Knowing your audience changes everything.
A few weeks ago, the branding and advocacy agency that I lead, Javelina, celebrated the nine year anniversary of Alana with the company. She was among our earliest hires and today she’s our Director of Client Services.
As people were sharing memories and congratulations in Slack, Alana commented, "Thank goodness for that job posting!" and it nudged a memory in my brain that I had almost forgotten.
Back in 2017, Javelina was growing quickly, and I was struggling to keep up. I needed help - a combo of an office manager, a client associate, and an assistant. I put feelers out in our network and had a few conversations, but struggled to find the right person. I remember being in London visiting family, waking up in the middle of the night because of jet lag, and suddenly realizing I was thinking about the problem the wrong way.
I had been focused on the position.
What I really needed to think about was the person.
I knew who I was looking for. Someone with enough experience to jump in quickly. Someone who could build something out of nothing – and was excited by the prospect. Someone who cared about social impact. Someone who was ready for a new challenge but might need a little encouragement to leave a stable, established organization and join a growing company that was still figuring a lot of things out as we went.
Once I became clear about that, how I was thinking about the job posting changed.
And right there, in the middle of the night in a dimly lit London hotel, I wrote a job posting unlike one I’d ever written before. I spent more words talking about them than us. Because it was written for the one person I needed.
The hiring process changed too. We intentionally included application requirements designed to test attention to detail. Instead of a traditional interview, myself and the finalists volunteered together at a local arts nonprofit while we talked. We intentionally designed the experience around the kind of person we hoped to attract.
And we found them.
Nine years later, Alana is our Director of Client Services. She has built the systems and processes that shape how we work today. She has defined our approach to creating excellence for our clients. She has contributed to remarkable outcomes for our clients and the communities they serve. She was also just recognized as one of Phoenix Business Journal's 40 Under 40.
That job posting truly did its work.
I've been thinking about that story a lot lately because I don't think the lesson was really about hiring at all.
When we're creating something, whether it's a job posting, a fundraising campaign, an event, an advocacy effort, or a piece of content, most of us start with the thing we're creating.
We think about what a job posting is supposed to look like. What a fundraising email is supposed to look like. What an event is supposed to look like. And there's nothing wrong with that. Those patterns exist for a reason. But every now and then, the challenge in front of us requires something different.
Right now, many of us are operating in environments where our existing strategies aren't producing the results we need. Fundraising is harder. Advocacy is harder. Reaching new audiences is harder.
That makes this a good time to step back and ask a different question.
Instead of starting with what you're creating, start with who you're trying to reach.
What is the thing you're working on right now that could benefit from a more creative approach?
When I find myself asking that question, this is the process I use:
1. Who is your audience demographically?
Start with the basics. How old are they? Where do they live? What is their professional background or life experience? The goal isn't to put people into boxes. It's to develop a clearer picture of who you're trying to reach.
2. Who is your audience psychographically?
What are they hoping for? What are they worried about? What motivates them? What might prevent them from taking the action you're asking them to take? This is often where the most useful insights live.
3. What is their spark point?
If you understand their hurdles, the next question is what helps them move past those hurdles. What is the thing that makes them take the leap anyway? For Alana, it was the opportunity to be part of something growing, mission-driven, and meaningful.
4. Design from there.
Once you understand who you're trying to reach and what motivates them, build the experience around that. Maybe that's a job posting. Maybe it's a fundraising appeal. Maybe it's an event, a volunteer opportunity, or a campaign. Whatever you're creating, start with the people you're trying to reach and work backwards from there.
The more clearly you understand the people you're trying to reach, the easier it becomes to create something that resonates with them.
Pro-tip. This activity is exponentially easier if you imagine a single person rather than a group of people. It doesn’t matter if you actually need one person (like when hiring for a job) or a group of people (as with events or campaigns). When you design for one person, it resonates with many. When you talk to everyone, you reach no-one.
Sometimes the creativity you're looking for isn't a new tactic or a new platform. Sometimes it's simply taking the time to understand the people on the other side a little better.
P.S. Here is the exact job posting we used if you’re curious about it.