Even the most creative marketing campaigns will fall on deaf ears if you fail to target the correct audience for your concept. Learn to define your target audience with 4 easy steps.
1. Define the Problem You Solve
Before you can define your target audience, you must define the purpose of your product. Understand exactly what problem (also known as a “pain point”) your product or service solves and understand it innately.
Some questions to ask at this point:
- Why is it important for this pain point to be addressed?
- What are the different ways to solve the problem?
- What steps does your product or service take to solve the problem?
- Why is your product or service is a better solution than your competitors’?
2. Determine What You Want
Once you’ve defined the problem that your product or service solves, create a list of what you want. This entails determining the best case scenario and what type of customer you would get under ideal scenarios. This step is important because you cannot aim to do business with everyone. You must choose a market and focus, or else you will end up confusing customers and your brand by trying to stretch it too thin.
Some questions to ask at this point:
- What kind of person don’t I want as a customer?
- With whom do I want to do business with?
- What kind of disposable income does my ideal client have?
3. Create a Profile
Once you have an idea of the type of customer you want, get to work nailing down the details and create a profile of him or her. Identify their motivations and where they spend their time so you know how to reach them.
Key questions to ask at this point:
- How old is my ideal client?
- What are his or her behaviors?
- What motivates my ideal clients?
- Where do they spend most of their time?
- What channels are most likely to reach them successfully?
4. Test and Evaluate
Once you have a complete profile of your ideal customer, it’s time to test out whether he or she is a good target market for your product. Test your target market by giving people an opportunity to buy your product and then seeing whether you reach them through the channels you predicted, and if the people who purchase are more or less similar to your profile. Offer samples, conduct a seminar or hold a focus group to gauge reactions.
Once you have tested your product against your target market and determined it works, launch your campaign with the knowledge and reassurance of strategy and evaluation behind you.
About the Author: Jocelyn Pick
