Identifying Your Targeted Audience

Big companies and websites have the resources and budget to appeal to all people. Since you might not have the privilege like them, one of the strategies to your success will be to go for a niche. Targeting and segmenting are the two popular buzzwords that had focused upon in marketing. Niche marketing is how you will have to keep in line with those words in your plan.

Web markets are divided into targeted opportunities. And these opportunities will assist you in making your decisions on the quantity and the quality of your marketing efforts. A successful niche marketing is the product of segmentation. Don't attempt to be everything to everyone but rather define a broad, targeted segment of consumers whose needs are not met by those existing site. Just as customers screening you, you should also decide whom you want to serve. Basically, there are two basic segmenting options to choose from :

1. Attract visitors who need the information or products which are available in your website.

2. Develop or change your website in such a way as to appeal to certain groups.

The primary objective of doing a segmentation is to ensure that you focus on those customers the way you can afford it. Your products or services have to be special for some reasons and appealing too. Identify your strength and leadership position and appeal to a consolidated audience that also has the similar interests. The ultimate goal of segmentation is to reach and sell to a concentrated number of people that are already exposed to your website, products and services. Some of the ways to segment could be based on the following :

• Gender - Just as there are different products that will appeal to men or to women, so there are also websites that are appealing to men or to women. Narrow down your focus and concentrate your visual appeal to one of the sexes.

• Age - This is the largest affinity group. Websites could be designed and targeted to children, teenagers, young adults or the middle-aged group.

• A matured market - This is not similar to age segmentation as it is used to identify growth of different age groups of the overall population. It can be broken down into 4 sub-categories as below -

  • Age 50 - 64 (older)

  • Age 65 - 74 (elderly)

  • Age 75-84 (aged)

  • Age 85 and above (very old)

  Contrary to a common belief, a mature households have more disposable income to spend than any other demographic. Example, retirees with an abundance of time and money appear to have found a new interest in personal computers. And this group will probably represent a strong market for an online financial services or even recreational sites.

• Occupations - What defines a person is their job connection which people will normally tell you something about themselves. Design your website based on this segment of their occupations and you will have their interest.

<Back to Index>