How to get started in target marketing.

In these tight economic times, a lot of companies are relying on marketing to drive sales rather than merely differentiate their brand identity. The technique they use – target marketing – “targets” a sub-group within their larger market segment for special handling, usually a sales offer or some other incentive to buy now rather than later.

Don’t confuse target marketing with your overall marketing strategy. For example, if you’re a bank, your market may be defined as all members of a community who have money, but your target market may be only those members of the community who own houses or have children in college.

If you’re considering a target marketing effort, here’s a strategy to get started:

• Identify target market segments. Which segments of your total market would you particularly benefit from reaching? Don’t be afraid to think outside the box here – “new college graduates” may be just as valid a target as “senior engineering management”.
• Find out what makes them tick. There’s no substitute for research. Try to learn how your targets think, what they need, how they really feel about your product, and what the best channels to reach them might be. Do enough research to be confident the way you package your promotion will resonate with your audience.
• Quantify success. Decide on a concrete measure of success, be it Web site hits, telephone calls, sales leads, new customers or gross sales.
• Analyze and refine. After you’ve launched each specific tactic, analyze what worked and why. Did sales leads turn into sales? How long was the sales cycle? Did you just make a sale, or did you make a new customer? Spending time on detailed results analysis will help you focus your marketing on better and better prospects and promotions.

Back to Archives