Some basics that marketers must follow to gain the right target market segment for their marketing strategy.
How to identify and target the right market segment to meet business goals.
One of the basic elements in defining a strong marketing strategy is to define the type of customer you plan to target. Unless you know who your customers will be, your strategy won’t be better than throwing a dart in the dark and waiting for it to land. No one can sell to the whole world. To be effective, the market must be broken down into segments where we think a product or service will sell and where we can find people who want to become loyal customers as well as brand ambassadors.
Breaking down your target market into an achievable customer base yields better results. As a marketer, you can achieve a better return on your investment. However, it sounds simpler than it is to execute. There are two concrete elements in this process of identifying and defining the target market segment.
#1 Market Segmentation
There are multiple parameters through which businesses can define and evaluate their target market segment.
Geographically
They can define the region, area, size, and other geographical extensions, such as international or domestic or urban/suburban or rural.
Demographically
Businesses must categorize their customer segment on factors like age, gender, income, occupation, ethnicity, social class, family status, and education.
Behaviorally
Businesses must segment their customers based on behavioral patterns. Are they loyal to a specific type of brand? Do they get excited by hearing about special benefits and occasions?
Psychometrically or Psychographically
Businesses must look at factors such as the attitude of customers, customer routines, and regular activities. Do the target customers share any type of opinion or reflect any specific type of interests?
However, this is just the first step in segmentation. To ensure that the segmentation done is practically feasible, businesses must evaluate these segments by asking a few important questions:
- Have you identified and measured various attributes of your target segment?
- Do you think you will be able to reach out to your target market through various communication channels?
- Is the size of the target market good enough to ensure that you have sufficient resources to execute your strategy?
- Do you have proper and valid reasoning for creating one or multiple segments? Is need assessment done properly?
- Have you ensured your segments are stable and not volatile? In other words, does the target segment keep shuffling or have restrictions been created?
Once the market segments are identified, businesses should define the best possible approach to target the chosen market.
#2 Target Your Market
As every good marketer knows, you can’t sell everything to everyone. Instead, smart companies focus on who they can sell to. Once a market segment is defined, marketers can begin to target.
Companies should evaluate the skills of the target audience and understand salient features and benefits of the products and services that are being marketed. Who requires those benefits, and how will it help them? When selling a product to another company, it is imperative to know who the actual buyers and influencers are. If your target customer is an individual, you must understand the profile of the individual and target the product or service accordingly.
Market segmentation and target customer analysis is a vital part of the marketing process, and even though it sounds simple to do, there are a lot of details that need to be taken care of to ensure a successful marketing plan. Smart companies are always one step ahead when it comes to customer segmentation and targeting, and do regular checks on their market positioning.
