Finding Nemo: Lessons on Where to Look for What You Want

Remember Finding Nemo?

Much like in the movie, Marlin wasn’t going to find his son by staying close to home. He needed to go out to where Nemo was in order to reconnect. Unfortunately for him, he had no idea where he needed to go and had to discover clues along the way.

For you though, you don’t have to swim on the back of a turtle forever in order to get in front of those you are seeking. You have a leg up here. You know where your constituents are.

In a recent conversation on the Relish This podcast, I brought up the idea of “swimming in the right pool.”

What I meant by this was that when you are trying to optimize your communication and outreach, instead of spreading yourself too thin and posting on every social media platform or calling every local business to support your cause, look at where your constituents are engaged and interact with them there.

Having a strong sense of your ideal audience, you can learn where they go for information and camaraderie and interact with them there to start to build relationships on their terms.

This is beneficial because activities focused on where your audience already engage increases your organizational efficiency.

Since you can be strategic about where you are engaging your audience and telling your story, you will save time and effort, focusing your attention to reach a larger audience of like-minded people.

For example, if your organization works in the outdoor space as an advocate for trail preservation and maintenance, you could start your “pool” exploration by assessing where like-minded individuals go for information and entertainment.

If this target demographic enjoys sharing photos and videos of outdoor adventures, you would be wise to get active on Instagram on which you can set a goal to follow and engage with users who appreciate the outdoors, cycling and hiking adventure travel, and the like.

Swimming in this (very specific) pool will help ensure that your efforts are focused on the right individuals to build effective relationships and expand your mission.

Focusing your efforts on this small, but engaged pool improves your opportunities to connect, focuses your marketing investment where it will be most effective, and keeps you from spinning your wheels messaging to an incompatible audience.

Think about where you are “swimming” and ask yourself, does my ideal audience interact with me here? If not, find where they are more likely to interact and engage with you.



Want to learn more about how to select the best pool in which your organization should be swimming? Drop us a line.