A Guide to Understanding and Defining Your Brand’s Target Audience
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Whether you’re a well-established company or a new brand just starting out, understanding your target audience is critical for long-term success. And chances are, you’ve already got an idea about who your target audience is, whether you realize it or not.
Because when you decide to start a company – whether you’re selling a product or providing a service – you do so to meet the need of a particular market. So however you define your market will dictate who you’re trying to sell to. And that’s the first indication of your target audience.
But in order to succeed, you’ll need more than a vague inkling of who you’re trying to sell to. You want a clear, detailed understanding.
So let’s explore the what, why, and how of defining your brand’s target audience.
Starting with the basics…
What is a target audience?
A target audience is the specific group of people that a brand is trying to connect with (and hopefully sell to). It’s typically defined by demographics (age, location, ethnic background, sex, marital status, income, etc.), psychographics (behaviors, interests, hobbies, values, preferences, experiences), or most often a combination of the two.
For example, a music venue’s target audience may be:
Young adults (ages 21-35) living in Chicago, with a passion for live music. They never leave home without their headphones and will travel to see their favorite bands. They have enough disposable income to spend on concert tickets, but still appreciate a good deal and will happily enroll in a loyalty program if it means scoring exclusive discounts and offers.
The description features a mix of demographic information (their age range, where they live, general income markers), as well as interests and behaviors (love of music, willingness to travel for shows, value a good deal).
Your target audience influences your branding, marketing, communication, and sales strategies – even your packaging. So it’s a good idea to take the time to get a clear picture of who you're talking to.
Why define a target audience?
To succeed, brands need to cut through the noise of a cluttered market and make an impact on their audience.
But how do you break through if you don’t know who you’re trying to reach?
Defining your audience – and getting as specific as possible – increases your odds of reaching people who actually want to engage, and buy what you’re selling.
So, while it’s tempting to cast a wide net and reach the most people, being generic won’t do you any favors. As the saying goes, if you try to appeal to everyone, you’ll end up appealing to no one.
When you know who you’re talking to, you can tailor your approach to them – what you say, how you say it, what channels you use to reach them. You can have meaningful, personalized interactions and build solid relationships with your customers. (And all of that leads to more revenue for you).
Defining your target audience can also:
Keep you focused
Your target audience acts as your north star, guiding you as you make strategic decisions. It’s a lot easier to chart a course when you know where you’re going.Solidify your brand’s voice
Knowing who you’re talking to informs how you talk. When you understand your audience, you can create a consistent brand voice that resonates.
Bolster your brand’s longevity
Especially with new, small businesses, it can be hard to separate the brand from the founder. When you take an audience-centric approach, however, the brand can stand on its own two feet. (Think about how Apple has remained iconic even after Steve Jobs passed away).To paraphrase George Washington in Hamilton, when you focus your brand on its target audience, it can outlive you when you’re gone.
Target Practice: 7 Tips for Defining Your Audience
Ready to identify your brand’s target audience? Here are some tips to help get you started:
Start with your current customers
If you’re an established company, look at your existing customer data to get a sense of who’s engaging with your brand. Pay special attention to repeat customers – they will make up the core of your base.
Look for patterns and trends to get a detailed picture of your target. Who are they? Where do they live? What content do they engage with?
Analyze the competition
Newer companies without a solid customer base can look to competitors to get see what they’re doing and who they’re trying to reach.
Then, ask yourself: how is your brand different from theirs? What do you offer that they don’t? And how might that make your audience different from theirs?
Monitor social feeds
Beyond customer data, look at your social channels. Who is engaging with your content? How are people talking about your brand, or the industry or market you’re in?
Look for indicators of their challenges, values, and preferences.
Just ask!
Use surveys to get feedback directly from your customers and clients.
Or find ways to incentivize them to share their personal data, such as signing up for a loyalty program, weekly newsletter, or membership perks.
Build customer personas
Once you’ve collected your data, use it to build a detailed profile of your target audience – a profile of a single person who represents your core base.
Give them a face and a name, describe their demographics, their profession, their daily challenges, and what’s important to them when it comes to the type of product or service you offer.
Then, keep that persona in mind with everything you do.
You can have more than one target audience
While you’ll likely have a main target audience for your whole brand, you may find that different products or territories resonate with different people – and that’s a-okay.
You could have a distinct target audience for specific campaigns, services, or regions based on your business’s needs.
Be open to new opportunities
In some cases, your audience may choose you – and you may find yourself reaching a group you never saw coming.
Take, for instance, Pedialyte. Long known as a way to keep children hydrated, the brand recently found itself popular with a whole new market: hungover adults.
Instead of ignoring the new buyers, they embraced them. Now, the brand even has products specifically designed for their newfound audience.
So you’ve defined your target audience… now what?
Now that you’ve got a clear picture of who you’re trying to reach with your brand, how do you actually reach them?
We can help with that! Shoot us a message to tell us about your project, and we’ll let you know how we can help get things rolling.
