How to Find Your Target Market Online

This week I'd like to focus on what I feel is probably one of the most important aspects of online marketing --

Find Your Target Market! 

This is a concept that a lot of people miss. Here's a case in point.

A few weeks ago I had a gentleman who runs a real estate website and newsletter requesting that I put one of his articles in my newsletter along with an ad for his site.

While I love accepting ads and payments for my newsletter, it would have been completely inappropriate for me to place his ad and article in my newsletter because my readers don't request my newsletter to read about real estate.
 
He would have been much more successful finding a real estate newsletter that would have targeted readers in the market for what he has to offer.

Not all advertisers would turn you away however.  As long as you are paying, you can find someone to run your ad so it's completely up to you to know where your advertising  dollars will be best spent. Otherwise you're wasting your money.

Don't make this mistake.  Find out who your target market really is.

========================================================

In This Issue:

-  Welcome!!
-  How To Find YourTarget Market
-  Thank You!
-  Search Engine News and tips

==============================================

         How to Find Your Target Market
==============================================

I receive a lot of questions and requests from my readers desperate to make sales from their websites. Achieving sales is probably the biggest challenge a web business owner has.

To effectively respond to those questions I have to begin with asking "Who are your customers?" "Who are the folks that would be interested in purchasing what you have to offer?"

It sounds like a simple question but it's a significant one that can make or break the success of your sales. Not everyone will be interested in what you have to offer and even many of those that are interested won't necessarily buy.

So what's the solution?

Avoid becoming all things to all people. Find your niche and become a specialist in that niche and strive to find the segment of buyers interested in that niche.

For example, an artist who does wall murals will need to reach a much different audience than an artist who paints abstract paintings. A muralist who paints children's wall murals will need to target a much different audience than a muralist who paints commercially.

Once you realize your niche and who your target audience is, you'll also begin to discover the marketing advantages you possess and you can then begin to capitalize on them.

Next you need realize that people purchase products based on three things:

- To fulfill a need
- To solve a problem
- To feel good

Your product or service can fill just one or it can fulfill all three. The basic concept it to determine which of these categories your products or services fall into. These categories will help determine how you will market to your target audience. If you can  fulfill a need, solve a problem or just help the buyer feel good you'll need to stress those points and stress them hard.

'Defining your Market'
It's important to take a few moments to think about the details of your products. This helps tremendously in narrowing down your target market and reaching only those that have an interest.

For example, if you paint children's murals in Dallas Texas you don't want to focus your sales efforts on people in New York looking for modern art.

Think about the following and jot down who might be interested in your products or services.

• Age Group: Children, teens, adults, elderly or all.
• Gender:  Male, female or both
• Marital status: single, married, divorced, widowed
• Income brackets: low, middle high
• Ethnic or religious backgrounds
• Occupations: Executives, doctors, lawyers, housewives, business  owners, blue collar, white collar, students, out of work, etc.
• Income status:  Individuals with low income, high income or both.

If we go back to my children's murals example,  my target customers might be:

home fashion conscious mothers between the ages of 25-40 with children of ages 1-10 with middle to high income brackets living in Dallas, Texas.

'Finding your target market on the internet'

Search engines are the best way of achieving a targeted market because those searching on the web can type in  exactly what they are searching for and receive the targeted traffic the search engines so proudly advertise.

But attaining good placement on the search engines is often difficult and time consuming. 

Ezines and newsletters are a very effective alternative. Most ezines cover specific subjects such as finance, marketing, health, internet, etc. Your job is to find an ezine whose topic matches your target market. To do
this you must locate an ezine directory.

Directories usually list contact information, advertising rates, and circulation. Once you find a targeted ezine then place your ad. You'll be amazed at the amount of traffic this can bring to your site.

Once you've found the appropriate ezine or newsletter you'll need to write an ad that will captivate your readers and compel them to buy your product or service, therefore your headlines and ad copy need to be compelling and convincing.

While you might feel the urge to write your own headlines or adcopy it can make a huge difference to invest in tools  that you buy once and use over and over. The idea here is to get your headlines and ads written as easily and quickly as possible.

My personal favorites are:

Headliner pro
This is a superb headliner program that asks you a few simple questions about your product, you plug them in and it creates the headlines for you.  It also includes emotional triggers and hypnotic words.

Marlon Sanders Ad Copy Secrets
This is a self help video and guide that offers a twelve step formula for writing ads that will get people to buy.

However you decide to market your products or services, make sure you are getting to the right people, your target  audience.

Attract them with your headlines and pull them in with professional ad copy.

========================================================

                       THANK YOU!

I want to thank all those that responded to last weeks poll.

I'm gathering some good information that will help me respond to your marketing needs.

What do you need to know about most?

-  What products to sell
-  Traffic to my site
-  Free advertising
-  Earn more affiliate commissions
-  Build a mailing list
-  Quality low-cost advertising
-  To learn what works online
-  To Learn what will work for ME

======================================================

                  Search Engine News and Tips

Retaining Traffic after a Web Site Redesign
http://searchenginewatch.com/searchday/article.php/3422791

Secrets of Successful Search Engine Optimization
http://searchenginewatch.com/searchday/article.php/2175081

The race for Total Search intensifies
http://www.pandia.com/sw-2004/58-totalsearch.html