Everyone likes to think that they understand their customers, but how many of us really try to completely understand the customers mindset? Every year, Beloit College puts together a “mindset list” describing the thoughts and mindset of their incoming freshmen class. Why would they do this? So that their professors will be able to discuss their topics with relevance, and avoid references and language that the students may not understand. You can see the latest mindset list here.

Companies have gathered “relevant” information about customers for decades, often looking at purchasing behavior, income, demographic information, and so on. But how many have actually looked at the mindset of their customers? Probably not enough. I think it’s a good exercise for every business to put together a mindset list for their customers. With today’s social media options, it’s easier than ever to interact with customers (and for customers to interact with each other). In order to have relevant messages for these people, you need to understand them and speak their language.

Sounds great, but how do you gather this information? The traditional method is to use surveys to gather information. However, I think that if you talk to the people that interact the most with clients, you will find some surprising information. If you have store locations, talk to your cashiers or whatever. If you’re a business to business operation, talk to your sales people or account managers. Listen to what they have to say, and put together a mindset list for your customers. You may be surprised at what you find.

Everyone’s got to start somewhere, and no one becomes an expert overnight. Attending an excellent business school is a great place to start, but as they say, there’s no substitute for experience. In my career as a marketer so far I’ve had tons of experience both good and bad, so let me share what I’ve learned with you…

1. Be patient: I’ve talked about this before. Patience is a trait that every marketer needs to develop in order to be successful. Marketing is all about controlling variables, and sometimes it takes time to see the effects of your work. You need to have the patience (and the guts) to “stay the course”, and see if you’ve made a good decision or a bad one.

2. Begin with mutual respect: Treat everyone with respect. Not just the people ahead of you on the food chain, not just your co-workers, or your customers. You need to treat everyone you meet with respect.  Besides, if they fail to live up to that respect, you can always change your mind later ;-D.

3. Cover your a**: If you don’t know what I mean, you will soon enough. Always make copies of your work, and keep track of everything you work on. Don’t be anyone’s fall guy.

4. Understand your target market: Don’t assume that everyone is like you. Just because you feel that a product or an approach won’t work, doesn’t mean that it will fail. First, you need to understand your target market, and approach your decisions from their point of view. Yes, you should trust your instincts, but you need to also take your personal feelings out of a situation.

5. Learn, not just from your mistakes, but from others as well: You’re a smart person (you are visiting my site afterall), and smart people learn from their mistakes. Everyone knows this already. You need to also focus on mistakes made by other people / companies, and make sure that you do not repeat them. This is why you should always stay on top of the latest developments in your industry, and in business in general.

6. Always get paid: This doesn’t mean that you should only work for money. Sometimes (like a good internship) the payment is experience, or good connections. The point is, you need to make sure you get something out of any effort you put in.

7. Don’t think you know everything: Pick up a marketing textbook from the 1980’s, and you’ll see that business has evolved. Don’t think that just because you have a diploma that you know all the current trends. You need to continue to learn and evolve. If you don’t you’re dead. We’ve talked about this before, and you know better.

8. Create value: Whatever you do, work hard. You may have just gotten a nice job, but if you don’t work hard at it, you’ll be refreshing your resume real quick. If you don’t have a job right now (hey join the club my friend) work hard at getting one, and create your own project (like I’ve done with this blog) to keep your tools sharp while you’re at it.

9. Don’t gossip: Be carefull what you say and who you say it to. You don’t know who’s listening, and talking behind someone’s back completely violates point number 2. If someone starts gossiping with you, just stay neutral and focus on your job.

10. Don’t panic: Everyone makes mistakes. When you’re just starting out, many times you’ll feel the urge to panic when a mistake has been made and will either throw your hands up and run to the boss, or will try to hide the problem. Don’t do this. Be honest with your boss, and come up with options to correct the problem. If they have a better idea, great, but don’t come up to them with a mess that you created, and expect to be bailed out.

Hey, I don’t know everything. You marketing vets out there post some more tips in the comments.