3 Important Questions to Ask When Creating a Targeting Strategy

As a small business owner, you now have access to data that informs you about audience behaviors and motivations. And this information allows you to focus on warmer audiences that are sincerely interested in your products, services, and/or company culture.

In this article we’ll look at three questions to help you determine the effectiveness of your targeting strategy. These questions can guide you to better understand your audience’s motivations.

1.     What would you do if you could no longer target people through location and age?

2.     What brands does your audience follow on social media?

3.     Can you name at least two Facebook groups that your audience might belong to?

If you answered all three questions than you’re probably rock’n your paid marketing. But don’t feel bad if you blanked out on any of the above queries, many targeting strategies by large companies don’t have answers to these questions either.

As we mentioned in a past article, Customers Don’t Shop Online, digital audiences begin their journey to becoming a customer when they discover content that appeals to them. That is why these questions are so valuable: they allow you to understand the values and emotional appeals of your audience.

For instance, the first question, “What would you do if you could no longer target people through location and age?”, encourages you to evaluate the depth of your targeting strategy and your understanding of your audience’s wants and needs. Conducting a sincere appraisal of your overall targeting strategy will show you where your psychographic targeting strategy needs improvement.

You can start refining your targeting strategy by asking yourself the following questions:

• Do you have a targeting strategy that relies more on income levels and age rather than audience motivation?

• Could you describe a member of your audience as if they are someone you know well?

When it comes to determining the values of your audience, you should look at the brands they follow. The second question in our guide, “What brands does your audience follow on social media?”, offers clues about the buying motivations of your target audience.

For example, if your target audience has an affinity for brands that focus on social responsibility, then you want create content that highlights how your business shares those values.

But what if you sell running shoes, and your target audience gravitates towards luxury brands. How can you adapt this affinity to your product? Well, highlight the elegance of the shoes. Explain how the shoes you sell will add luxury to their run. Showcase the comfort, performance, and style. Use keywords that pinpoint the audience’s motivations.

Converse did this in the mid-1980s with their “Limousines for your feet” campaign. The campaign wasn’t about comfort, it was about style. It was about flash. And it was aiming to turn their sneakers into the Rolls Royce of footwear. Converse appealed to their audience’s want of getting noticed when walking in the city.

This brings us to the third question: “Can you name at least two Facebook groups that your audience might belong to?” Answering this question provides insight into their interests, such as hobbies, and these are important motivators. Creating content that appeals to your audience’s interests will stick in their mind and help develop a relationship because you are connecting to their emotional motivations.

So, to recap, demographics help you target physical attributes such as location. And this is helpful because you don’t want to market your business to an area that you cannot service. However, psychographics is what helps you drive conversions. Psychographics allow you to target emotions and motivations. As such, you can create content that adheres and persuades because you are appealing to the wants and needs of your audience. This is why you should ask the three questions presented in this article when you build your next targeting strategy.