A target market or audience is a group of people who share similar traits or needs that your company hopes to serve. These people are the end users most likely to purchase your product (click on your site, sign up, and make a deposit). It’s important to distinguish that anybody can make use of your service, but everybody is not your target market. In other words, you can’t target everyone, but nothing stops you from selling to everyone.
Establishing a clear target market helps you focus your marketing efforts in the most effective way possible. You begin by defining your service/product, and then you define the person who will want to use what you offer.
Understanding the person, you are intending your product for helps you better cater to what this person wants to see. It also helps you identify the factors that drive them to click, sign up, or deposit. You can then structure messages that appeal specifically to them.
Factors to Consider When You Define Target Market
When you establish an audience, you want to make sure you define this group of people as specifically as possible. To do this, collect as much information about the group as possible. Target audiences are united by common traits like their demographics and overall consumer behaviour. There are various characteristics you can consider, and these might differ depending on the industry your business is in. Some general characteristics include:
- Age
- marital status
- level of education
- income status
- employment status
- occupation
- location
- ethnicity
- spending patterns
- interests
How to Find Your Target Audience
You can only correctly identify your audience through proper research, some things don’t come by gut feeling. Here are a few pointers on how to get this done.
- Research Your Current Customers
A good way of identifying who is likely to pay for your product is to collect data on those who are already using your product or service. Once you’ve gathered enough information about your existing client base, it’s easier to go after people who fit the same mold. Many businesses have things like rewards and loyalty programmes where customers can sign up to gradually collect points redeemable at a later stage. This process usually involves filling in a form or survey. This is one way of collecting information. But not everybody enjoys filling in forms or questionnaires. The more hassle-free option is using whatever information you already have and track trends or averages using that.
- Look at Your Website and Social Media Analytics
Social media is often a pleasant way of filling out the gaps in your client analysis. Finding out who is interacting with your social accounts like Facebook or Twitter can give you a sense of whose interested. Even if they aren’t using your service yet.
- Assess Your Competition
Once you are clear on who is using your service and who’s interacting with your socials, have a look at what your competition is doing. Assessing an affiliate site or business might help you answer some questions you’ve had about your business. Or, they might give you insight on how to improve your service.
- State Why Using Your Service is Beneficial
If you are an online business for example, be clear on why using your service is better than using the service of other online businesses in the same industry. Customers are better convinced and more likely to buy in if you explain how its beneficial to them.
- Write a Target Market Statement
At this stage, collect all the information you’ve collected up until this point and put it into a statement that defines your target audience. While you construct this statement, be sure to include the most demographic and behavioural characteristics as well.
Example: Apple’s brand positioning statement
“For individuals who want the best personal computer or mobile device, Apple leads the technology industry with the most innovative products. Apple emphasizes technological research and advancement and takes an innovative approach to business best practices. It considers the impact our products have on its customers and the planet.”
By reading the statement, we can establish the following things about the brands intended market:
- Technologically savvy individuals who want the best
- Cares about the impact of technology on the planet
- Cares about best business practices
There’s a lot more that goes into profiling one’s audience but what we’ve discussed above is a good guideline to how that’s done. Making a good effort to define your audience can help your business dominate that specific market which is all you could ever want.
