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Hello, everybody. Welcome to the B2B ICP training. My name is Dancho Dimkov, and in the course of the next period, I'll actually walk you through the B2B ICP Framework. Before we dig into the details, I thought that first I should take a step back. I mean, there is always the one big question that everybody asks is that Why? Why do you actually need a B2B ICP? Well, let me give you the answer.

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There are usually three main cases why do you actually need a B2B ICP. First is when you want to enhance your solution. So whether you have a software solution, whether you have a service or whether you have a product, you need to better understand your ideal client in order to improve your existing products, whether you need to add some additional features or additional functionalities without knowing what they need, there's no way you can do it. So if you want to get better at what you do and better serve your clients, you need to do the ICP.

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The second thing why you need the ICP is for marketing purpose. Having a laser-focused marketing content helps significantly. When you know who you want to target, you can improve your content. You can start writing more relevant blog posts. You can start creating podcasts. You can even do social media posts, but when you know your target audience, you're really talking to them and they can feel it and they can empathize and they will want to work with you more.

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And the third part is a better defined ICP helps you with the sales process. When you know who you're talking to and when you know their pains and their fears and their hopes, you can really create a solution and show them how your solution specifically is tailored to them. And it's actually meant to help. It's much easier when you have a product that is really tailored to a specific audience, and it can sell much easier. So now that we've cleared, why do you actually need the ICP, the second step is when? I mean, when is a good time to create a B2B ICP?

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Well, the obvious question is when you start a business is the best time. It's even better when you consider starting a business. When you have it as a concept stage, then it's the best time when you need to do the B2B Ideal Client Profile identification, or even a complete market research. And of course, the second best time is now. The earlier you do the ICP, the better you're going to get some insight on why you need it, how to do it and better improve your business. And as we've worked with a lot of companies, let me tell you the four key things when companies are coming to us for defining the ICP. It is based on the Ansoff Matrix according to theory, and it's either people are having a new product or want to enter a new market or combination of both.

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So the first most common case where we do an ICP for a client is that when they have a product or a solution and they just wanted to go to a new market. If it's a geographical market, if it's a different market segment, in both cases, it is a new market audience, and a new market audience could have different needs, geographically different culture, could have different needs or different adjustments to the existing solution to satisfy those needs. And in that case, you actually need to do the ICP, the Ideal Client Profile.

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The second case is that when you are serving the same market, but you want to introduce a new product, and here you actually need the feedback from your ICP. What they want, what they need, whether their need have changed over time. And that's how actually "upsell" came. You listen actively to your target audience, you hear them all and you introduce new products and new services based on their feedback.

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The third scenario where companies usually use ICP is that when there is a new product on the new market. Trust me, then you really need the ICP. You're entering into a new market that you need to better understand your audience and you're introducing a new product. You're not sure whether it's going to be a perfect fit, and you know that the product market fit. Well, in this case, you actually need it the most.

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And the fourth least used example, but people should be aware of it, is that when you have the same product and you're using on the same market, in this case, it's obvious you should know your ICP, but here is the problem. As time goes, needs change. You need an ICP every six months to your existing target audience, in order to better understand whether their needs have changed, whether there is some adjustment that needs to be made in order to keep yourself ahead of competitors. So now that we know, why would you actually need the ICP? And when do you actually need?

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The last bit of this video is actually to show you how. I mean, at BizzBee, Solutions, we've worked with more than 450 clients so far, and over the course of six years already, and we have our bulletproof framework. When it comes to ICP, B2B ICP identification framework, we actually have four steps. It's nothing complicated. And the whole of this whole course is to tell you how you can also build it for yourself. And if you don't know me, I'm actually more into writing. So actually, I'm just going to write you the framework here. So if we're talking about the ICP framework first, there are two main things that you must have in mind.

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First, you need to be aware about your company's strengths. You need to understand your company's strengths. I mean, I know a lot of consultants that will tell you, you know what? Well, actually, it starts with the market, with your opportunities, and then figure out what to do with your business. Well, guess what? If you're a new business and entrepreneur, it has a perfect sense. But man, if you spent six months on MVP or twelve months in building your company, or years invested in your business, there's no way you're just going to throw everything down the window and start from scratch. So that's why we always say the first step is to actually look within your business. What are your strengths? What are your unique selling points?

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In order, when you know that, then you can look at the second part, which is actually the opportunities. But it's not opportunities first, then strengths. But it's actually first strengths and then opportunities, because when you know what are you good at, then you can easily look at the market and start seeing which market segment or which market could benefit the most from your existing solutions. Knowing these two, when you merge them, you're actually having the ICP.

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Now, when we are talking about B2B ICP, it's not like it's in the B2C, in the consumer market, where you know that you're targeting males, 20 to 24, with specific geographic criterias. But actually in the B2B, you're looking at companies. And when you're looking at companies, there are different layers, like first, in which industry they operate in. Second, what are the company firmographics and by firmographics within geography, company size and many other criterias that define the company. And lastly, you're not talking to a company. You're actually talking with people within the company, which means that you need to identify what is the ideal target positions, whether it's a job role, whether it's a function, but you need to know who you need to talk to within all these companies. And now that you have that, usually in most cases, people stop here. But in BizzBee, we have another layer.

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And that's the last part, actually from the ICP framework, which is conversation starters. The reason why we need this is, imagine that you get to the ICP and you know who is your target audience. But there is still a bit missing. I mean, just by knowing who you want to target, you cannot really enhance your solution or improve your marketing or sales. You need some research and by research, I'm thinking to try to really understand your target audience. What are their pains? What are their hopes? What are their desires? What kind of issues are they facing at work, on the level of the position or what kind of issues the company is facing on the level of company? Like small companies have one kind of problem, big companies have different problems. What kind of problem the company is facing on an industry level? The whole industry is either the trend is growing or shrinking or they're facing some kind of problems. This kind of golden nuggets that you can get from the conversation starters will actually help you reshape the three key things that we discussed how to actually enhance your product or solution, how to actually laser-focus your market because you will know what to write about and actually how to sell better because you will know your target audience.

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So to wrap up, when defining the Ideal Client Profile framework, there are only four steps. The first two are the strengths, as a first starting point where you need to understand your strong sides and then look at the market opportunities, in order to see potential market audience. And when you combine, you actually have the B2B ICP, which is on the level of industry, on a company infographics and also company position roles or job titles. Knowing that you still need the last step, which is actually better understand your target audience and what kind of problems they are facing on a position level on a company level, on an industry level. And that's it! You see how easy it is? We're going to go over each of these steps, but at this stage, I just wanted to high-level show you the framework that we use at BizzBee. Thank you for listening and talk to you soon on the next lesson.