The first W in the 5W template is WHO.
When you’re writing up a marketing action task to help you reach your S.M.A.R.T. goal, you’ll want to include a description of WHO is involved for the task. (As you’ll see, you won’t be listing a particular person by name, but more a type of person.)
Depending on the task, you may be interacting with people you’re already connected with somehow or you could be finding new people to add to your network of connections.
The main possibilities I usually choose from for the WHO are:
- Potential clients (sometimes called leads, prospects, or opportunities)
- Potential referral partners (people who come into contact with your ideal clients and can be a source of introducing you to them in some fashion)
- Current clients
- Current referral partners
- Peers
One note on that last one: sometimes people are concerned about interacting with people they consider to be their competition. However, I think it often helps to have a community of people who know what you’re going through, particularly when you’re a solopreneur. They can be helpful in brainstorming solutions to problems, possible sources of work, potential partners, or resources to take on your extra work when you’re busy. And while it’s true that they may be your competition, I’m a firm believer that there’s usually enough business out there to go around.
When you’re writing up your 5Ws for a single task, you may find that it looks like you’ll be interacting with more than one type of person for a particular task. For example, when you go to a live networking event you may run into more than one—even all 5!—of the types of people listed above. You can list them all for the task, but to help keep things simple and directed, choose ONE type of person as the primary focus for each task (maybe mark it with a * or circle it or put it in bold—whatever makes sense for you).
So there you go, that’s the first W. Any questions or thoughts on this, please comment on this post.
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