Latest / The SmallBizChat with Melinda Emerson / Why SMBs Need to Research Their Target Customers with Dr. Natalia Caylor

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Why SMBs Need to Research Their Target Customers with Dr. Natalia Caylor · The SmallBizChat with Melinda Emerson

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  Three, two, one, zero.
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  Ignition.
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  Lift off.
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  Ending small business failure.
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  Welcome to the Small Biz Chat podcast with the number one small business expert, Melinda
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  Emerson.
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  Melinda's goal is to end small business failure, and she'll give you the information
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  you need to succeed and live the life you dream of.
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  Now here's your host, the small biz chat lady herself, Melinda Emerson.
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  Have you subscribed to the small biz chat podcast?
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  Well, it's time.
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  Every Wednesday, we offer listeners bite sized actionable tips to start and grow a successful
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  small business.
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  In just twenty minutes or so a week, you can get a ton of insight and resources to propel
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  your business forward.
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  Be sure to subscribe to the Small Bitch Chat podcast today.
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  Hi, everyone.
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  I wanna introduce you to my next guest.
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  Her name is doctor Natalia Infante Kahler, and she is the founder of Ola Insights, a market
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  research firm specializing in multicultural and mainstream insights.
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  As a bilingual qualitative researcher and moderator, she has helped brands and
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  organizations connect with diverse audiences through data driven strategies.
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  Her expertise guides clients in understanding cultural nuances and how they drive meaningful
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  engagement.
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  For more information, you can go to holainsights.com.
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  Natalia, welcome to the Small Bitch Chat podcast.
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  Thank you, Melina.
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  It's an honor to be here.
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  Thank you.
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  All right.
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  So tell us a little bit about you.
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  Tell us about your background and how you came to start your research company.
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  I'm raised in Paraguay in South America.
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  So I'm fully bilingual in English and Spanish.
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  I also attended Colorado State University.
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  That's where my background research.
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  I did a lot of research in multiculturalism there.
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  I also did a lot of research in the private sector, in financial and also nonprofit.
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  And then in 2019, just to save time, in 2019, I decided to open my own agency, market research
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  agency.
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  I love research, and in 2019, I opened my own research, which is research agency, Ola
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  Insights, and I've been doing market research as a full time since 2019.
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  And I haven't looked back since then.
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  I love what I do.
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  Every single day is something different and I love it.
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  Awesome, awesome.
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  So let's talk about what are the biggest mistakes that small businesses make when trying
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  to understand their customers?
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  What do you think some basic things that small business owners can do to get clear?
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  Because I think sometimes as small business owners, we get into this, well, everybody needs
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  this.
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  You know what I mean?
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  Like that's really how people think.
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  And so can you help me help my audience understand how to delineate down who their
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  paying customer actually is?
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  Yes.
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  I think when we are one, we are too attached to our own products or services, right?
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  Which is understandable.
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  I mean, it's our own baby, right?
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  We are developing our own products and services.
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  Emotionally, we are too attached to our own products and services.
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  So sometimes we tend to hear what we want to hear.
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  Oh, so and so said they love our product or they love my product, so that means it's
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  viable.
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  So that means I have to take it to market, right?
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  And actually, that's probably not true.
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  Now because my mom and my grandma and my aunt and my sister say they love my product, that
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  means it's a viable product.
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  That's when usually market research comes handy, and we can do a data driven market
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  research and show whether that is actually viable or not.
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  Also, it's a good idea to listen to the negative feedback because that's usually
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  helpful, where we can or the the business owner can understand and say, okay.
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  There's a reason why there's a negative feedback because that's usually a good way to
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  improve your product or service also.
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  There are different ways that the, a business owner can use the feedback to improve their
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  own, product or service also.
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  Now there's all these tools on here you can use to get insights and information.
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  Are there any specific tools that you like that that are affordable for the small business
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  market to really look at to really get effective market research?
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  Social media is one for small businesses that is technically free.
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  Google, Google Sheets survey through monkey SurveyMonkey.
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  Sometimes you can do some polls on Facebook, sometimes Instagram.
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  Now that doesn't mean that it's going to be completely accurate because usually, the people
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  that are following you on Instagram are following your product or services.
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  They are following because they love your product or services.
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  Right?
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  So, usually, the feedback you're going to get is most likely going to be very positive.
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  So you also wanna hear from people that are, I will say, the outliers or people that are not
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  familiar about with your services or your products.
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  And most likely, they are not going to be following you on on Instagram.
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  So how do you reach out to them?
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  They are not on your Instagram.
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  You are going to hear from people that are already your followers, and those are most
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  likely going to be positive.
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  Mhmm.
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  So that's different.
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  So the the low hanging fruits or the inexpensive one will be social media, will be
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  customers that are coming to your place, asking them questions.
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  But the most important thing will be, what do you do with the data?
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  Once you get the data, there's no point on gathering the data if you don't do anything
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  with it.
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  You have to do something with it.
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  Gather the data and then apply it.
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  Because if you gather data and you don't do anything, and if I am your customer and I
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  provided all this information for you and then I keep coming back to your store and I see that
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  my feedback didn't do anything, then I'm like, okay, I'll just go back to another story.
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  But if I see that my feedback made a difference, then I'll give you my loyalty,
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  right?
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  I'll keep coming back because I realized that, I will realize that my feedback counted that,
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  you know, I am important to you.
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  So those are things that are, I will say, low cost for a small business owner.
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  Social media is the most, I will say, low cost that I can think of.
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  Now I don't know about you, Natalia, but I hate filling out surveys.
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  I mean, like, it is horrible.
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  Like, every time you talk to any organization, they wanna will you hold for a survey or will
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  you know, we'll send you a survey.
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  So what what is the deal with that?
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  Like, how should we pursue surveys?
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  Should you actually incentivize people?
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  Like
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  Oh, yes.
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  Pay people to do surveys?
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  Because I feel like if you're not offering a, you know, $5 Starbucks gift card or something,
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  people are like, kick rocks.
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  You know?
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  Oh, yes.
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  Absolutely.
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  Absolutely.
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  If you are a storefront, I will say, offer an incentive where they can spend that money there
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  in your in your store.
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  If not, a virtual a virtual card where, if possible, they can spend something in if you
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  are providing a service, a discount so that you benefit, and then they can keep using your
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  service.
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  Mhmm.
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  That will be a very good one.
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  Because yours you it's important for you to incentivize them for their for the time they're
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  taking to fill out the survey.
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  So, yes, it it is important.
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  Yes.
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  Absolutely.
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  I love it.
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  I love it.
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  Now one of the things that I think people don't do is, like, they start their business, they
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  run it on their business plan, they get their target market research if you will, about who
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  their customer is and then they like go with that.
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  And it's like, what we learned during the pandemic, how people buy people's tastes change
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  drastically.
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  So how often should a small business owner update their ideal customer personas?
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  I will say quarterly.
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  Really?
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  Oh, yes.
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  Oh, yes.
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  People move, people change.
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  I mean, our behavior keeps changing.
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  We live in a virtual world.
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  Mhmm.
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  There's so much competition.
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  The economic trends.
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  They keep changing.
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  There's competition like a business a new business coming or a business going out of
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  business.
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  Yes.
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  It all depends also.
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  I mean, do you have a lot of competition or you don't?
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  It all depends.
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  Is your business your business sales going up or stay flat or going down?
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  I mean, it it it all depends, but I will say about quarterly.
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  It all depends on your finances.
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  It all depends on how much competition competition you're having.
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  But about quarterly, it depends on your customer satisfaction.
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  If you are getting a lot of feedback from your customers saying, well, your service or you're
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  noticing noticing that they are not satisfied with your products, your services, and they're
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  going somewhere else, well, probably you need to adjust your market research and say, well,
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  maybe my messaging is some something is off with my messaging.
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  It's not resonating with my target audience.
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  Maybe I have to do something to adjust something so that it can resonate with the
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  right audience.
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  Well, the other thing I wanna ask you about is I feel like a lot of times when small business
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  owners are developing their ideal customer persona, they focus on demographic information
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  versus psychographic information.
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  And can you talk about the differences and how someone can get psychographic information?
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  Because it is a little harder to get.
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  Right?
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  Right.
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  The demographic is more of the person that more of the segment, the the age, the the cultural
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  background, the the gender, the where they live, of the Yeah.
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  Suburban, soccer mom, you know, double income, da da da, you know, like that kind of stuff.
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  Right.
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  The the psychographic is more knowing the attitude, like, the why, why behind it.
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  So I know who is buying.
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  Now I wanna know why they're buying.
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  So we need the one plus one in order to get the entire picture.
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  So we know who is buying now.
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  Oh, and I need to buy I need to know why are they buying.
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  I know I know this is my persona.
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  I need to know what is the reason they are buying.
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  So that's the psychographic, and that's very important to know so that I can I can trigger
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  the messaging at the right time?
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  So to to know when are they buying?
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  Is it a specific time of the year, of the week, of the day?
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  Is it a cultural component?
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  You know?
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  Is it a niche part of it that I need to send my messaging that that is going to help them so my
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  messaging can be in front of them so that I can sell my product more.
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  So it is important to know that.
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  So can you give me an example of a company that you've worked with that, like, once they learn
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  some new like, they finally did some data on their customers and it made them do a complete
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  about face in terms of what their marketing strategy was?
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  Yes.
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  I have a business, a food food retail business actually that came to me and they wanted me to
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  help them understand better understand their audience.
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  They were not selling as much as they were expecting And they wanted to see what was the
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  reason.
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  So I did all the interviews, the analysis, everything, and what happened was the messaging
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  was off.
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  Mhmm.
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  They the the messaging they were sending to their audience, to their customers was off.
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  It was a very it was a very niche segment that where the the retail business was, and they
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  were completely missing it.
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  The cultural it wasn't culturally targeted to the group in that area.
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  It was more general.
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  So it wasn't resonating with that group that came to the retail.
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  So when I interviewed the participants, and I asked them questions such as what are some of
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  the products that you usually buy at the competition places versus the supermarket?
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  They said, oh, I will go to such and such supermarket to buy certain products.
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  And when I will ask them, but what about this supermarket or this place?
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  Do they have this this product also here?
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  They said, oh, I never realized.
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  Yes.
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  They did have.
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  They just never realized because the messaging wasn't there.
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  It was at the other place, but not here.
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  So it again, it was just the positioning inside the retail place and then the messaging, they
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  completely missed that.
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  So they didn't realize that their messaging in their marketing and everything was there.
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  So so they were losing a lot of money also with that, with their marketing.
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  So they had to re not rebrand, but slightly change the messaging so they can regain that
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  audience again.
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  What would you say is the most overlooked data point and feedback source that small business
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  owners could be paying more attention to?
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  The feedback that they get from the customers.
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  If they are getting the the customer's feedback, I will say the most overlooked one
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  will be the feedback, the attentions to the feedback you get from your customers.
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  That's important, whether positive or negative, but most importantly, the negative one.
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  So just ask routinely asking for reviews.
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  You're like, they've gotta ask.
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  Even if it feels uncomfortable, they gotta ask.
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  How was it working with us?
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  What was this like?
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  How long was your wait time?
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  That kind of stuff.
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  You really do need to ask.
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  Yes, yes.
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  And implement a change, not just hear it and just leave it there, but do something with it
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  so that the customer knows that you're actually listening.
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  Well, the only other thing I wanna say about this is sometimes I see people and they wanna
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  do a survey and they say it's a quick survey and the next thing I know is a 31 question
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  survey.
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  Like that's the other thing that makes my head like be like, I really don't enjoy that,
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  especially because I don't like surveys anyway.
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  Unless I'm mad and somebody sent me a survey, then I got time for that.
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  But what I'm saying is, how can we, like, what is less is more?
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  Like, what is the most question somebody should really have on a customer feedback survey?
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  How many questions?
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  If we're talking about a survey survey where you reply yes, no, yes, no.
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  I will say probably 10, no more than 15.
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  And also I will say, let them know how long it's gonna take.
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  It's gonna take three minutes, five minutes, and no more than ten, fifteen minutes.
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  Because I agree with you.
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  If I have to take a survey and I think it's gonna take two minutes, but it's actually
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  taking fifteen minutes, or is I think it's I just need to answer questions.
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  And then at the end, it says, oh, by the way, scan the receipt that I didn't even I don't
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  even know where the receipt is anymore.
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  But okay.
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  That's not fair.
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  Yeah.
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  Yeah.
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  I I mean, there's just there's just good manners when it comes to this stuff.
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  Hi.
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  Well, listen.
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  Tell me what is the best business advice you've ever received for your business?
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  One of them was when I wanted to start my business was if not now, when?
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  Because I was doubting and it's like, what is this?
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  What is that?
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  What is this?
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  And I remember it was as simple as that.
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  If not now, when?
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  How long how much longer are you going to wait?
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  If not now, when?
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  What if?
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  You know?
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  What if yeah.
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  It's like there's always lessons.
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  You know?
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  I love it.
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  I love it.
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  Thanks for listening to the Small Biz Chat podcast with Melinda Emerson.
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  Subscribe to this podcast wherever you listen to podcasts, and join us next Wednesday for
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  more fantastic information and interviews.
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  You can find more sources and small business success strategies by visiting Melinda's
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  website, succeedasyourownboss.com.
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  Thanks again for listening, and we'll see you next week.