Marketing Your Business: Branding | Part 2: Target Audience
- Geek House Data Dynamics
- Sep 1
- 3 min read
Updated: Sep 3
In case you are new to this series, we are turning our programmes into bitesize articles for free. Stay Tuned every Monday for a new part of the first of many series: Marketing Your Business.
In these articles, I take our written programme points, and where I would be on a call with someone and explaining them as well, I have blockquoted my summary and any add-ons that come to mind, like examples and case-studies.
Hi, it's me. So we are taught to not generalise, to not judge a book by it's cover (which tbh that's the whole point of the cover but that is by the by), to not stereotype... and then in marketing that is what we do to reach the audience that best suits our business.
Target Audience Segmentation:
Audience segmentation is a crucial marketing strategy that involves dividing a target audience into specific segments based on various criteria such as demographics (age, gender, income) and psychographics (interests, values, lifestyle). By understanding the different segments within the target audience, businesses can tailor their marketing efforts more effectively to meet the diverse needs and preferences of each group.
Doing this allows companies to create more targeted ad campaigns, leading to higher engagement and ultimately higher conversion rates.
Imagine a Guess Who (or a knock-off guess who so Hasbro doesn't sue me). When you play the Who Guess game the initial questions tend to be "Man or Woman?", "Young or older?", "Glasses?", "Beard?". Well a new way to play is "Does this person seem to care about veganism?", "Do they own a flower shop?", it's the "Vibes" guess who and that my friend it audience segmentation in a nutshell.
Personas:
Developing customer personas for each segment is a valuable exercise in creating detailed profiles of typical customers. These personas go beyond basic demographics and delve into the goals, challenges, and preferences of individuals within each segment. By humanizing the target audience through personas, businesses can gain deeper insights into their customers' motivations and behaviours, allowing them to create more personalized and targeted brand messaging.
These Customer Personas also help in identifying unique pain points and desires of different customer segments, allowing companies to tailor their products/services completely to better meet these needs. Again thinking of the guess who board When doing the "Vibes" version, this is the persona you are creating for that character in order to answer the question correctly.
I understand that this can still be difficult even when imagined in a fun household game ( :/ ). When I started my first business, I was like "I don't care who they are, as long as they are customers". Which, yes true, but also creating the target audience for your business allows you to better reach targeted customers - if you are starting a bar, and you just boost your promo to generalised targets/no targets, then you will reach less people interested in your business due to:
Location (you want to target people local to you),
Religion (some religions do not allow drinking),
Not to mention obviously some people don't drink anyway.
Interests (Real ales over cocktails) along with many other reasons.
Whereas if you target it to "woman over 45 who love a cocktail in your local area": ALL that boosted ad goes to the target audience - Targeted ads for targeted customers. (That doesn't mean don't make targeted ads for the lads either if they are a target audience too, just do a separate one)
Example:
To illustrate the concept further, let's consider an example of an eco-friendly brand that has developed a primary persona named “Eco-conscious Emma.” Emma is depicted as a young professional in her 30s who places a high value on sustainability and is willing to invest in eco-friendly products, even if they come at a premium. By creating such a detailed persona, the eco-friendly brand can tailor its marketing strategies to resonate with individuals like Emma, addressing her specific needs and values to build a stronger connection with this segment of the target audience. This personalized approach not only enhances brand loyalty but also attracts like-minded consumers who share similar values and preferences, thereby expanding the brand's reach and impact in the market.
More next Monday: Unique Value Proposition (UVP) and Unique Selling Point (USP)s
If you have any additional questions please do not hesitate to use our free consultations available or email us at info@ghdatadynamics.co.uk
