Target Marketing - The Critical Success Factor

Every now and then I'll meet somebody with a fairly low opinion of marketing. Such people seem to love nothing more than sharing their cock-eyed view of the world.

Recently I had the 'good' fortune to be trapped with just such a person. He proceeded to tell me that targeting was a load of rubbish. His particular approach to marketing is as follows...

• My product is marketed at everybody
• I don't want to risk losing a sale by excluding someone
• If they're alive and have money in their pocket, they're in my target market

This person is certain he's never made a profit on any advertising he's ever bought. Naturally, he blames the advertising rather than himself. Naturally, he has no data to back up his claims. And naturally he thinks marketing is a scam.

What's interesting to me about this person is how his comments about target marketing illustrate why his advertising efforts have failed.

His unwillingness to consider the purpose of a target market is the very thing that makes his advertising ineffective. The plain fact is, ad copy can't be powerful if it isn't written with its intended audience in mind.

The things you need to say to get a 50 year old excited about your product are different to those needed when talking to teens.

Knowing who your target market is makes life much easier. Here's a list of everything it can tell you...

• Where to advertise:
  If your target market consists of single parents, you can use Google to find the sites they already visit
• How to write copy:
  If your market is young urban teens in the UK, it's useful to write the way they speak
• What to offer:
  Once you know where they hang out online, you can observe what they're interested in. This research will help you construct a powerful offer
• How to set the price:
  Find out what they're already buying, and price accordingly
• Affiliate opportunities:
  In your online travels you'll come across plenty of sites that market complimentary products. Touch base, and discuss joint-marketing opportunities. Twitter can help you find and build these types of relationship
• Social media:
  Some target markets are very active in certain social media. This can help put you in touch with your market, and is an excellent way to observe your market and gain a deep understand of what motivates them
• Lead generation:
  Lead generation only works when you have powerful copy and a compelling offer. Without a clearly defined target market, lead generation will fail (as will direct sales)

The importance of target marketing can't be overstated. Every marketing activity ought to flow from target market. When the audience is well defined, and properly understood, everything seems obvious and simply falls into place.

Relationship and Referral Marketing with Twitter? Here's how...

A client and I have been discussing the use of Twitter in online marketing over the last week. Today, this client came up with a brilliant new way to put it to use. Here's a quick run-down on the background...

1. One of their target markets is brides (they provide wedding entertainment for receptions and/or parties)
2. We ran an experiment to see whether or not it's possible to find brides using Twitter
3. While we attracted many companies seeking the same market, Twitter didn't send us many brides (i.e. they're not using Twitter to look for information about weddings)

I was discussing the outcome of this experiment with Claire Park of Incognito Artists, and we both agreed that Twitter wasn't likely to be a useful source of leads. Despite this, there are 2 things Twitter did well...

1. It was a quick and low cost way to test the potential of the market
   
2. It built a list of potential future alliances (i.e. complimentary suppliers)
   

1. Market Testing with Twitter

Twitter isn't a replacement for full-blown market research. What it offers is an approximation of likely behaviour over a very short period of time (48 hours in this case), at no additional cost.

What is obvious from the followers we picked up, is that many complementary businesses are using Twitter. And that it probably is a useful tool for building alliances. It was Claire that spotted the opportunity to use Twitter as a way of developing mutually beneficial relationships as follows...

• The company's Twitter page attracts followers over time
• Most of these followers will be companies looking to supply complimentary services to the same market segment
• We make contact with these companies, offer to post a free tweet on their page, and ask if there's anything special they'd like us to post
• We retweet when they post something useful or interesting

This use of Twitter can be further refined to ensure we pick up the right companies...

• Schedule tweets to go out only during UK business hours
• Tweets are crafted to include the targeted company's name and the primary keyword relating to that topic

The objective then, is to use Twitter as a means of forging a relationship with those company's likely to be in a position to refer their clients on to Incognito Artists. As a supplier of wedding entertainment, this company is often one of the last to be booked. Everybody else in the supply chain is generally called up first. And that makes almost everybody a potential source of referrals.

To put it another way, Twitter can be used as a B2B relationship marketing and referral tool.