How To Define Your Target Audience In Your Target Market

There are over 7 billion people in the world. And as of July 2020,  more than 4.5 billion of all humans are online. And, they spend at a bare minimum, an average of 4 hours and 25 minutes per day on the internet.

Not all at once, of course. 

But, between working and scrolling, people are present online all hours of the day and night.

This means that now, more than ever, brands must also be online if they want to establish connections with their target market and audience. 

The Difference Between Target Audience and Target Market

Not every single one of the 4.5 billion internet users is going to be right for your brand. So, you need to figure out how to capture the attention of those people most likely to buy into your product or service. 

You do this by setting up a target market and target audience persona. 

But, before you start, you should understand the difference between the two. 

They are very close, actually. 

A target market is an entire large scale group of people your brand wants to sell to. Whereas, the target audience is broken down into those from the target market who you predict will actually take action.

For example, your target market might be “pet owners in Michigan”. But, your target audience might be “apartment dwelling pet owners age 25-35 in metro Detroit”. Messaging would be completely different when you break your audience down into segments. 

Why You Need To Define Your Target Audience and Market

You know your brand isn’t right for everyone. By not establishing your audience, you’re going to seem very…hm…generic. 

Once you identify who your market is, you’ll be able to refine your branding and marketing to better appeal to that demographic. 

Using the pet owners as our example, you now know who you’re going to be ‘speaking to’. This knowledge will guide you into crafting visuals and messaging that appeals to pet owners in your target audience. 

Create your target audience by:

• Age
• Gender
• Income
• Location
• Profession
• Marital status
• Lifestyle
• Values
• Beliefs
• Behavior (spending habits and brand interactions)

Through various platforms like Google Analytics, and native social media channel analytics, you can learn what days and times you’re most likely to reach the largest portion of your audience. 

Why It’s So Important

You’ve worked hard to get this product or service launched. And, you know success rests in how you market it. 

You now have to make sure your message is showing up in front of the right eyeballs. 

That is why targeting is an essential part of marketing, and your audience needs to be identified immediately. 

36% of people will read something if it speaks to them and mirrors their views. Even further, most people would prefer to have repeat information on things they already know and agree with. 

This means your brand needs to play in the same sandbox as your prospective customer. 

The right targeting and the right messaging will allow you to: 

• Speak directly to those who want to hear what you have to say.
• Earn high quality leads willing to complete your call-to-action.
• Carve out a space that sets you apart from your competitors. 

How To Hit Those Targets

Hopefully, you have a basic grasp of your target audience. Once you have an idea of who you’ll be talking to, it’s time to:

• Identify and analyze your competitors to get an idea of what’s working for them. 
• Create a customer persona based on the target audience bullet points listed above.
• Address your audience’s pain points and show them how your product or service can solve their problems. 
• Be present on social media. Now, you don’t have to be active on every single platform. Pick two or three and work those. 
• Encourage interaction and user-generated content. 
• Build brand loyalty by nurturing relationships.
• Refine your brand based on what’s working and what isn’t.
• Also, make improvements to your product or services from the feedback of your loyal fans.

Just like all other aspects of marketing, there will be constant monitoring and refinement involved because of how fast things evolve on the internet. 

At the end of the day, just knowing who your audience is and where they are, allows you to spend some time hanging out with them. 

And that is what ends up being most important to your success.