How to Thrive in a Competitive Marketplace

Defining your target audience is one thing – divining it is something altogether different. A thorough understanding of your target audience is critical to marketing success. It’s a fundamental principle but one that gets neglected surprisingly often by marketers.

To be truly successful in reaching your target you need to delve beneath the veneer of basic demographic and psychographic data and immerse yourself in your audience. Why? Because everything hinges on them - they drive how your message is crafted, what it should look and sound like, the mental cues it uses, when, where and how it’s delivered – your target audience is the most important factor in the marketing equation.

The most effective way to go beyond the surface is to talk to your target audience. Become friends with them. Seek out opportunities to listen to them. You can learn more about your audience in a handful of five-minute conversations than you can with a pile of statistics.

There’s lots to discover. Where does your audience get their information? How can they be intercepted? What else is competing for their attention? Who are their role models? Who do they listen to? Who influences the people who influence them? And so on.

A “well-divined” target audience profile is worth its weight in marketing gold.