Your messaging should function as a filter: making the right people self-select IN and the wrong people self-select OUT before they waste your time or their money.
Generic messaging converts no one. Specific messaging that deliberately excludes non-fits drives higher conversion rates and lower customer acquisition costs.
Three Filtering Mechanisms
1) Demographics
Observable, binary criteria. You either meet them or you don’t.
Include:
- Platform requirements (Mac/Windows, iOS/Android)
- Budget thresholds ($50k+ revenue)
- Geographic constraints (US-only, Bay Area only)
- Technical requirements (must use Salesforce, must have API access)
- Team size (solo founders only, 10+ person teams)
Implementation: State these explicitly in headlines, first sentences, or ad targeting parameters.
Examples:
- “Mac only” (not “Works best on Mac”)
- “$3M+ annual revenue” (not “For growing SaaS companies”)
- “Bay Area only” (not “Currently serving select regions”)
2) Psychographics
Internal characteristics that create emotional resonance.
Categories:
- Pain points: “Launched to crickets,” “3 months of runway left,” “Can’t get past 100 users”
- Stage: “Pre-revenue,” “Post-launch, pre-PMF,” “Scaling past $10k MRR”
- Values: “Bootstrapped (no VC),” “Privacy-first,” “Remote-first teams”
- Trade-offs: “Prioritize speed over perfection,” “Choose freedom over scale”
Implementation: Use one psychographic filter per message. Don’t stack 5+ or it becomes noise.
Pick the filter that has the strongest agree/disagree reaction. Lukewarm psychographics don’t filter.
3) Self-Identity Language
The exact words your ICP uses to describe themselves.
Discovery process:
- Go to where your ICP congregates (Reddit, LinkedIn groups, Slack communities, forums)
- Read 50+ posts/comments
- Document:
- How they describe their problem
- What they call themselves
- What they complain about
- What terms they explicitly reject
Examples of discovered language:
- “Solopreneur” (self-selected)
- “Indie hacker” (community term)
- “Bootstrapped founder” vs “VC-backed founder”
- Job titles: “Expat CFO” not “digital nomad”
Building Your Filter Statement
1) List All Disqualifiers
Write every reason someone wouldn’t be a fit.
Questions:
- What platform/tool must they use?
- What’s the minimum budget/revenue/team size?
- What expertise level is required?
- What stage must they be at?
- What must they be willing to do?
Document these. These become your demographic filters.
2) Extract Their Language
Go to 3-5 places your ICP hangs out.
What to capture:
- Problem descriptions (their words, not yours)
- Self-identifiers (what they call themselves)
- Complaints (what they hate about alternatives)
- Celebrations (what they value)
Output: A list of 10-20 phrases/terms they actually use.
3) Identify the Emotional Trigger
What internal state makes someone your ICP right now?
Format: {Emotion} + {Situation}
Examples:
- Frustration + “launched to crickets”
- Fear + “3 months runway left”
- Confusion + “don’t know why conversions dropped”
- Guilt + “building instead of selling”
Pick one. Use it early (headline or first sentence).
4) Construct the Filter
Format: {Demographic} + {Psychographic} + {Self-Identity}
Template: “{Who you serve - demographics} who {situation/pain - psychographics} and {how they describe themselves - identity}”
Application Examples:
Weak: “Project management for teams”
Strong: “Project management for remote engineering teams (10-50 people) who’ve outgrown Trello but don’t need Jira’s complexity”
- Demographic: remote engineering, 10-50 people
- Psychographic: outgrown simple tools, don’t need enterprise complexity
- Identity: engineering teams (not “businesses”)
Weak: “Marketing tools for startups”
Strong: “Email automation for B2B SaaS founders ($0-5k MRR) who need to nurture trial users but don’t have time to learn Marketo”
- Demographic: B2B SaaS, $0-5k MRR
- Psychographic: need nurturing automation, time-constrained
- Identity: founders (not marketers)
Where to Apply This
Paid Ads
Put demographic filters in:
- Ad targeting parameters (geography, job title, income)
- Ad headline (first 5 words)
- Ad description (first sentence)
Landing Pages
Put all three filters in:
- Headline (demographic + psychographic)
- Subheadline (self-identity + emotional trigger)
- First paragraph (reinforce all three)
Outreach Emails
Put filters in:
- Subject line (demographic or psychographic)
- First sentence (all three combined)
- Explicit disclaimer if needed (“This is only relevant if you’re a Mac user”)
Sales / Interview Calls
Ref: Customer Development
State filters verbally in first 60 seconds: “Before we go further—you’re {demographic}, dealing with {psychographic}, and {identity}, right?”
Testing Your Filter
The 3-Second Test
Show your filter statement to 10 people: 5 inside your ICP and 5 outside your ICP.
Ask: “Is this for you?”
Pass criteria:
- ICP says “yes” in < 3 seconds
- Non-ICP says “no” in < 3 seconds
If either group hesitates, your filter isn’t working as well as it should.
Funnel Diagnostic
Ref: Your First Funnel
Run your message through a small test (ad, landing page, outreach batch).
Metrics to track:
- Click-through rate (CTR)
- Conversion rate (sign-up, reply, purchase)
- Ratio of CTR to conversion
What good looks like:
- Lower CTR than generic message (you’re filtering)
- Higher conversion rate than generic message (right people clicking)
If you’re getting lower CTR and higher conversion than the generic message, you’ll pay less per click with ads and increase your conversion rate at the same time. You’ll get more of the right people to your landing pages.
What failure looks like:
- High CTR, low conversion = attracting wrong people
- Low CTR, low conversion = message isn’t resonating at all, so try a different combo of demographic + psychographic + identity.
If either of these scenarios is true, you’ll know either (1) your message is not resonating (try a different combo of demographic, psychographic, and identity), and/or (2) you’re segmentation is wrong and/or (3) that distribution channel doesn’t work for your product.
Your job here is to figure out which one of those is true. So, you can change the message and test more, double check the segmentation settings in your ads, or if neither of those is relevant, go back to do more research to fix your filter, or move on to a different channel and try the filter/message somewhere else.
Common Failures
Hedging
What it looks like: “For both beginners and advanced users” “Suitable for small businesses and enterprises”
Fix: Pick one segment. Write a different message for the other segment.
Invented Language
What it looks like: Using terms you made up that your ICP doesn’t use.
Fix: Use their actual language, even if it sounds less polished.
Implied Filters
What it looks like: Assuming people will infer “Mac only” from screenshots showing Mac UI.
Fix: State every filter explicitly. People skim.
Too Many Filters
What it looks like: “For Mac-using, remote-working, bootstrapped, B2B SaaS, solo founders with $1-5k MRR building dev tools who value privacy”
Fix: Pick 3 maximum: 1 demographic, 1 psychographic, 1 identity.
Category Creation (Optional)
If your ICP doesn’t have a name, you can create one.
When to do this:
- Your ICP exists but has no unifying term
- The problem you solve is real but unnamed
- You can invest 12-18+ months using that term consistently
How to create a category:
- Name it (usually: {market type} + {problem nature} + {audience}, or simplify it into one)
- Define it (clear boundaries: what it is and isn’t)
- Claim it (use it everywhere consistently)
- Defend it (educate market on why this category matters)
Examples:
- “Conversational marketing” (Drift)
- “Solopreneur” (Terri Lonier coined it but Justin Welsh owns it)
- “Growth Hacker” (Sean Ellis)
- “4-Hour Workweek” (Tim Ferriss)
- “Permission Marketing” (Seth Godin)
Warning
Category creation is slow and expensive. Only do this if you’re committed to multi-year investment.
Alternative: If your ICP uses multiple terms and you have the space to do so, list them all in your copy until one solidifies: “For expat consultants, remote executives, and global professionals.”
Implementation Checklist
- List all demographic disqualifiers
- Spend 2-3 hours in ICP watering holes documenting language
- Identify the one emotional trigger that creates urgency
- Write filter statement (demographic + psychographic + identity)
- Test with 5 ICP members and 5 non-ICP
- Revise based on 3-second test results
- Apply to ads, landing page, outreach templates
- Run small test and measure CTR vs conversion rate
- Iterate based on funnel diagnostic
Related Frameworks:
- Customer Development - How to discover ICP language through interviews
- The Mom Test - How to ask questions without biasing responses
- Your First Funnel - Where self-selection appears in conversion stages