We hear a lot about target market when it comes to our online business, but honestly, what is a target market?
Who are these people, how do you find them, but more importantly how do you get their attention?
A target market is your target audience, it’s a specific group of people within a larger market that your particular marketing message is directed to.
But why is that so important?
Because if you can know exactly who your target market is and understand the kinds of things that matter to them or the things that get their attention, you can apply that information to how you write and communicate with them.
For example, a Mercedes Benz dealer you won’t make many sales targeting young single moms struggling to make ends meet.
But even for those qualified to buy you still need to know their interests and objectives for buying. A 30 year old buying a Mercedes looks for different features as opposed to a 60 year old. Typically someone younger looks for sporty, impressive features, while an older person focuses more on safety and reliability.
Frankly, not getting in front of the right people means less traffic and definitely sluggish sales. There’s not much point to being in business if that happens.
Defining a Target Market
In order to know what a target market is, specifically your target market, you need to define who those people are. After all they’re just people, but they are people that fall into a specific group like age, gender, income or perhaps even race or religion depending on your product or service.
So for example, let’s say you sell decorative outdoor benches. Who is most likely to buy an outdoor bench? Typically it’s a home owners, right? They might have a pretty good income as people on a tight budget won’t spend money on things they don’t truly need. These are probably people that love the outdoors, so they’ll probably be in warmer climates.
Next, why would someone want an outdoor bench?
You might find out that curb appeal is important, if that’s the case then write content that is directed to people who are looking for curb appeal. They are your target market so talk their language, give them information they want to read about and demonstrate how outdoor benches can give them the curb appeal they’re looking for.
Alice Seba of Contentrix, says it best in her free target market guide when she says,
“When you know EXACTLY who you’re creating content for and marketing to, it is 100% easier to get them to say yes to that purchase.”
and she demonstrates that in her guide,
‘ 15 Things You Should Know about Your Target Market to Immediately Boost Your Sales’
where you’ll also learn what is a target market …really, things to know about your target market and how to actually find them.
You can download her free guide here.
Don’t miss the mark on pin pointing your target market because if you can know who those people, are you can target them directly, and if you know what gets their attention and what makes them buy, your job gets a lot easier and your sales will increase dramatically.
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June 8, 2011 at 9:16 am
that is what i am always thinking about – finding the proper people to sell my goods. and i should say it sometimes very hard to find the targeted audience. thanks for the tips anyway, as far as i understood i better spend some time for research first, and then advertise.
Hi John, I think you’ll find that if you really research who your target market is, it will save you advertising dollars and bring you traffic that is more likely to buy.
Best wishes, Liz
Sometimes you know the target audience without a doubt, but they are hard to get in front of online as far as what they search for. For example if an electrician needs a website and I design websites for electricians, they rarely search electrician business website, they search small business website, which is to broad of a search term for me to get in front of them. I cannot make them search for what I have to offer. I have targeted niche but no easy way to get in front of them.