Trying to reach everyone can make it harder to reach the people who matter. Defining your target audience helps you focus your marketing on the customers most likely to want what you offer.
In this guide, we’ll cover what a target audience is, how to identify yours, the difference between a target market and target audience, and how to choose the right channels to reach them - including OOH.
What is your target audience?
Put simply, your target audience is the group of people most likely to be interested in, need or benefit from what your business offers.
There are a few different ways to understand who your audience is. You might look at things like age, income, occupation and life stage, as well as where people live or work. Their interests, needs, buying habits and consumer behaviour can also tell you a lot.
The factors that matter most will depend on your business. If you run a local café, for example, knowing where your customers live or work and what their daily routine looks like could be useful. If you run a B2B business, their job role or industry might be more important. For a retailer, it could be what people buy, how often they shop and what influences their decisions.
Your target audience doesn't have to include everyone who could potentially buy from you. Instead, think about the people you most want to reach with your marketing and who are most likely to become customers.
How to identify your target audience
If you’re wondering how to identify target audience groups for your business, start with what you already know. Your existing customers, sales information, website data and conversations with your team can all provide valuable insights. The aim is to look for patterns that help explain who buys from you, why they buy and what they have in common.
Step 1: Look at your existing customers
Start by looking for patterns among your existing customers. Consider where they live or work, what they buy, how often they buy and how they found your business. This can help you identify common characteristics and give you a starting point for defining your audience.
Step 2: Understand what they need
Think about the problem your product or service solves and what might prompt someone to look for it. Understanding these motivations can tell you more about your customers than demographics alone and give you useful insight into their consumer behaviour.
Step 3: Use your customer data
Look at the data you already have, including website analytics, sales, CRM information, social media insights and previous campaign results. Pay particular attention to the difference between people who show interest and those who become customers. This can help you identify which audiences are most valuable to your business.
Step 4: Talk to your customers
A few conversations or a short survey can help you understand why customers chose your business and what influenced their decision. If you have a sales or customer service team, they can also provide useful insight into common questions or needs from your existing customers.
Step 5: Research your competitors
Look at who your competitors appear to be targeting and how they position their products or services. This can help you understand the wider market and identify audiences that may be underserved or worth exploring.
Step 6: Segment your audience
Your customers may naturally fall into several groups. Audience segmentation involves dividing them based on shared characteristics, needs or behaviours. You could segment customers by location, demographics, interests, needs or purchasing behaviour.
Step 7: Create a target audience profile
Bring your findings together in a simple target audience profile. Include who your audience is, what they need, how they behave and where you might reach them. For example, an independent gym might target people who live or work within three miles of the gym and want flexible training options before or after work.
Step 8: Test and refine
Remember that your audience profile is a starting point rather than a final answer. Look at who responds to your marketing, makes enquiries and becomes a customer, then use these insights to refine your approach.
