This is how you characterize and sell to a target audience.
Defining target audiences for your brand is the first essential step needed to formulate the right messages that will lead to interest and purchase of your service or product. In this article, I will not only instruct you on how to define a target audience but also how to communicate with them correctly through content and strengthen your brand foundation.
These days I’m rebranding my business.
This means I’ve started everything from scratch. Messages, language, and visuals define USP, which is the unique selling proposition for my services. I conducted competitor research, wrote new content, and outlined a different approach for my website (hopefully launching soon). But all this effort is based on something very specific. My target audience.
Among all the new and different aspects of my business, I tried to understand how I could help others not only define their target audience but also reach it easily.
And that’s the main goal of this article.
So what exactly is a target audience and why do we need to know it?
The target audience comprises individuals or groups with a potential need for our service or product. They possess specific characteristics and inclinations, making them the focal point of our marketing endeavors.
For instance, consider a straightforward example of a target audience: working mothers aged between 30 to 42, residing in the central region, grappling with providing nutritious meals for their families. Together with their spouses, their household earns 10,000 USD per month or more. I term this example as “simple” because it serves as a foundational framework. However, looking deeper is essential to comprehend the experiences, concerns, and motivations of our target audience in embracing change through our service or product.
In general, the target audience is categorized based on demographic factors, areas of interest, and purchasing history. As illustrated in the example above, constructing our target audience involves considerations such as geographical location, age group, and occupation, and may extend to educational attainment, income level, and other pertinent parameters.
(Don’t confuse the target audience with personas; there’s a difference, and I’ll elaborate on that in the next article I write).
3 Questions that will help refine the target audience:
Who makes the purchasing decisions of my target audience?
If my product or service fulfills an existing need, and the audience actively seeks a specific solution, they are likely to choose to purchase from me or exclusively with me. When companies and organizations I collaborate with actively seek someone for terminological branding and storytelling, they demonstrate clear purchasing intent.
Whether they ultimately choose to procure from me depends on the effectiveness of my marketing messages and how well I address their needs.
However, their intent to purchase is evident. There’s no need for me to extensively promote the service; they are actively seeking it.
What are the specific interests of my target audience?
It’s essential to begin with the end in mind. Understanding the interests of our audience aids in comprehending their buying preferences and the factors that motivate their purchasing decisions. This is crucial. Once I grasp their hobbies, preferences, and personal-emotional connections, I can tailor my communication to resonate with them.
Let’s consider an example: women who practice yoga. This audience (which, despite having sub-audiences, we’ll simplify for this illustration) has specific attire preferences, including accessories like mats, carry bags, towels, and specialized clothing. Moreover, there’s an emphasis on aesthetics.
Wearing branded yoga apparel, in addition to comfort and functionality, holds significant importance. Factors such as a non-slippery mat or a mat with adequate thickness to alleviate pressure on palm joints must be considered before launching yoga products.
When catering to a group with distinct interests, understanding their experiences is crucial.
What is the culture of my audience?
Dividing the target audience by cultures, like Guy Raz selling his podcast to Soviet Union expats or a salon specializing in treating afro or curly hair. But it’s easy. It’s intuitive for us to think in terms of cultures like this. In my opinion, even talking to people born in the 80s and raised in the 90s and giving them references to music, TV shows, or other nostalgic markers is also an understanding of the culture of the target audience.
All these things allow us to understand the motivations of our audience and give us a deeper understanding of who we are talking to, writing to, and marketing to.
When we write all these parameters clearly, we can create appropriate messages that make our audience feel connected, trusted, and most importantly, understood. And when the audience feels understood, they develop brand loyalty.
It’s not just about the messages
The correct definition of the target audience doesn’t just start and end with marketing messages and building trust.
One of the most frustrating things is the never-ending need to market. And market. And market.
When I know who the target audience is, and I know that they are organizations and companies, I will know how to position my marketing campaigns on LinkedIn. If I know that my target audience is young mothers up to the age of 30, I know that probably the best platform to invest in is Instagram.
When I know who my target audience is, I can work less hard on marketing and of course not waste unnecessary time.
Another option is to follow people who represent my target audience and gather information on the terminology they use, experiences, desires, interests, etc. All this will help us sharpen our offer and messages and improve our position against the audience.
Analysis and expansion of audiences
I believe that most of those who read this article are not starting from scratch. Not entirely anyway.
If you’re talking to an audience that has purchased from you in the past downloaded a guide or watched a video on your website – you can use that information.
In this case, I would analyze the audience that has already become a customer or needs my content and try to squeeze out data that will help me understand their needs and which messages will work.
But even if we have an audience, part of the beauty of the digital world is that we can continue to grow the audience that follows us. And as you know, not all the audience becomes a paying customer. Most of the audience will continue to follow us because they derive value from us. The beauty of it is that some of them will become ambassadors and will refer paying customers to us.
If you want to grow your audience (and you do), it’s enough to define the target audience try to leverage exposure on social networks and persist in writing content, videos, and other forms of digital marketing to attract a broad base of potential customers from various market segments.
Know the competition
Okay, maybe not really the enemy, because they’re our colleagues. But it’s important to know what exists in the market. What’s already being offered in the industry and how our product or service is different from what exists.
So before we can offer a unique proposition, I really recommend conducting market research to understand what we’re up against.
Competitor research will force you to really understand what exists outside and will help you create a better picture of the number of competitors and identify the key players.
What it helped me understand is who among the players is just perceived as similar to my activity. Who is really providing value to the audience and what are the products that exist in my field? For me, it was an excellent opportunity to find a unique sales proposition (USP).
Most of the customers who came to me, small and large, passed on the competitor research. It seemed unnecessary to them for some reason.
But I can assure you that competitor research will expose threats you didn’t know existed and will help you create a work plan to deal with them. And there are always threats. Alongside opportunities, of course.
Trends are the name of the game
When the coronavirus first broke out, there was a crazy trend of free webinars, and the market responded to it with love, until it got tired of it. Then came a period of focused digital conferences, with a number of experts in specific fields. After that came the golden age of digital courses. Now we are in the midst of the era of reels and TikTok.
What I want to say is that it’s important to know how to advertise, to whom, and what are the leading trends.
A good way to understand this is to look at what our competitors are doing and where they are investing their efforts. If you are targeting the same audience, you can also see the engagement there is on such trends and others.
However, I need to understand what suits my target audience and adapt the action and trend integration in my marketing.
Using the language of your audience
The strongest way to market is to use the language your target audience uses. But how will you know what that language is? Just ask.
When I started out with the storytelling workshop, I asked each of the 72 registrants for the first round, “What is the most important thing for you in this course?” and wrote down all the answers in a file. Then, it was very easy for me to see which terms were recurring, how people expressed themselves, and what was important to them. And then it was easy for me to take that and improve the course and also market it to the next round.
But that’s not the only way, of course. You can send a survey to our audience (up to 5 questions, don’t overload them).
You can also conduct a short interview or hold a focus group with questions suitable for the target audience.
If it seems too much for you right now, you can also just browse the web. Read posts, and comments, watch videos, and discussions – and take quotes or words from there.
The most important thing is to create a special file for all the information so that it’s easy for you to analyze it and make it useful for you and for the messages of your brand.
You’re probably thinking… Okay, we’ve defined the target audience.
But how on earth do we reach them?
Social Media
The problem begins when we try to be active on all social media and it just exhausts us.
To know where it’s best for you to start, let me ask you a question – how is it easiest for your audience to consume content? I’m sure you don’t have a predetermined answer.
I found that the audience I address loves to read. Therefore, my blog is one of the most important assets in my activity. However, I also found that my audience also loves videos and seeing me speak. On the other hand, I know that most of the population is visual, meaning images will speak to them. And yet… I can’t market on all networks all the time.
I recommend starting with one or two platforms and focusing on creating marketing content there. Then, you can expand to more platforms. In any case, no matter what you choose, I really recommend opening a blog and a website where you control the content and can’t be stripped of control over it.
Organic Content
I’m in love with organic content. I hardly ever used paid advertising in my life.
Marketing through content with high value that speaks to your audience is an excellent way to establish authority and expertise in your field. It’s an excellent way to show the world who you are and what your value is, and also to stay in the minds of your audience. But not only.
Potential customers check you out. If you offer them something to purchase, they will look for your website and will want to “taste” you before making a purchase. Informative articles in a blog, videos that convey your energy, or reviews and product comparisons can help them make the decision to buy from you.
The video leaves a mark on written posts
Video content has been on the rise for quite some time now. From long YouTube videos to short clips on reels and TikTok, video is the next medium.
Interestingly enough, both young and old audiences prefer YouTube over other social media platforms, so while writing these lines, I kick myself for not investing more there.
You can use video content to reach a specific audience through lecture videos, how-tos, short entertaining content, online seminars, product demonstrations, case studies, promotional videos, and brand interviews. There are so many ways to use video, you don’t have to choose. You just need to be consistent.
The Journey to the Inbox
All the review I’ve done above is a small part of the marketing funnel that ideally should convert followers and website visitors into a distribution list. You know it as “Leave your details and I’ll send you the free guide” or any other variation of that.
If earlier I bothered to mention that it’s better for you to have a website so you can control your content, distribution lists will help you control your audience and continue to communicate with them at all costs.
Segmented distribution lists will help you maintain contact with your audience, maintain high engagement, and offer purchase suggestions, special discounts, and more…
This is an audience that already knows you, so less work is required to sell. They already know you, your value, and the value they get from you. Of course, within the distribution lists, you can also go back and sharpen the audience you’re talking to. It all starts and ends with data.
