How to determine the Target Market is the way to move forward and the actual reason for doing business in the first place. Without knowing your audience, the people you wish to target, you will not be able to create your customers’ profiles.
It is important to come up with ways on how to determine the Target Market that you wish to approach, and thereafter start creating your Online Marketing Strategies and tactics toward conversions either in the form of online sales or leads.
Some simple examples of understanding your potential audience let’s say are their lifestyle, what do they value the most, what do they really enjoy doing the most, to which age group do they belong to, what level of income should they have, and many other elements to consider.
The very first step is to define in which type of market you belong to. There are three main markets as mentioned below:
Three key market types
- Consumer market: This is the standard individual market where users purchase products for their personal use, e.g. milk, groceries, etc.
- Industrial market: This type of market is one where businesses purchase items or raw materials to produce finished products
- Resellers market: This market acts as an intermediary one where individuals or businesses perform the so called “reselling” of products or services for profit
The second step, is to perform market research. You should be able to match your products or services with your Target Market’s profile.
The third step, is to identify why a customer would want to buy your products or services. What features and benefits do you offer that will attract the attention of your audience, or will actually solve their problems?
The fourth step is to segment your Target Market based on criteria or characteristics such as geographic, demographic, psychographic, and behavioristic.
- Geographic: This criterion is one where you have to decide if your business is going to operate on a global level, international, regional or local.
- Demographic: The demographic part involves criteria such as gender, income, occupation, age, race, religion, family size, education level and marital status
- Psychographic: This criterion is one where beliefs, attitudes, and emotions play an important role for the consumers’ decision in purchasing products or services.
- Behavioristic: This part involves customers’ purchasing habits, such as how frequently the buy particular products or services, their loyalty level, etc.
Furthermore, there are also some key steps on defining or rather creating a better idea of your Target Market such as:
- Identify and understand your potential customers’ problems and how your products or services can solve such problems
- Create your customers’ profiles or personas
- What type of problems can you solve or what benefits can you offer to each type of customer profile?
- Will you also be able to serve niche markets and be more specialized?
- What is the level of expertise that you can offer?
- Who are your main competitors and can you differentiate from the crowd?
And we are done. You have now a clearer idea on how to define your Target Market wiser, thus performing those actions that will drive your startup business or even your established restructured business to the next level.
For support on how to determine your Target Market, you can always contact us and our experts will come back to you with the answers.