Author: JimH

What Is Audience Targeting?

The term audience targeting in any other context besides marketing would sound ominous. But for an internet marketer, or any other type of marketing, it simply refers to identifying the audience that would be interested in buying what you are offering. Facebook has hundreds of millions of users but internet marketers need to narrow the audience for their ads down to the users most likely to be interested so as to buy. What is needed for a profitable campaign is a well targeted Facebook audience.

When it comes to targeting you will need to identify some things about your desired buying audience that are obvious. Like gender, age, maybe nationality. But to truly know your audience you need more than the obvious. You need to know what members of your audience are interested in. What are their hobbies? What is their intent?

Think of it this way. If you were selling hamburgers where would your target audience be? What do they like? What time of day would you make yourself available to them? Where would you place your hamburger cart? Keeping the answer to these simple questions in mind there are things you definitely wouldn’t do to reach your market. And there are things that it would be best for you to do if at all possible.

Keeping with our example of the hamburger cart here are some things you wouldn’t do. You wouldn’t stand outside of a vegetarian market to look for people to buy your hamburgers. Why not? Because generally speaking vegetarians don’t eat hamburgers. Where would the perfect place be to look for people who like hamburgers? How about at the head of the drive-thru lane at McDonalds or some other hamburger joint in the middle of lunch hour? But you might be thinking “McDonalds would never let me set up a cart in their drive-thru lane …” and of course you are right. But don’t confuse targeting with “access”. In the real world you may not have access to McDonald’s customers in their drive-thru lane but those are the bulls-eye targeted consumers you would be looking for.

Let’s stick with our hamburger cart example but move it to the internet … hopefully by now you realize that on the internet you can have the same “access” to the figurative McDonalds customer as McDonalds has. If you can target on the internet better than McDonalds does then you can attract the figurative hamburger lover to your offers instead of theirs. It all comes down to the targeting. If you can identify, who your target customers are, what they are interested in on the internet, where they go to find it, and when are they ready to buy then you can bulls-eye target your internet audience.

Of course the effort involved in properly targeting a Facebook audience (or any other one) on the internet can be time consuming if done manually. That’s where targeting software comes into play. Targeting software can be used to optimize the process of getting to know your audience, their habits, and where to find them. Our Targeting Express Broad Targeting Formula 2.0 Software is designed to optimize your targeting efforts so that you can find buyers quickly enough to present them with your offers before they buy them some where else.

Know Your Audience When Marketing Online

Internet marketing is quickly becoming one of the most popular advertising options available. The Internet reaches a worldwide audience and is available 24 hours a day. For this reason more and more potential customers are turning to the Internet for a variety of reasons including researching products and services and making purchases. As more and more consumers turn to the Internet for these reasons, it is important for businesses to establish an online presence. This is so important because failure to do so may result in their competitors gaining an edge over them in competing for sales. While it is important for business to begin Internet marketing campaigns it is also important for these same businesses to realize basic advertising principles still exist and they cannot neglect these principles. Most importantly those who advertise online have to be aware of who their target audience is and how to reach this audience.

As with any marketing campaign, business owners should do some market research before they launch their Internet marketing campaign. Ideally this will involve hiring a research consultant with a great deal of experience in conducting and evaluating this type of market research. The results of this research should determine the basic demographical information for the target audience. The results should also include information on how to reach this target audience. A business that cannot afford to hire a consultant to conduct this market research should still make an effort to obtain this information on their own. This can be done through informal polls of current clients. This information may not be as comprehensive as the information obtained in a more formal study but it can still provide a great deal of insight into the best way to reach the target audience.

Once this information is obtained, it is important to tailor the Internet marketing campaign to appeal to the target audience. There are a number of different variables which can be modified to ensure the right message is reaching the right people in a manner they can understand and in which they can relate. Some of the ways in which your Internet marketing campaign can be tailored in this way include the aesthetics of your website or advertisements, the wording of your copy and the use of more advanced design features such as audio and visual or interactive tools.

The aesthetic appeal of a website can greatly contribute to how the website is viewed by the members of the target audience. A website which is designed to attract the attention of an older generation with more conservative tastes should include muted colors, clean design and conservative graphics. This will help to ensure the target audience enjoys the website. Conversely if you are looking to appeal to a younger audience with more liberal viewpoints you might chose to design the website with bold colors, eye catching graphics and creative design features.

The copy you include on your website should also take your target audience into consideration. Consider the examples of a conservative and a liberal audience listed above to create a better understanding of how the copy on your website can appeal to the target audience. When marketing to a more conservative audience, the copy should be tailored to use formal language and use facts to back up viewpoints. However, when you are marketing to a more liberal audience or a younger audience you can consider using less formal language which is likely to appeal to the target audience. You can also focus more on emotion to express viewpoints.

Finally, when a website is created for the purposes of Internet marketing it is important for the design of the website to appeal to the target audience. You may wish to include audio and video clips on your website but these clips should appeal to the target audience. For example if your website sells skateboards you might consider incorporating audio clips from punk rock bands as opposed to country music bands. There may be some skateboarders who enjoy country music but in general punk rock music more closely represents the skating culture. Keeping these details in mind is very important for Internet marketing.