Implementing an effective marketing strategy is the key to creating and maintaining long-lasting relationships with their audience. This leads to an increase in sales which allows companies to stay at the forefront of their respective industries. The very first step to developing an effective marketing strategy is to define your business’s target audience. This is your complete guide to everything you need to know about understanding and defining your target audience.
What is a Target Audience?
Your company’s target audience is the sector of the population who are most likely to purchase your products or services. This is the group that you want to focus on reaching with your marketing campaigns. In most cases, the people who make up your target audience share one or more common characteristics such as:
- Gender
- Age
- Profession
- Location
- Income
- Educational level
- Marital status
- Behavior
Companies can then use the commonalities of their target audience to create personalized content that better resonates with their audience.
Why Is It Crucial to Define Your Target Audience?
The fact of the matter is that not everyone in the world is going to be a potential buyer of your product or service. Trying to reach everyone means you will not effectively reach anyone. Buyers need to be able to relate to your product. When a connection is made, then trust is established and purchases are made.
Defining your ideal audience allows companies to develop effective marketing strategies directed at those who are most likely to buy their product. This means you make the most of your marketing dollars and receive a higher ROI (return on investment) on your marketing campaigns.
Examples of Startups Who Have Effectively Defined Their Target Audiences
Uber
Uber is a startup service that gives people a way to get from point A to point B easily and safely. Consumers have the ability to book a ride from any device and even customize certain features of their ride. Uber effectively markets to its target audience consisting of anyone who needs transportation from one location to another. This includes busy professionals who need a ride to a meeting or to companies needing to provide professional transportation services to clients.
Hired Inc.
Hired is a platform where employers can easily connect with talent and job seekers can easily connect with companies in need of personnel. They market to their demographic of employers who need a hassle-free way of finding the highest quality candidates to fill open positions and qualified professionals who need an effective way to connect with high-quality professional job opportunities.
Dialpad
Dialpad is an innovative solution that gives company teams the ability to work remotely more effectively by moving the company’s phone system, conferencing, and call center to the cloud. Dialpad markets to their target audience of businesses who either employ remote staff or employees travel regularly for business, yet need to stay connected.
Questions to Ask When Defining Your Target Audience
There are multiple factors that go into thoroughly defining and understanding your target audience. Here are the 5 most important questions you need to ask when defining your company’s target audience.
What is the Action That Your Target Audience Ultimately Needs to Take?
The end action that a company wants its target audience to take will vary depending on the overall purpose of the organization. For most businesses, it will be to purchase the product or service offered. However, for some organizations, it may be to donate, volunteer, or even spread the word. For example, share a post on social media.
Which Sector of the Population is Most Likely to Take the Desired Action?
This is the part where you have to look at factors such as age, physical location, income level, etc. to determine which group of people your product or service will appeal to. Let’s say for instance that your company sells winter outerwear. Your focus will be on people who live in colder climates, not those who live in warmer clients without a need for outerwear.
How Does Your Product or Service Help Your Target Audience?
The best marketing strategies are those that solve a problem. What are the frustrations of your target audience and how does your product or service make their lives easier. Determining the answer to this question will help you create an effective marketing strategy that shows your audience why your product is a solution to their problem.
What Drives Your Target Audience?
What are the factors that ultimately convince your audience to make a purchase? Perhaps they are motivated by a good sale or the prospect of a part of the proceeds going to a worthy cause. The answer to this question will vary for each business as there is an endless number of reasons that consumers make purchases.
How Can You Best Reach Your Target Audience?
Defining how to best reach your audience is the final piece of the puzzle in defining and understanding your target audience. Does your audience spend more time watching television, utilizing streaming services, on social media, etc? Knowing how to reach your target audience will help you make the best use of your marketing dollars and receive a higher ROI on your investment.
Let Ascent Help You Get the Exposure Your Startup Needs
Ascent understands the need for startups to gain exposure to clients and investors when they need it most to be able to grow and scale their business. This is why our conference is the number one place for startups to gain exposure to their target audience and close deals with investors in order to receive the funding necessary to help their companies succeed. Learn more about our partner event series – The Investor Summit.