How Use of Demographics Can Develop Insight to Your Target Audience
Posted on November 23, 2007 - Filed Under Marketing Strategies
Most of the traffic to A-list blogs are made of bloggers like you and me who want to know how to achieve the same status of these Internet Moguls and gurus. We want to know what X factor contributed to the rise and success of top blogs, and the “secret formula” that enables a new blog to gain over 1000 subscribers within 3 months.
However, not all of us are as talented as some bloggers, and others may not have the insight to their key audience.
1. Different Geography.
Looking at my traffic from Google Analytics, my top visitors come from the US and Canada (67%) and Singapore (13%). This is not a surprising figure as US and Canada are top on my list of targetted audience, and my Singapore traffic would comprise of friends for whom I originally started my blog for.
I have never been to America or Canada, and my sole source of insight to my key audience is that Singapore is a hubnub of expats from all over the world, and I work in an American MNC that promotes diversity. However, I am not immersed into the American culture and I have only met a few Canadian acquaintances here. My portal to understanding my key audience comes from the American media - series such as Seinfeld, Sex and the City, MTV, YouTube videos, NY Times, etc.
2. Unfamiliar Niche.
Apart from cultural barriers faced by someone like myself, there are also social barriers that can be an obstacle to understanding your key audience. This is true if you are not from the same niche, and will be even more difficult if your niche requires technical information. In such a case, you might want to consider running regular polls or survey questions on your blog to understand the mindset / concerns of your readers.
3. Changing Niche.
Given the dynamic nature of the Internet, this is a challenge faced by some market niches. For example, Ashley Quall of whateverlife.com currently has a hugely successful site because she is marketing her products to other 14 - 16 teenagers like herself. However, she acknowledges that in another few years, she would have to hire teenage girls who are younger in order to continue being relevant to her key audience. Or if you are writing for a blog on environmental issues, new policies and laws are constantly being introduced and revised together with emerging technology. In both cases, your target audience may be the same demographic, but they could be made up of a different generation with different needs / issues.
Understanding Your Target Audience Demographic
Handphone companies spend a lot of money hiring research companies to conduct focus groups on responses to new handphone models and TV ads. Companies that sell consumer goods spend a good part of their research money conducting market survey for packaging, product launches, rebranding, etc. They know that understanding the needs / wants / desires of their target audience is critical to the success of an ad campaign or product launch. And they invest the time and money in getting the product right for maximum effectiveness. They have invested millions of dollars into building their brand, and will do what it takes to protect the image and customer perception of their branding. It costs less to protect a brand than to rebuild it.
Blogs are very much a B2C business unless you are in the business of buying and selling blogs. To be a successful blogger, you need to invest in understanding your target audience, and approach your blog as a brand that you have to protect. It doesn’t matter if your blog is 3 months old or 1 week old. Branding requires consistent quality and reinforcement of particular traits associated with your blog.
For some bloggers, understanding your audience may be intuitive while for others sketching out who your target audience is may seem difficult if your niche market is a broad or unconventional one. My suggestion is that you create a mental image of who your target audience is, so that when writing or researching an article for your audience, it becomes easy for you to relate to them.
First, list down the demographics or characteristics of your target audience. List down their:
1. Age
2. Nationality / State
3. Stage in life
4. Earning Power
5. Assets
6. Hobbies or Pastimes
7. Family Status
8. Spending Habits
9. Profession
10. Social Status
11. Ambition
12. Life Philosophy
Next, Write a one page description of an imaginary person with the traits and characteristics of your target audience and give him / her a name. For example, here’s one demographic description of my target audience:
Mark is a successful and entrepreneural sales manager who has a lovely wife Mary, and a two year old daughter, Sandra. He constantly works late at his office, earns $66,000 a year, is paying rent for his condo while starting a trust fund for Sandra’s college education. Mark is 29 years old, and has a group of like minded friends who are entrepreneurs. He is a calculated risk taker, and sees the opportunity to run an online business through blogging. His ambition is to earn enough money from his online business that will overtake his salary so that he can quit his job and run his business from home as he wants to spend more time with Sandra and Mary. His favourite past time is golfing, so he has decided to start a blog about that and hopes to eventually set up an ecommerce site for selling golf clubs.
This is just one of the three demographics I have of my target audience. Having a demographic picture when I’m preparing my articles helps me decide which articles are right for my blog, what I want to cover in my article, and how I will present it. It helps me identify with their needs, what their ambitions in life are, and what information I can provide in my article that will be useful to them.
If your target audience demographic is a very unique group of people or unlike yourself, it will pay to either do an offline or online survey, or enter into some sort of activity that will put them within your reach for research. Some methods include:
- Research other blogs that are targetting the same audience as yourself. Analyze the topics and writing style and read the comment boards.
- Post an online survey and run a contest with a prize for completed surveys
- Join a group or association which they belong to
- Subscribe to the types of magazines that they read
A true understanding of your target audience gives you the key to writing essential content that addresses their needs and concerns. It determines the effectiveness and impact of your articles, and a perceived felt need where you offer help and a solution drives traffic like bees to honey. If you have not drafted out a brief demographic of who your audience(s) are, you have a real opportunity to grow your blog and drive branding by taking time to do that.
Do you have an unique audience demographic? What are some of the methods you use to understand your target audience?
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Comments
6 Responses to “How Use of Demographics Can Develop Insight to Your Target Audience”
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Hi Ivy,
You’ve never been to the US? That shows how you put the concepts in this article to work. I would have thought that you had attended college here or worked here at some point.
Oh, and don’t believe everything you see on TV about American culture, particularly about the Southern US. It’s usually quite different from what gets portrayed in TV shows and movies.
lol, thanks for your comment Frank!
I guess in some ways, while the cultures we live in are quite different, people will have the same universal concerns or needs…
And I’ll try to not believe everything that American serials and movies are telling me. It would have been fantastic if Die Hard was written from a true story though
hi, Ivy, how are you?
this is the first time I’ve read any of your stuff & I’m looking forward to reading more.
Have you ever done anything with psychographics? How about an article on that?
Speak to you soon!
daniel
Hi Daniel,
Thanks for your comment! Psychographics are typically encountered when dealing with surveys and focus groups, for the purpose of market segmentation.
If I were to write an article for psychographics, it would focus on the use of research to understand your audience by geography, and by cohort. That is more a mass communication device rather than an online marketing device. But do give me some time to give it a think to see how I can make it relevant to the online audience. You are right - it would make for a very interesting read!
very interesting.
i’m adding in RSS Reader
What do you mean ?