Parental Identity & Marketing: They're More Alike Than You Think
With the way the world has changed, you'd be hard pressed to find a household that didn't have at least some connection to an entrepreneur! Whether it's you or your partner, your colleague, and/or a family member - the idea that the digital world has opened up so many opportunities for us to create flexible lives is difficult to ignore! As I work with many work from home parents, I am struck by the similarities that exists between being a business owner and being a parent! In this video, I share with you 3 ways that being a parent is similar to marketing as a business owner!
No time to watch the video. Read the transcript below.
For those of you who know me know that I'm a parent coach and that my business is The Parenting Skill. Well in that business you know that I do have two roles. Number one: I'm a parent coach, I help parents discover and unlock their unique parenting powers. But in my other role, I'm also a business owner. And what's funny: as I work with parents and as I work behind the scene as a business owner, I begin to see how so much of what you do as a parent is a lot like running your own business and trying to market to clients. So, let me tell you a little bit about why I think that and how is that going to look for you in your family.
Knowing Your Ideal Clients
So the first role that parenting and marketing look exactly alike, is that in marketing you have to know who your ideal clients are. That translate to: do you really know who your children are? As a parent you are a business owner and your children are your ideal clients. An ideal client is someone who you know what their problems are, you know what their biggest worries are, and you know what their pain points are. But, you also know what their strengths are; you know what invigorates them, and what motivates them and what makes them happy. So if you're a parent and you are trying to see how can you really get in tune with your child, you can ask yourself, "Who is my ideal client?" You really need to understand not just their pain points, not just the things that make them tick, and not just their behaviors. But you also have to understand their strengths, what motivates them, what invigorates them, and what gives them life. If you learn both of those together, then you are going to know your ideal client. The same way as business owners and marketers have to know their ideal clients as well.
As a parent you are a business owner and your children are your ideal clients.
Building Relationships With Your Ideal Client
The second tip is to know how to build relationship with your clients. As a business owner, it is not simply me knowing what your pain points are and what's really going on for you or what problem I need to solve for you. But it is also good for me to get to know you, for us to trust each other and for us to build a great relationship that you trust the knowledge and strategies that I give you - and that I trust that you are going to follow through on that advice. It's definitely a two-way street. The same thing goes for you as a parent! Again remember you are the business owner, your kids are your ideal clients. And in order to really help them move forward and to really help them understand and unlock who they are truly. you've got to build a relationship with them. Building a relationship means really understanding who they are by: talking to them, building trust with them, having those everyday conversations where you understand what's truly going on in their lives. And, even more so, knowing what's truly making them feel different things. That's part of building a relationship. And as a parent and as the business owner of your family, you've got to know how to do that - build that relationship! In order to really move your kids as a parent or your clients as a business owner forward in the work that you're doing with them.
Building relationships is just as integral to parenting as it is for building a business - it's where you build trust and truly get to know who you're serving.
Problem Solving With Your Ideal Clients
Lastly, you combine knowing who your ideal client is and building that relationship together, which then coalesces into the third tip: getting down to problem solving. As a business owner if I don't know who you are, if I haven't built any trust with you, are you really going to allow me to help you solve any of the issues that are going on for you? The answer is no! The same applies for you as a parent. Again, I want to recall that you're the business owner of your family. Your kids are your ideal clients. So if you really understood who they are, you've really taken the time to build that trust, that relationship, they will come to you with their problems. They'll come to you with their peer issues; they'll come to you with their academic issues; they'll come to you with their social issues. Then, together you and your child can problem solve to figure out what’s really going on for my child. When you're problem solving you can create healthy solutions that your kids trust or are in their best interest. And, moreover, if you're done tips 1 & 2, you'll believe that they'll actually follow through with the solutions you've come up with. This can really create a great cycle for you and your family. So as the business owner of your family, you really get to see some real progress. You really get to see your kids move forward and you get to do that in a way that builds trust and creates a great foundation for you to continue to be an effective rocking parent. Isn't that awesome?!
The problem solving step can't happen if you don't know who your child is and haven't taken the time to build the relationship. Problem solving involves trust - so you have to build that first - just like a business owner would!
The Recap
Know your ideal clients: You have to know your ideal clients and as a parent your ideal clients are your children. You have to understand what makes them tick, what makes them excited, what their main pain points are, and what their main strengths are.
Building relationships with your ideal clients: You have to start by using all that knowledge that you've gained from knowing what their strengths and weaknesses are, what their pain points are and what motivates them to really begin to build that relationship with their kid.
Problem solving with your ideal clients: If you've done a great job of understanding their strengths and weaknesses, really building that trust, then your kids will come to you with all their issues; with all their problems. Then, you can really figure how to actually come up with solutions that is are to be unique to your child.