In today’s business world, content is everything – especially when your business is base online. The better you can tailor your content and products to serve their needs and solve the problems they face, the more likely you are to succeed.
But how do you identify your audience/customers so that you can shape your content and products to fit their needs? This article will show you how.
What is your audience?
Before we get into WHO your audience is, let’s agree on what we mean by the term audience. We are talking about the segment of the population that shares an interest in the specific topic that you write about.
In other words, it’s the people in your niche.
Who are you?
Even I rolled my eyes when I typed that. It sounds so hippie-trippy. I don’t mean like “like, who are you man. And like why are we here man.”
Actually maybe that is what I mean – just not in a mystical spiritual way. What I mean is how will your audience view you and what role do you want to play for them.
Depending on the depth of your knowledge on your subject you may either be an authority or a partner who is learning along with them.
One isn’t necessarily better than the other. But regardless of that, I think the core of the role you play is as a guide. You’ll guide your audience on their path to the goals they have set for themselves.
So, in answer the quest, you are a guide.
How others tell you to define your audience
There are plenty of business resources that tell you to define your audience in terms of traditional demographic information: age, income level, gender, educational level, race, etc. You know. All the stuff that is included in non-dissemination policies.
You should define your audience, but that’s some old-school thinking that unfortunately persists. Instead why not define the audience by what they want?
Don’t get me wrong. Sometimes those other factors will come into play, but I don’t think it’s the place to start.
For whatever reason, my personal TikTok feed is full of women who are decidedly over 50 – including a welder and some dancers. If I were using that account for marketing, I never would have expected that and I would have missed a lot of customers.
I’m not saying that they all have the same goals in mind, but it does illustrate that interests and goals are not defined by age, gender, race and the other traditional demographics.
Narrow it down
Here’s where I contradict myself a little. But just a little.
Don’t make your audience so broad that you are trying to be everything for everyone. Focus instead on a little slice of the pie. Maybe people who want to successfully train their dog who they adopted when full grown – the dog, not them.
You can of course narrow that down further by dog size, behavioral issues or breed.
And here’s the thing. You’ve narrowed it down, but not necessarily shut out others who would benefit from your advice.
To my previous point, you also haven’t assumed that people in that position are defined by their traditional demographics, but rather their goals.
Don’t overthink it
Let’s keep this simple to start with;
Making assumptions
Start my making assumptions. Define your audience as what you think they are.
You will almost certainly be wrong – at least in part. That’s okay. Just start writing to that audience and see how it goes. Get some content out there and see how it is received.
This is not like giving a presentation for an employer who will judge you and possibly derail your career. This is the internet. If you make a mistake, correct it or abandon it. If it’s really a terrible mistake (it probably isn’t), delete the post. No biggie.
Let your audience tell you who they are.
I do NOT mean that you should go out and survey them, and take what they say as gospel. I’ve tried that with my own in-person business. And let me tell you; That was an expansive lesson.
People will tell you what they want to believe and what they want you to believe. They’ll tell you what they would buy and what they’d pay for it. But as much as they be trying to be helpful, they are almost always completely wrong. I’m not trying to be negative here. Just honest.
But the way they WILL tell you honestly what they’re interested in is by reading what you write, watching your videos (or whatever), and either interacting with it/you or opening up their wallets.
If you’re writing about making wooden clocks, and people keep asking about the workshop layout you have in your pictures and videos, they’re telling you something. If you make a video tour of the workshop and it becomes your most viewed video, they’re telling you something. They’re telling you that they are interested in workshop design.
You know a little more about your audience. And you can tailor your content to that interest. You may still post about lock-making, but you will have their attention if you also talk more about the shop. And maybe it’s time to sell them workshop plans.
Evaluate your Choice of Audience
So you’ve decided who your audience is. But are you right?
The most accurate way to do that is to write and produce content for several years and see. But that’s not terribly practical.
The best way is to check out your competition. Check out if there are lots of results when you search the term you think your target audience would search. If there are, that’s a good sign.
What about if you search Amazon. Lots of results? Good sign.
Are your potential competitors selling products to your audience already? Good sign
Are your competitors plentiful? If so, that’s a good sign.
What? Why would it be a good sign that you have a lot of competitors that are already selling to your audience?
Because that means there is an audience, and they are willing to spend money on people and products who provide a solution. And you will provide the solution.
But if you are one of 10 people offering the same solution, isn’t that bad? Not if one in ten choose you. But even if one in a hundred chooses you it’s still more than zero. But there are way over 100 people in the audience if nine other people are selling to them.
I don’t want to get too far into the math since it would be pretty speculative, but with close to 8 billion people on Earth with more being born – litteraly every second – any market that is big enough to have competition is large enough to support tons of competitors.
You don’t even have to be the best option (though you should try), you just have to be the first one that any given person trusts and likes enough to buy from.