Are you an Achiever? A Look into Target Marketing Psychographics

Marketers target the pain and pleasure of different psychological demographics. These psychographic groups help us understand the power of programming.  The six main psychographic groups which are targeted in advertisements are: The Struggler, The Emulator, The Explorer, The Socially Conscious, The Belonger and The Achiever.  This article is going to take a closer look at The Achiever.

Sources of Pleasure for The Achiever are leadership, goals, tradition, control, competition, ethics, innovation, prestige, productivity and methods of measuring results.  Sources of pain for the Achiever are  following, lack of direction, unproductive time, chaos, lack of control, under-performing, and disorganization.

The Achiever is pretty much everything the Emulator wants to be. The Achiever earns a six-figure income and is a "leader of men." They are competitive, disciplined and goal oriented. The Achiever lifestyle only happens with a deliberate strategy of short-term pain, long-term gain.

For me, that strategy was opting to stay in and work rather than go out with my friends. It was creating a system of saving 20-50% of my income year-in and year-out. Many Achievers go through rough times and many go bankrupt. But, usually the bankruptcy is the result of taking calculated business risks that go bad. The Achiever views these as lessons learned and resets his goals to rebuild.

When I taught karate, I always knew when an Achiever was considering joining my school. It was as though he was interviewing me rather than me trying to sell him. He would come in and watch more classes than most prospects. He would ask smart questions about the time frame it took to earn a black belt and what would kind of commitment would be involved. Tuition wasn't the issue, time and commitment was. Achievers are deliberate in their thinking. They know that if they commit to earning a black belt, they will follow through, so they don't want to make commitment lightly.

Achievers, like all successful people, like to be measured. From their waistline to their net worth, Achievers like to know where they are at and where they are going.

Achievers think of themselves as unique. They don't like to be grouped with other people. Merrill Lynch once ran a TV spot that showed a group of bulls walking down Wall Street. The goal was to imply the power of wealth, however the ad performed poorly. They changed the ad to a single bull walking through a china shop and the ad's response was much higher.

Achievers are the group that would most likely suffer from the impostor syndrome. Since they have worked themselves up the ladder, some will have a nagging self-doubt that they don't deserve their success or that it's just a matter of time before someone discovers that they are not as smart as people think they are.

The way I've learned to deal with the impostor syndrome started by learning to say, "Thank you" when I was complimented. This is very powerful, but much harder than it seems. For years when someone would say, "Nice job, Mr. Graden" I would not accept the compliment and beg off an excuse as to how "I got lucky today." I wouldn't accept the credit for doing something well. Once I learned to simply say, "Thank you", I began to overcome the impostor syndrome. Every time I said "thank you" was like laying a brick in my new foundation of strength and confidence.

In time, I began to see that I was developing a track record of success that was undeniable. Certainly I had a lot of great help, but those are relationships I put together by hiring the right team or positioning myself with people who I could help or who could help me.

That track record helped me to recognize that I could not have faked it for this long and in so many areas. While I don't know that I am completely over the impostor syndrome, I erased most of it by accepting that evidence over time.