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Posts Tagged ‘Target’

If you’ve been involved in marketing during the past decade, you’ve probably noticed that things are a bit different since this whole ‘online’ thing got underway.

While being online has starting to become an ‘ordinary’ part of many people’s day-to-day lives, the experience of being online is very different from any other type of popular media.

Those of us over the age of twenty clearly remember a world without the ‘Internet’. Back in those olden days most media consisted of marketing channels to which the majority of the population flocked. In exchange for giving people access to this content, advertisers were given access to the people who came to visit. They tossed their messages in front of us as we wandered around hoping that something would catch our eye. Sometimes it did. Mostly it didn’t.

Because these mass marketing models were based on ‘quantity’ and not ‘quality’ of consumers, there was an up-front expectation that there would be a tremendous amount of waste. Advertisers understood that even if they were targeting the very best demographic group for an offer the vast majority wouldn’t even see or respond to the marketing offer.

For marketers, it was the safety in numbers advertising approach that kept them going.

This approach also trained us, as consumers, to understand that our direct involvement in the marketing process wasn’t really necessary. The TV commercials would continue to run whether we watched them or not; the print ads would stay right where they were printed even if we didn’t open the magazine or newspaper; the ad on the side of the bus would keep moving down Main Street would keep going even if we ignored it.

But the arrival of the online world started to change things and pretty dramatically. Consumers now have millions of “channels” to choose from and advertisers have fewer places where they will reach mass markets. In fact, the very structure of the Internet means that consumers don’t even need to look at or interact with advertising anymore…unless they really want to.

Culturally we’ve developed a number of ways to share information with one another. We’ve also learned how to customize messages so that they reach specific people. We never pick up the phone and think ‘Okay, I need to talk to every person on Earth. What’s the number?’ We don’t send an email to everybody in the company every time we have a thought to share with Sandy in accounting.

When we start any new marketing campaign we need to first think about who the campaign is trying to reach. What is the ultimate goal? What is the campaign saying? What obstacles can get in the way of the right consumer receiving the message? What should the consumer do to take advantage of the offer?

In the past mass marketing has represented the ultimate delivery mechanism for advertising messages but paints the audience with such a broad brush that its goal of reaching the right people can’t be efficiently kept. To be truly effective, a delivery system has to reach the greatest number of individual consumers who can take action on the message being sent.

The bottom line is that a message that reaches 1,000,000 of the wrong people isn’t more effective than a message that reaches a single right person.

The ultimate goal of effective advertising is to maximize effectiveness while reducing waste. Correctly targeting a campaign means first identifying who the best people to receive a particular offer are and how to go about identifying where they are.

When we target online audiences that are three primary areas of exploration:

1. Contextual targeting
2. Database targeting
3. Behavioral targeting

Let’s take a closer look at the differences between these three areas.

Contextual Targeting

The simple definition for contextual targeting is the placement of messages where the people most likely to be interested are most likely to see it. Contextual targeting is perhaps the oldest type of targeted marketing. For years, trade magazines, area newspapers, local television stations and local radio stations have served as channels for contextual marketing campaigns.

Because each channel caters to a specific range of the population either based on topic interest or region, advertising using contextual targeting has generally meant reaching an audience that has already been ‘filtered’ down to a common interest or locale.

In online marketing, contextual marketing works in a similar way. Many web sites focus on, or have sections that focus on a single or limited range of topics. Like trade publications, these sites attract a self-selected audience who share a common interest whether its butterfly collecting, paintball battlefield strategies or exploring the validity of UFO sightings. For advertisers looking to communicate with these specific groups, good targeting is as easy as placing topically relevant ads on those pages.

Demographic Targeting

Demography covers a broad range of ways a population can be sliced up to define certain segments. A few of the more traditional segments include:

• Age/ Lifecycle
• Gender
• Race/Ethnicity
• Socioeconomic status
• Location of residence
• Religion
• Nationality
• Occupation
• Education level
• Family size
• Marital status
• Ownership (of home, boat, car, etc.)
• Language

While many of these characteristics can effectively narrow a population down into an audience, traditional demography often offers just a generalized benchmark of behavior.

For example, I currently live in a fairly rural part of the country. While I share a number of demographic characteristics with other people within my particular zip code (middle aged, white, own my own home, went to college, married, speak English, or a variant thereof) those benchmarks do a lousy job at identifying us as a whole or me as an individual. My little town runs the gamut of religious and spiritual beliefs, political leanings, socioeconomic levels, education and what’s considered a fun way to spend a Saturday evening. In short, we share very few characteristics as a population apart from our choice to live in the same part of the country.

For marketers trying to reach ‘us’ based solely on where we live, the results of any geographically targeted campaign are going to be just about as untargeted as you can get.

To reach a more refined group of people based on attributes that aren’t as generalized as most demographic groups, marketers need to find ways to measure ‘who’ consumers are instead of ‘what’ they are.

Here are a few more recent targeting approaches that marketers are using to reach highly refined audiences.

Psychographic Targeting

For marketers to effectively target any audience they need to have a clear understanding of the personal interests that the target audience shares. Social scientists categorize this segmentation as the study of psychographics. Psychographics are commonly defined as individual attributes directly relating to personality, values, interests or lifestyles. There are sometimes referred to as IOA variables or characteristics (for Interests, Attitudes and Opinions). Psychographics often target the most personal parts of who we are.

We belong to multiple psychographic ‘groups’ based on our interests as individuals. Our relationship with each group ranges from little involvement to whole involvement. For example, I may take my bicycle out for a short spin on a warm summer day. This action classifies me as a bicyclist and helps me to identify with other people who enjoy riding bicycles. However, my involvement in this group is very different from the guy who’s training for an upcoming Tour de France and spends 6 hours a day on his bicycle. My identity with bicycling is one of enjoyable weekend pastime while for the guy in training it’s almost on par with being a lifestyle. If given the opportunity to purchase bicycling paraphernalia I’m going to have a different perspective as to its value and necessity than he will.

Marketers looking to reach a thin-sliced audience need to understand common shared traits and how individuals in these groups ‘weigh’ their interests in these areas. Whether targeting deer hunters, urban dwellers, backgammon players, people of Scotch-Irish descent, unicyclists or guys who mow their lawns on Saturday morning, the value of each psychographic slice is going to depend on how the people in these segments define themselves.

Technographic Targeting

Online targeting is often restricted by technological limitations that prevent marketers from reaching consumers. For marketers to effectively reach consumers it’s often necessary to know where potential obstacles or bottlenecks exist.

Technographic targeting focuses on identifying the technological foundations that consumers are using to connect with the Web. This includes things like computer CPU speeds, Internet connection speeds, Operating Systems, browser types, browser versions, and drivers or extra software availability.

A common example of technographic targeting is measuring the online bandwidth capabilities of a visitor to a web site. For example, if, as a marketer, I wished to send a video based ad to my target audience I’m going to want to know if they can receive the ad. While broadband adoption over recent years has made this task easier, there are still millions of people worldwide who are using dial-up modems to get online. Without knowing how my target audience accesses the web, I run the risk of wasting impressions by sending ad content to people who can’t receive it.

On the other hand, by measuring the connect speed of my target audience, I can then sort that audience out into sub-groups and provide separate ad units for each group.

Technographic measuring can also tell marketers a lot about a potential customer. A high-tech company looking to introduce a new cutting edge product can effectively target prospects by measuring the operating system on the recipient’s computer. Prospects running the most recent versions of Windows or the Macintosh OS might be classified as being technologically savvy while prospects still running Windows 98 on a 7 year old PC are probably not good candidates for marketers looking to reach ‘early adopters’.

Centrographic Targeting

While geographical targeting is generally considered part of standard demography there are a few variations that fall outside of the basic geographic targeting realm. Whereas most geographic targeting focuses on regions and areas of the country and world based on their proximately to one another, centrographic targeting focuses more on population characteristics that can be associated with specific regions.

For example, every winter across the Northern United States there is a need for snow removal services. There is also a need for services like heating system maintenance, fuel delivery and sales of things like ice scrapers and snow tires. Meanwhile, in the Southwestern United States the need for these services or products each winter is very limited or non-existent. On the other hand, the hot summers in the Southwest requires air conditioning and home cooling services that are not always necessary in the North.

Centrographic targeting can also identify and isolate differences between population groups. For example, people living in a city like New York are going to have a different perceived need for products and services than people living a few hours north in rural New York might. Even staying within the boroughs of New York, the cultural diversity of different ethnic groups alone makes for dozens of unique regional markets.

Significant differences can also exist among cultural groups that share a similar language and history, or current geography. For example, Hispanic populations living in Southern California and those living in Southern Florida may share common cultural histories and ancestry but represent very unique markets based on unique regional characteristics.

While reaching those audiences requires a new layer of understanding on the parts of marketers, if used correctly the ability to reach more of the right consumers with any marketing offer is also going to result in greater effectiveness and much less waste.

Rob Graham – LearningCraft, LLC.
October 1, 2007

Copyright (c) 2008 Paul Flood Marketing, LLC

When you create your marketing programs, do you believe your investment should only get your name out there and build your brand. There’s an ongoing debate among marketers about the value of this strategy.

Those of us in the direct response crowd disagree with that thought process because the typical small business owner usually lacks the resources to wait for prospects to need their service. We believe marketing investments should generate leads or clients with branding being an added benefit of the investment.

An additional problem with pure image or brand advertising is that it is very difficult to track and measure its effectiveness. In my mind, if I am going to invest in my company, whether it is in advertising, direct mail, new equipment or staff, I want to know my return on my investment and believe clients should also be able to do so.

Is there a happy medium between the two camps where we can serve our clients with marketing that builds brands and gives prospects a reason to buy now? Is there a small business target marketing strategy that accomplishes both objectives? Absolutely!

The tool to make this happen is the Unique Selling Proposition, or USP. A good USP is pure marketing gold and creates a compelling reason for the consumer to act immediately. They will think, “I need this” or “I need more information about this amazing product.”

Let’s go back a couple of decades so we can illustrate this point with a couple well-known examples: If Federal Express just ran ads that were about their name and logo, they would have gotten name recognition, but that’s about all. Instead they said to their prospects “When it absolutely, positively has to be there overnight.”

Did the compelling USP work? Most people will agree it worked rather well for FedEx.

Will it work for a small business? Well, several years ago, a man named Tom Monohan was in one of the most competitive businesses that also traditionally has one of the highest failure rates – The restaurant business. He was in the most competitive arena of this market – pizza. The marketing message Tom created was a lot more compelling than the name of his pizza parlor is.” His message was, “Fresh hot pizza in thirty minutes or less – or it’s free.” I think we can agree that Dominos Pizza did well with their USP!

People, businesses included do not care about you, your name or your brand. They care about what you, your product or your service will to do for them. Once they’ve made the decision to buy, your name increases in psychological importance, but not until then.

Remember that your small business target marketing has very specific objectives and they are to deliver prospects or clients. If they are not designed to do so, you can either hope that you will get more clients or throw out useless ads and switch to ads and marketing designed to bring you profits.

The marketing designed to generate profits starts with your USP and tells your targeted prospect why they should buy from you and do so now.

Running a home business is difficult because of the multiple duties you take on. You are responsible for the content produced, generating traffic through intriguing marketing and advertising, and dealing with all of the customers. However, determining your home business target market is just as every other aspect.

It is simply impossible to appeal to every person in the world, which is why it is so vital to determine your online business target market. By finding the target market for your business, you can get a better understanding of how to arrange your website. You can still have your own style of writing and creativity, but now you can base it off a certain group of people.

Your home business target market is the ideal prospect to purchase your products, which is why it is ever so important you take the time to adjust your website to meet their needs. Take the time to research what people are looking for across the web. Once you identify what’s popular and what’s not, you can then include various things associated with your website to help reel in your target market.

There are several programs online that can assist you in identifying the keywords that your home business target market is searching for. Some will cost you money to view while others are free of cost. Pixelfast and Wordtracker are a couple of programs that allow you to find the most popular keywords searched for free.

Once you know the keywords that are being searched, you can adjust the way you write your content to make it more appealing. By highlighting the various keywords and making them stand out within your content, a couple of things will come from this. First, it will make it much easier for your reader’s to find what they are looking for on your site. Second, your keyword optimization efforts will help you climb higher on the natural listings of the search engines, thus increasing your traffic.

As you may already know, the internet is expanding and changing by the day. To stay with your competition and continuously offer your online business target market what they are looking for, you have to adapt to the way the internet is changing. This means posting fresh and enticing content on a daily basis and offering insight to what is going on with the internet.

Knowing your online business target market will help you connect with your readers and offer enticing content. If you are out of touch with your readers, all you are doing is taking up space on the web. You have the power to put whatever you want on your website, but your home business target market has the power to accept or reject your website. Take the time to get to know your target market and I guarantee you it will be well worth the time.

What is consistently rated as one of the most effective small business target marketing strategies? Without a doubt it is the Joint Venture (JV), also known as a strategic alliance. Target, or niche marketing means that you are marketing directly to the prospect most likely to buy your product or service. Your JV strategy can be the ultimate form of target marketing since you are using the targeted customer and prospect list of another business owner.

The JV and strategic alliance are so popular and profitable because they leverage the assets (customer list, goodwill, relationship, etc.) your partner has developed with their client and prospect base. Nearly all potential buyers (business and consumer) prefer to do business with a company, firm or practice for which they have a degree of trust.

Marketing legend Dan Kennedy likes to say that we are all walking around holding an umbilical cord saying “plug me in and tell me what to do.” Whether you are looking for a place to buy a hot dog,tobuy a yacht, or looking for a brain surgeon or a new church in your community, you are looking for someone to recommend where you should go to obtain the product, service or advice.

Don’t confuse the JV with referrals. Referrals are great for new business and are an effective small business target marketing strategy but generally are given only one or two at a time. Referrals can also dry up if you are not diligent about keeping in touch with your clients and letting them know how much you appreciate and value their business.

JV’s can be as simple as selecting a retail partner and issuing a joint coupon to one another’s client base. They can also be very complex, multi-million dollar deals between large companies. American Express is an example of a very large and sophisticated company that partners with several other large businesses to leverage the client lists of both firms. If you have one of their cards, you have received numerous calls and mailers from them endorsing their JV partners. The partners get the implied endorsement of a blue chip company like Amex and Amex gets increased card purchases as you use the card to buy the recommended partners products.

Now that you’ve decided to add the JV to your small business marketing tools, where do you start? You start by profiling the characteristics of your ideal client. What else do they buy and where do they buy it? For example, Paul Flood Marketing, which is my company, implements a unique and non-traditional marketing system in small businesses and I guarantee profit increases of 25% or more in as little as 90 days. As the old saying goes, “Fish where the fish are,” so I have partnered with other small business consultants, primarily CPA’s and small business attorneys, who have endorsed my services to their clients.

If I had tried to contact many of these business owners cold, I would have probably been turned away but the endorsement of my trusted partners established trust. This trust is what you will leverage with your alliance partners.

Armed with the list of potential partners, you formulate your contact strategy. You could try writing letters but I am a strong believer in just picking up the phone and saying to the owner, “Hi, I am a local business owner and I have an idea that could help us both dramatically increase our sales and profits and I’d like to talk with you about it. Do you have a minute so I can explain the concept?

Great, if makes sense for us to talk in more depth, we can arrange a time to get together.” The thing I like about the phone is that I can immediately get a feel about the business and the person in just a couple of minutes.

When you first meet, you will most likely need to explain how the Joint Venture small business target marketing strategy works and how it will benefit both of your businesses. Most small business owners are only familiar with traditional marketing or networking so it may take a bit of explaining to get the concept across.

The most common objection you will encounter is the trust factor so bring testimonials and samples of your product, service, practice or whatever you are selling to the meeting. You need to show why the other business owner person know they can trust you and your business? People are naturally wary (as they should be) about referring others to their clients because their reputation is on the line, as is yours.

Always conduct due diligence. Be sure you speak with some of their clients to confirm their claims about quality products and service. If you feel uncomfortable at the beginning, bow out of the relationship gracefully. Ther’s no sense in adding aggragvation to your life!

The other objection is the confidentiality of av client list, but that is easily overcome by offering to mail your endorsement of your partner to your list and they mail their endorsement of you to their list. What if you don’t have a list? You pay to mail your letter to their client list and you may also want to pay them commissions for sales you get as a result of the mailing. There are some professions that are prevented from paying or receiving finder’s fees so if this applies to you, you need to investigate alternatives.

What is the simplest JV strategy? Each partner mails an endorsement of the other’s business to their list with a description of the benefits of doing business with them and why they are recommending one another. It’s that simple. The key to success of the JV as your small business target marketing strategy is that you and your partners must be proactive in promoting one another and in managing the relationship. As the person who originated the partnership, take control and action to make it happen. If you have a partner who isn’t committed, drop them and find another.

When you are actively using the JV as a small business marketing tool, you will be amazed at the results you can achieve in a relatively short period of time. Of course, as with any other business strategy, there are experts like myself who can be delivering profits while you are attempting to find your first partner. The key is to make the decision to make it happen, to leverage your contacts and your list and get started!

Copyright (c) 2008 Paul Flood Marketing, LLC