The other day on the way home from work, I passed a Chick-Fil-A with a stretch limo outside. Now, I really have no idea why the limo was there, but I conjured up my own story, nonetheless. High school prom night. Fella blew the whole wad on a nice tux and cool ride. Something had to give. It was the $150 dinner at Byrd and Baldwin Restaurant.

I figured this guy in so many ways represented today’s marketeers. He had a goal (prom night – I’ll let you figure that one out), had limited resources (money – I think we all can relate to that one) and had to figure out the smartest way to get to the goal with not quite enough jack to cover all the bases. Now I’m guessing he thoroughly understood his target market (his date) and her likes and dislikes (“…she already likes chicken sandwiches, so she’d be a lot more impressed with the limo than a nice filet…”), which we’ll call “psychographics”. Classic marketing stuff on every level! Sorry I don’t know the end of the story (in fact, I don’t even know if my made-up story explaining the limo was even close), so I can’t give you a rousing anecdote about how this all turned out.

But I think everywhere you look, there are subtle messages that speak directly to what we face every day. And when you think about it, our customers face the same dilemma we do – the nexus between limited resources (them: money and mortgage ability; us: marketing and promotional budgets) and big hairy audacious goals (them: that dream home; us: selling them that dream home that we built). Seems everyone in the circle is solving problems with less than perfect information and resources.

Keeping that in mind might just make us a bit more empathetic to our prospect buyers. So…what prom night dilemma are you facing this week?