When it comes to creating lead magnets, the easy way to get it right is to consider both your point of view, and your audience’s at the same time. Since the whole point of having a lead magnet is to fill your list with people who want what you offer, it makes a lot of sense to find out what they want so you can create your lead magnets to address their needs and wants.

The key – and we’ve talked about this before – is knowing who your ideal customer is. In an ideal world, you already know who your best customer is and what they need and you’re already selling it.They already want what you’ve got, so it’s not hard convince them.

But if you don’t know your audience as well as you think you do, there are a few things you need to know before you start creating lead magnets, and any other type of content, for your ideal audience.

Here are 12 questions to consider when creating lead magnets:

Q1: Where do your customers hang out online?  

Knowing where they like to hang out whether online or in person helps you know where to focus your advertising dollars and energy when you’re trying to build your list.

Q2: Who do they like to get information from?

Knowing where your audience gets their information now is going to help you understand what type of information is best for you to create too. You can study your competition to get this information.

Q3: What keeps your customers awake at night?  

Your audience has problems that they worry about, that they stress about, that they need solutions for. You should be able to write down at least three to five problems that you can provide solutions for based on the niche you want to serve.

Q4: What are their goals?  

Knowing your ideal customer’s goals in life and in terms of your specialty will help you create messaging and solutions for them that they will easily accept and want.

Q5: What priorities do your customers have? –

Everyone has certain priorities in life. If you know what they are and where they fall on the list, you have a better chance of creating lead magnets that address the situation.

Q6: Do you know what their core values are?

Knowing your audience’s core values can help you tremendously with the way you communicate with them. It helps you know which words to use, how to phrase things, and how to communicate with them better. Of course, it goes without saying that you should be working to attract an audience whose core values are a match with your own.

Q7: What products and services do they use (other than yours)?

Understanding the brands that they use will also help you tremendously with knowing how to best communicate with them and relate to them on a personal level.

Q8: What ways do they prefer to communicate?  

Everyone has their preferred way of communicating with people. For me, it’s email. For others, social media, help desks, or phone calls might work better. Some like all. Some like to get beautifully designed email newsletters, and some prefer text-based. Know what your audience prefers goes a long way to getting content in front of them that they’re going to use.

Q9: Do you know and understand the niche lingo?

This knowledge can help you design better emails, better sales pages, and better lead magnets too. Knowing these phrases can be the start of your keyword research too.

Q10: Do you know what your ideal customer’s day looks like?

What does your ideal customer do from the moment they get up until they go to bed at night? Without being a creepy stalker, it really does help to know what your customers life looks like. Getting to know them is a huge part of building the know, like, and trust relationships you need.

Q11: How much, if any, disposable income do they have?

This is a huge question because it’s so important that you know what they can afford, whether or not they’re willing to pay for your products and services, and how to price your products to make it a no brainer for them, and profitable for you at the same time.

Q12: What makes your customers happy?

Do you know what makes your audience feel happy, joyful, and content? For me, I’m all about being happy and content and I like it best when my customers and subscribers are also happy and content.  Knowing what puts a smile on someone’s face makes it so much easier to give them the content and solutions they going to need.

Final Thoughts

Knowing your audience is crucial to creating lead magnets that will work for them and for you. It’s all well and good to direct your content to people who like to consume it, but that’s not enough if you’re trying to make a profit. (And if you’re not trying to make money why do you have a business?)

Your audience should also be interested in your products and services as well as your free content. That’s where questions like the ones in this post come in handy. If you can answer most of these, you’ll go a long way toward creating lead magnets and other products that your customers will be waiting for.