“Know your audience” is a commonly recognized phrase. It emphasizes the success behind providing the most compelling version of language for your intended audience, at the right time, in the right place. In the marketing world, this phrase is the basis of an essential component in the success of campaigns: target audience. Read on to find out how to build an audience sucessfully, even in a down economy.
Target audience:
Target audience refers to the specific group of people your business intends to reach through its marketing efforts.
Generally, your target audience should be the group of people who are most willing and most likely to buy whatever you are selling. As the end goal of these marketing efforts is to generate business, it’s a fairly easy concept to understand.
Why target a specific audience:
For the small business owner, defining a target audience and marketing to that specific audience group is an essential component in being able to compete with large businesses.
By identifying who you want to reach and focusing on those people, you can develop an effective marketing strategy. As a byproduct, you will save time and money: two very precious resources.
Take large television programs, such as the Superbowl, for example. These programs are well-known for the insane number of viewers they draw in. As a company, you might think having your campaign air during the commercial breaks of one of these widely beloved programs is the best marketing idea as you would draw in an appealingly large number of views. However, in doing so, you are greatly exhausting two of your most precious resources:
Money:
As the competition between companies that want their campaign aired during the little time the program breaks for commercial is tremendously large, it will cost you a pretty penny to reserve airtime.
Time:
Companies put their greatest efforts into these campaigns. They are guaranteed to drawn in a large viewing therefore each company wants their campaign to be memorable. Aired campaigns viewers found entertaining get discussed for weeks after they have aired. More commonly known by the viewers, the commercials that do air can be just as entertaining as the program itself. Admittingly, I like watching the commercials more than the Superbowl football game itself by a longshot. The entertainment they provide is some of the most intriguing I see on T.V. all year. Even after they air, they are still talked about reaffirming the level of effort they require from the companies putting them together.
For the small business, the idea of your campaign airing during the Superbowl should be less appealing than you might be thinking at first. The total viewer count might be a large number; but only a small percentage of those viewers would be actually interested in your product. Your precious time and money would be more efficiently spent elsewhere.
How to:
Let’s say you own a local bike shop. Rather than marketing your campaign (with the understanding you have the means to do so without going under) to the entirety of the Superbowl viewers, focus on your target audience. That may mean advertising the campaign in a local community program pamphlet or a state specific biker’s magazine.
Why? Because the people reading these are most interested in what you’re trying sell. The total amount of people your campaign reaches may be lower, but you would be reaching the right people.
Your best chance of generating business isn’t the men that spend their free time watching football states away. Nor the people who gather to watch the Superbowl as a social event. It would be marketing directly at the people in close proximity to your store. People that are interested in the outdoors and possibly even more specifically, bikers.
It’s a fairly logical concept. It wouldn’t be smart to run a homemade baked goods stand right outside of a vegan grocery store. Those going there mainly don’t consume whole milk; an ingredient in all the baked goods I wanted to sell. I would not generate any business outside that store as those people are uninterested in my product. Instead, I could set up shop outside a school basketball game. People who go into the game may be interested in eating a baked good while they watch. Directly driving my sales.
Tips and tools for reaching your target audience:
Utilize features embedded on social media platforms! With the fast-paced growth of social media, more and more users are joining every day. Combine a massive number of users with certain algorithms, and you’ll find it very difficult to reach your intended audience. But by utilization of the platforms features such as hashtags, the platform will do all the work for you! Read our blog post on hashtags and how you can use them to reach your target audience here!
Wrap-up:
Understand your target audience. Who are they? What do they value? Using them as your basis of campaigns. By knowing who your consumers are, and where you are most likely to reach them, successful marketing becomes a whole lot easier.
Written by Julia Casey, Color of Thought Creatives Team
Sources:
https://www.marketingevolution.com/marketing-essentials/target-audience
