Introduction
Finding and catering to a target audience is one of the most elusive topics regularly discussed in marketing. How do you find out your target audience? How do you target your marketing campaigns to that group of people? A company’s effectiveness at answering both questions distinguish the most successful businesses from the companies that declare bankruptcy within five years of opening. But what is a target audience? A target audience (especially on social media) is a group of people a business determines are most likely to buy either their products or services. With many companies having a solid idea of their target audience and proficiency with social media, it is imperative to establish a strong target audience at the beginning stage of a company to match or potentially even exceed the success of a company’s competition.
How Can a Company Establish Their Target Audience?
A company should first try to determine what demographic its target audience will belong to strictly based on the nature of the product or service they sell. If the product involves physical therapy for instance, it most likely will be tailored to the older generations, just as video games will tailor to the interests of the children growing up now. Once the most basic demographic information is determined, a company should examine its customers’ behaviour regularly. Understanding the psychological mindset of one’s customer will eventually lead to sales in the long run. Catering to your target market’s hobbies, interests, and ideologies will lead to higher chance companies will stay in the industry for more extended periods.
To help establish a target audience, it is crucial to complete consumer test groups to determine the demographic and personality of people most intrigued with the company’s product. They can provide feedback and help to improve a product, so more people feel inclined to purchase it. The larger the test group, the more accurate the results will be relative to the entire population of possible customers.
The Benefits of a Strong Target Audience
There is a higher likelihood of a customer going up the stage of loyalty established by marketers worldwide with a substantial target audience. The six stages of customer loyalty are as follows:
- Awareness (A customer finds out about a product through an advertisement or word-of-mouth by other customers)
- Research (If a customer is intrigued enough, they will research the product or service and find out whether it suits their needs)
- Buy (They buy the product or service)
- Use (They first use the product)
- Repeat (If they enjoy the product or service, they will continue to use it)
- Refer (The customer then refers the product to people they know)
Avid customers who love a product are more likely to refer people. Rightfully establishing a solid target audience will make this entire process flow much more quickly than prioritizing the wrong group of people in a business’ marketing.
Conclusion
The target audience of a company is their “bread-and-butter.” Without a strong group of passionate people purchasing a product and influencing others to do the same, a company will miss out on large amounts of revenue. To maximize a company’s efficiency and capability to grow with time, finding out their target audience and understanding the psychological tendencies of that group will alert as many prospective buyers as possible to a company’s products and services.
