The strategy of target marketing involves locating a niche market and focusing your advertising efforts at places where this group is most likely to be. There are a variety of tools that can be used to locate your niche.
One of the tools that advertising agencies and business owners have used for years is demographics. Not only to identify a niche, but also to decide where their advertising dollars are best spent.
In the offline world of advertising, demographics are sometimes used to decide where to put billboards or send coupons via regular mail. An advertising agency might study the demographic profile of a population according to sex, race, income or age.
To effectively advertise on TV, it is helpful to know who is watching what shows. Sometimes phone surveys are used to gather this information.
Commuting time is also an important part of the demographics. Items that would be appealing to people with long commutes would include audio books, head phones and fuel efficient automobiles.
Target marketing also includes choosing websites based on content or that appeal to a specific age group.
As an example, WebMD contains advertising from many pharmaceutical companies. Investment companies often advertise on news related sites. Toy companies and video game manufacturers advertise on game sites. You get the idea.
Small businesses with limited advertising dollars often partner with other businesses in order to contact their niche via email. They also may use Pay Per Click Advertising, like Adwords, to help keep within a budget and also target their niche.
In addition to using demographics, marketers use another concept called psychographics. Psychographics is a less well-known term. This concept enables one to classify a market by their activities, interests, values or opinions.
Just as an example, the major breweries advertise during football games. While not all sports fans drink beer, many of them do.
The popularity of the internet may have changed target marketing. But it is still being used and will continue to be a part of an effective marketing campaign.
