Knowing Your Target Audience

When you are creating a plan for your business it is important to focus on your target demographic. Who is your ideal customer and how can you market towards them? Making this plan will help you when it comes to researching your marketing plan. The way you target seniors will be much different than the way that you target millennials. It is all in how it is presented and how your target demographic sees it.

To figure out which demographic you want to target you have to identify markers based on shared traits such as race, age, income, location, etc. Figure out which are the most important markers so you can work towards targeting that group of people and then flesh out the group with secondary traits such as education, marital status, number of children, etc. You don’t want to go into it excluding any specific group but you want to make it as focused as possible so you can make a bigger impression.

Once you’ve determined the best demographic for your product or service you can start to create your marketing around that. How your website looks, what type of content you produce all matters when it comes to your target audience. You want to hook those specific people and you want to give them a reason to choose your product or service. 

Instead of addressing everyone, you should focus on your business’s ideal customer. Unfortunately, numerous small business owners wrongly believe their product or service is suitable for everyone. For instance, targeting Facebook ads to “everyone” (genders, ages, etc.) makes little sense when your product is intended for ladies over forty. Advertising to everyone is rarely effective and can actively harm your marketing efforts by upsetting individuals and wasting unnecessary advertising funds.

Steps to identify your target audience:

• Determine customer demographics. Unless you offer oxygen, only some require your product or service. Who? Gender? Age? Or liberal? Their income, education, and interests? After narrowing the criteria, targeting those most likely to require what you’re selling is more accessible.
• Assess consumer demands. Once you know who you’re targeting, you’ll need to determine their needs concerning your business. By imagining their issues and asking their questions, you may address them in your marketing message before they arise.
• Decide how customers will find you. We all have friends who prefer texting to phoning, so we know only some respond the same way. Is your ideal client older? Print ads may work. Run Twitter advertisements for Millennials who have never read a newspaper. Local or global? Are they trendy or niche? Reaching your audience through their preferred media is best.
• Cross-promote. Find companies that share your audience without crossing corporate lines. For example, if you offer baby blankets, co-marketing with pre-and post-natal fitness clinics can assist both firms without hurting either. In addition, you can guest write on each other’s blogs, share social media postings, and offer customers exclusive discount codes.
• Increase office networking. Sharing dominates the modern internet. Diamond Strategic Marketing advocates involving the entire workforce in outreach, not just the promotion staff, to create authentic, personal “marketing” of your business’s product or service (assuming your employees enjoy and use it).

Identifying your target demographic in advance will assist you in refining your brand’s messaging and marketing plan. In addition, it enables you to build your brand on a firm foundation. Target audiences are intended to captivate consumers and provide a clear understanding of how to promote them.
So have you worked out your target audience yet? Send us a message at CXC Digital and tell us how we can enhance your online marketing engagement.