5 Ways to Find Your Target Audience

Table of Contents:

• Introduction

1. Brainstorm Target Demographics
2. Create a List of Similar Interests
3. Study your Competitors
4. Host a Focus Group
5. Interpret your Data

• Conclusion

Introduction

Finding the correct target audience is one of the key foundations of running a successful marketing campaign. You could have the best product or service for the best price, but if you’re promoting it to the wrong people, you will never make a sale. For example, if you have a delicious vegan restaurant but you’re promoting it to people that love to eat meat, you’re probably in the wrong place!

So how do you go about nailing down your target audience?

My name is Hannah Robertson: Force Media’s copywriter with years of writing experience. Today, I will cover the steps that our founder, Jordan Agolli, uses to find target audiences that launch our clients' marketing campaigns.

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1. Brainstorm Target Demographics

A good starting place is making an educated guess! Consider everything that makes up a target audience and what categories would theoretically hold the most influence on their attitude toward your product or service. Some questions to get you started may be…

1. How old are they? 
2. What gender are they? 
3. Where do they live? 
4. Are they married?
5. Do they have kids?
6. What decade did they grow up in? 
7. What is their economic class?

Again, not all of these factors will influence your target audience, and it would not be wise to make a target audience too specific. Consider every factor, but really focus on what would be most influential for your product or service.

For example, if you are selling mini vans, it is smart to focus on people with young children, but you may limit your audience if you only create content that appeals only to one gender.

Once you know details about the demographic you are looking for, you can tailor your marketing approach to appeal to them by considering these questions:

1. How do they communicate?
2. What social media platform do they use the most?
3. Are they more trusting or less trusting of products on the Internet than the average person?

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2. Create a List of Similar Interests

Now that you have a rough idea as to what your target audience looks like, it is important to test that hypothesis with the tools of the modern age. Marketing has existed for hundreds of centuries, but the avenues in which we market our products or services have changed and will continue to change as platforms evolve. To match this evolving world, then, it is smart to use the platforms that people are using now: social media! 

Before you can properly benefit from using social media, though, it is important to first decide what you are looking for. Jordan recommends beginning by creating a list of similar interests. 

Take, for example, our client Alterroom, who sells luxury leather desk mats. After we created our target demographic based on the questions above, we found our customers to be 25 - 60 years old who care about technology, design, and a custom workspace. From there, we were able to create a massive list of similar industries, products, books, movies, TV shows and magazines to use for our targeting. Here are a few examples:

1. Computer Keyboard
2. Computer Monitors
3. Standing Desk
4. Apple Products
5. Tesla Model X 
6. Wired Magazine 
7. Marques Brownlee

We chose these target markets for Facebook and Instagram ads since our customers will most likely have an overlap within these interests.

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3. Study your Competitors

Now that you know where else your customer’s interests lie, it’s time to test your theory in the cheapest way possible: studying what others are doing. When we say that, however, we don’t mean you should copy your competition. That would be lazy and dishonest to do. Instead, use your competition as a source of inspiration.

Ask yourself: What are they doing right with their campaign? What are they doing wrong? And, finally, what can you do differently? How can you do it better?

Studying your competition also allows you to see which target audiences are working in your industry and what they are responding to. Check out your competition’s posts and peek at the comment section. Who is interacting most? What posts are they interacting most with? Could this demographic react the same way to your posts?

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4. Host a Focus Group

If you want honest feedback on your target audience, ask for it! Find a group of people that fit inside your theorized target audience and ask them questions about your marketing, product, or services. The answer they give could be tremendously valuable and influential on future marketing decisions.

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5. Interpret your Data

After you’ve launched your ads, study the data! Advertising platforms are well sophisticated and can tell you which demographics of people are clicking, watching or purchasing from your ads. Use that data to influence your targeting decisions for future campaigns.

Conclusion

Key takeaways:

• To determine your target audience, start by brainstorming what it might be. What demographics may be more drawn to your product or service?
• Consider what other topics your customers may be interested in and shape your marketing campaign to cater to those interests.
• Study your competitors to see what demographics are more engaged with their content.
• Host a focus group of those you expect to be in your target audience and ask for their opinions on your product/service or marketing campaign.
• Interpret your data and repeat steps as needed until you find the perfect audience to target.

There are several influential factors that go into determining your target audience. They’re well worth the effort, though, as the audience you target could mean the difference between your marketing campaign sinking or swimming.

There is no definitive way to know which audience works best for you right away, but taking the time to properly research your competitors, speak with your predicted audience, and test your hypotheses will quickly earn you the results you are looking for. Just see what this research led to for Alterroom:

Still wanting extra guidance? We are happy to help! Force Media has plenty of experience testing target audiences and tailoring strategies to meet them where they are, just see our Outside Landscape Group Case Study blog! If you would like to find similar results, please fill out this application link, and our team will review your application and get in touch with you within 24 hours.

Thank you for reading, and we can’t wait to see the results your business earns when presented to the right audience. 

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