The best marketers are able to aptly identify target audiences, interpret them, and then make calculated decisions based on how we believe we can get them to do what we want to accomplish.
At first, that may sound like manipulation.
The best marketers are also salespeople who know how to:
- Effectively upsell and cross sell AND
- Provide a product/service that is a win-win for both parties
But before you can sell anything, you need to know as much as you can about your ideal customer.
Defining a target audience is not just a best practice – it’s the only practice.
Your target audience will drive your branding, positioning, content creation, graphic design, packaging, customer service, pricing…everything!
In this article, we’re going to walk you through some of the specifics of identifying your target audience, as well as tactful strategies for actually targeting them.
Table of Contents
The ROI Triangle
One of the most difficult aspects of growing a business is the process of building up an audience. Plenty of entrepreneurs have great ideas for products – products that are guaranteed to sell like hotcakes when they’re put in front of the right people. The big challenge is figuring out who the “right people” are so that the product can live up to its potential.
If you want to start and grow a successful company, you can’t do it without an audience. And in order to generate maximum value, there are three specific things you’ll want to focus on.
We’ll call it the ROI Triangle.
- Establish Empathy. You have to be 100% clear on who your audience is, what their problem is, how they feel about their problem, why it’s so painful to them, what they’re seeking, how they’d prefer to solve the problem, which methods they’ve tried to solve their problem with in the past, etc. If you aren’t empathetic, you’ll never build a healthy business that lasts.
- Craft a Compelling Offer. Once you’re empathetic to your audience and know what they want/need, it’s time to craft an offer. This offer speaks to the target audience precisely where they are and establishes quick rapport. The customer should be thinking, “They’re reading my mind! Tell me more…”
- Gain Visibility. Once you understand your audience and have a compelling offer, the goal is pretty simple: Get in front of as many of your target audience members as possible. In other words, you’re laser-focused on traffic and lead generation.
(The ROI Triangle obviously leaves out the product itself. To build a successful business, the product or service has to be something that people want. But that’s an article for another time. We’re operating under the assumption that you have that squared away and are simply trying to reach the right people with the right message.)
The 3 Personas of Your Target Audience
When most marketers talk about the concept of a target audience, they’re referring to one specific target. But in reality, there are three personas to every target audience. (And there can very well be multiple “sub” personas of each of these audiences.)
- The customer (the person who will pay you). This is your main focus. It’s this person that ultimately makes the buying decision and rewards your hard work with a financial transaction. It’s the customer who keeps the lights on and allows you to write yourself a paycheck each month.
- The influencer (the person who influences the person who pays you). The influencer has a great deal of say in how the customer thinks about certain issues and trends. Finding who the key influencers are is like discovering a key that gives you access to the customer’s neural pathways.
- The supporter (the person who pushes and encourages you). This third category can consist of almost anyone. These people aren’t necessarily going to buy anything from you. And they probably don’t have much influence over the customer. They do, however, have influence over you. They push, encourage, and motivate you to do well.
When we talk about audience targeting, we’re really talking about going after each of these personas in unison. While the customer is certainly the most important, the other two personas – the influencer and the personas – must be targeted as well.
Defining Your Target Customer
The first step is to identify the target customer. There could be anywhere from one to five, six, or even seven different target customers, but for simplicity’s sake, we’re going to prete