoughts

Relationships take time to establish and time to maintain. You will get better results by being intentional and making appointments. As I stated in a past post, you should find people with the bandwidth to commit to meeting on a regular basis. This will help both of you invest in a mutual exchange of ideas, empathy, and ultimately business (directly or indirectly).

As we start to pack up our items, we have an internal conversation with ourselves, “Do we really need or use this?” The joy of recycling or donating that stuff is real because we know that if we ever need it again, we can buy it again. When it comes to moving, less costs less, and more costs more. Call me Captain Obvious… but moving less takes less time also!

“But when we really delve into the reasons for why we can’t let something go, there are only two: an attachment to the past or a fear for the future.”

― Marie Kondo

I would love to hear your thoughts on how you could focus on your 10. Have you been disillusioned or had success with advertising? Are you blending small sales with bigger ones and do you feel they have equal value for your business? Are you investing time to build better relationships with your perfect customers?

Comment below and share your thoughts, ideas, or questions about building relationships with your perfect customers.

To learn more about this and other topics on B2b Sales & Marketing, visit our podcast website at The Bacon Podcast.