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At Jessie Marie Studio we strive to educate through visual solutions.
You may think this means we simply make good looking logos, ads or websites. This is part of it. However, we also offer marketing consulting. This is where we help a client with a marketing strategy so they can be more successful with their marketing dollars. The first part of creating a marketing strategy is to define a client's target market.
Wikipedia's definition of a target market is: a specific group of customers that a business has decided to aim is marketing efforts & ultimately its merchandise or services towards.
Do you know who your target market is?
Where do they live?
Are they male or female?
Are they young families?
Or empty-nesters?
Where do they shop?
Where are they on the weekends?
The different categories we look at with a client are:
Geographic Location
Where their customers live
Demographic and socio-economic status
Gender
Age
Income
Occupation
Education
Household size
Stage in the family life cycle
Phychographic
Similar attitudes, values & lifestyles - outdoor lovers, movie goers, church goers
Behavioral
Occasions, degree of loyalty - weddings, holidays, brand loyalty
Product-related
Relationship to a product - someone in need of a new roof, Harley Davidson drivers
One client I helped through this process was St. Andrew's Lutheran Church & Campus Center on the University of Illinois Campus. I was helping them create a marketing campaign for a lecture series they conducted this past school year. It included everything from emails to posters to church bulletin inserts to social media pieces. When I started working with them they wanted to use their marketing dollars to target "everyone."
When I hear anyone say that the first question I ask is: Are you Coca-cola?
Coca-cola does indeed targets "everyone." But think about it. Do they really? I would say they look at different segments all over the world & then create different marketing campaigns for each one. Different countries, different parts of countries, etc.
So I sat down with St. Andrew's and created the graphic above. We broke up all the different people they were trying target into a visual target. The center of the target are those people they wanted to put the most time & energy into.
You will see on the back side of the sheet which items focused on who from most important to least by these color coded indicators.
The star category of people are the lecture series biggest fans. These are the people who will promote your brand or in this case St. Andrew's event because they truly believe in it - not because they are getting paid a dime.
Now, when a company is not yet established with dedicated fans or wants to create a tribe of certain customers the star category would be who you want to target. For example, at Jessie Marie Studio we have recently decided to target individuals, companies or organizations that value great design & the great outdoors. This mix would align with our values - the phychographic segmentation - as a company. Giving us an opportunity to work with nature lovers who want to educate about that love.
By looking at a client's target market I will not only be able to create a great looking logo, ad or website. But a graphical product that speaks to the right people.
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Shortly after I gave this presentation I read the following post on The Mogul Mom. She made a fabulous point about knowing your targets demographic and socio-economic status doesn't hold much power when it comes to sales, emotion does. I would have to say I agree. What do you think?
