5 steps to find your target audience (with examples!) (2023)

If you are trying to please everyone, you are pleasing no one. Good? This also applies to your marketing: if you are trying to reach everyone, you will reach no one. People can view your ad or visit your website. But your ad and message won't attract anyone if you don't have a specific audience in mind.

That is why it is essential to find your target audience and start using them immediately. So, in this guide, we'll provide you with all the information and steps you need to do just that.

Index

• Defining a target audience
• target audience vs target market
• Why do you need a target audience?
• Types of target audience
• How to find your target audience
• How to profile your target audience

What is a target audience?

A target audience is the specific group of people you want to reach with your marketing. That means youmaterial de marketing– from your email copy to your tagline and brand story – you need to appeal to this group of people.

Here's a great example of a targeted marketing campaign that includes AirBnB's video and messaging.

The voice in the video is young and passionate. The images are not very produced. Instead, it almost looks like a great iPhone video made on the spot. This is clearly aimed at an audience of young adults looking for authentic and spontaneous experiences when they travel. Works.

That is why it is so importantfind your target audience. If you want your marketing to appeal to this group of people, you have to design everything with them in mind.

target audience vs target market

We need a quick clarification of the terms here:Your target audience is not your target market.They aretarget marketIt is who your product or service is intended for. Your target audience, on the other hand, is the specific group of people within your target market that your marketing is trying to reach.

So if, for example, your target market is small businesses, your target audience could be local service-based business owners, marketing managers of small e-commerce retailers, or freelance marketing consultants. Or it can be all three.

Businesses often have more than one target audience in their target market.

Here are some more target audience examples:

• assisted living
  • Target market: Seniors
  • Audience #1: Seniors in the New England area
  • Audience #2: Adults working with aging parents in the New England area
• moving company
  • Target market: people who move
  • Target audience #1: Residents of urban apartments
  • Objective public n.º 2: suburban families
• plataforma PPC
  • Target Market: Small Business
  • Audience #1: Local service-based business owners
  • Audience #2: Small Business Marketing Managers

And at an even deeper level, you'll have mini-audiences for every campaign you create. Actually,hubspotfound that most marketers create content for multiple audiences, with three audiences being the most common.

Why do you need a target audience?

With these examples, you can see why.knowing your target audienceIt's so important. It's the context you need to create content and messages that resonate. The PPC software provider that caters to the small business target audience will look totally different with their branding and marketing material than the PPC software provider that caters to corporate businesses.

And the advertisement that a nursing home creates for the elderly will be very different from the advertisement that it creates for adults who are caring for their elderly parents.

Types of target audience

Your business may have many different audiences, as they will align with the focus of your marketing efforts and your goals. In someMarketing campaign, you can be super specific. If you run a landscaping business, for example, this might mean targeting all of your customers in one city with an event or discount to improve your customer base in that area.

TruGreen, a Tennessee-based company, is targeting new customers in Boston with this Google ad and accompanying discount.

But when you work to identify your target audience, you should focus on the types that align with the marketing channels you regularly focus on. Here are some examples:

• Email:you can have oneNewsletterwith tips targeted to your general audience, fueling targeted email flows to potential customers, and/or triggering targeted emails to current customers.
• Event:You can host an event for an entire community, like the landscaping company example above, or one that caters to potential customers. You can even throw an event for current clients or potential partners.
• Community:You can run a Slack or Discord group connecting potential customers in similar roles, or a similar community connecting customers using your product.
• Adverts:You couldrun facebook adsencourage repeat customers, Google ads targeting potential customers looking for a solution, orinstagram shopping adstargeting your competitor's customers.
• Social Media:You could share a thought leadership piece aimed at influencers who would share it, an how-to video for your prospects, or you could host a series of interviews with notable figures for your audience, be they authors, celebrities, or experts.

How to find your target audience

If you are not very clear about who your target audience is, for your brand in general, for amarketing channels, or for a particular campaign: you need to take a step back to identify it. You can determine who your target audience is by looking at who interacts with your product, your brand, and your marketing. To see how:

1. interview your clients
2. Audit your social followers
3. check yourmarketing performance metrics
4. Take notes on your competition
5. Define who is not your target

Here's an infographic outlining the steps above, courtesy offriendship's Day:

Click to see full size

And here's a look at each step!

1. Start with your customers

Your customers are the people who use your product or service, so clearly your positioning of your offer, the solution you presented, your marketing, or a combination of these worked. That's why this is the perfect place to start.

First,see demographicsof your clients: what are their titles, where do they live, how old are they? Are there any patterns that emerge when you do this? Pay close attention to patterns with your loyal and repeat customers. Then look for patterns in your unique customers.

Then it's time totalk to your customers. This is the best way to get an idea of ​​why they love your brand, product or team. This will help you with your positioning, including thebenefitsyou will stand out in your writing and conversations.

Also, it's a good time to ask where your customers hang out and get advice. Are certain Instagram influencers, industry newsletters, or company blogs trustworthy? Thosecustomer perceptionsThese are great data points to have because you can prioritize these channels for your marketing.

Questions related to problems/weak points:

• What was the problem you were trying to solve?
• How were you solving/trying to solve the problem before us?
• If you have used other providers in the past, what problems have you encountered with them?
• Did you have any doubts in choosing us?
• Is there anything we can do to improve?

Questions related to lifestyle/behavior:

• How did you hear about us?
• What terms did you search?
• What media/newsletters do you read related to this topic?
• What social media platforms do you use?
• How much time do you spend online?

Questions related to your competitors:

• What made you choose us over the competition?
• What is the main benefit of our product/service?
• What additional benefits did you experience?
• What do you like about us?

2. Keep an eye on your social followers

Your social followers are another existing audience that you can look at to see who your current marketing is engaging. More so, it gives you an idea of ​​the consumers who are really interested in your brand. In accordance withsocial outbreak, the most common reasons people follow brands on social channels are to gain access to discounts, keep up with company news, and discover new products or services.

You won't have the same access to your social followers as your customers. If you still want to do an interview, make sure it's a quick survey with super specific questions. Otherwise, focus on demographics and behavior. Here are some things to consider:

• • • Location
    • Age
    • Carrera
    • family income
    • activity level
    • Followers of other brands

Again, you should pay special attention to the people who interact the most with your social profiles.

The good news is that you can use a tool, even a free one, to analyze this data. Buffer, for example, also offers a free tier.

3. Dive into your content analysis

The next existing audience that you need to take the time to tap into is your website visitors. Who is already reading your content? Who is downloading your technical documents? Who interacts with your videos?

Analytical Googleis the natural place to start when looking for this type of information. You can learn:

• • • DemographySee how your users are broken down by location, including country and city.
    • Where do the users come from?Is Twitter a great referral source? Is it a niche industry news site? A certain blogger? This gives you more information about where to target your marketing campaigns.
    • What themes resonate with them.What is and isn't of interest to your website visitors can provide clues as to who your target audience is andhow to attract them.
    • What terms are they looking for?Find out what they are searching for on Google that leads them to your site.

There's even an interests tab where you can view affinity categories and market segments:

4. Take a look at your competitors

You have competitors. Regardless of your product, offering, and target audience, you have competition. And you can use them.

Take a look at who your competitor is targeting in their marketing. Where are they advertised?Facebook? Instagram or Twitter? Who are they targeting in their ads? Thatpain pointsare you stressed? Analyze your ads, messaging, and brands to gather an audience and see how they compare to yours, including how they overlap and how they differ. Overlay can help you see, and the difference? This will help you better articulate your brand differentiation.

Here, monday.com clearly identifies the difference between its target audience and Trello's: marketers on bigger teams, responsible for more projects, starting as soon as possible.

In addition totarget audiences of your competitors, you want to know which of these audiences is actively engaging with your content. Dive into your social following to spot overlaps and differences alike. For a step-by-step process, see our guide tocompetitive analysisin search and social networks.

5. Set your parameters

This last step may seem like an outlier in the process, but it's very important: you need to identify who your customer is.it's not. Get monday.comcompetitive ad exampleabove. The team has clearly decided who is their audience and who is not. Your audience is not someone looking for a free and simple Kanban solution. (That's what Trello is for.)

So for this step, take a look at all your data: customer interviews, social media followers, website visitors, and competitor comparable audiences. Then identify the gaps that you are definitely not addressing.

• • • Are you a pet store that doesn't have reptile tanks? Its target audience does not include iguana owners.
    • Are you selling alcoholic shakes? He's not trying to address anyone under the age of 21, even if that's hard to tell from his pictures.
    • Can you serve US customers only? Therefore, your target audience is not just anyone who operates outside of those boundaries.

Defining your parameters will help guide your marketing and even your business strategy.

Profiling your target audience

Once you've added all the data about your followers, all the anecdotal information about your customers, and all the details about your competition, the final step is to bring them all together in an audience profile.

Here is some information to include:

• • • Location
    • Age
    • gender identification
    • Charge
    • Industry
    • Education Level
    • family income
    • interests
    • hobbies
    • Use of the platform

Your audience profile will also include details relevant to your brand. Here are some examples of audience profiles:

• • • First Time Urban Dog Owner
    • College student with no career plan
    • Trained chef working outside the industry

And with that information, you'll want to developpersonasto share with your team. These are detailed fictional characters that make up certain buyers within your target audience.

Examples of target audience

let's finish with sometarget audience examplesfor the brands we know, to help you solidify your understanding of this concept.

Wild

Suppose your product is dog equipment: harnesses, bowls, leashes, toys. Your target market, in this case, is people with dogs. To reach your target market, you may needuser generated contenton their social ads with satisfied customers, a newsletter featuring the top dog stories of the week, a pet care blog, and whitepapers for first-time pet owners. His brand is elegant, modern and minimalist. Your target audience for this marketing campaign is not just pet owners; it is the young Millennials or Gen Zers who get their first dog.

WildThe landing page is very well targeted: branding, copy, and even a toy positioned specifically for WFH pet owners.

airbnb

Clearly, the target audience for this campaign is adventurous dog lovers.

Would these ads have the same impact on dog lovers if they had an image of a smiling person with a suitcase and a marker indicating dog-friendly hosts? No.

But Airbnb also runs campaigns that target young couples, single professionals, seniors, and more.

Nike's target audience

when lookingNike x Under Armour, we can see that although the target market for both brands is people who wear sportswear and sportswear, there are several key differences in their target audiences. Nike is a sophisticated brand whose marketing is aimed at social influencers and people under 55 years of age. Under Armour, on the other hand, is not for the money-maker, has a mostly male audience, and targets the 18-25 Gen Z demographic.

Starbucks target audience

Let's compare Starbucks vs Dunkin. Starbucks' target audience is primarily college students and higher-income professionals. With in-store merchandise, healthy snacks, comfy sofas, and free Wi-Fi, the target audience is anyone who wants to grab a coffee while working, chatting, or spending time alone (and saving the planet).

Dunkin, on the other hand, has minimal store experience and lower prices, targeting people on the go (America runs Dunkin, after all) and lower budgets. It is also common in the eastern half of the US.

image source

Define your target audience and utilize it

Having a clear picture of your target audience is critical, but it's not the final step. To make your marketing more effective, you need to make sure everyone on your team has these profiles in mind. Then, once you have that definition, share it widely so that whatever your business puts out can serve those who matter most.