If you think about your target group, you usually first concentrate on the so-called existing customers – those of whom you know or think that the product or service could be interesting for them. Yet there is certainly a much larger circle that would be eligible. Time to expand the radius.
In order to identify the target group, many founders use data such as gender, age or place of residence. In addition, if the person has created surveys, there are also buying interests, preferences and more. Very few founders have large customer databases that they can use, so they have to do their own research. This is costly, but worthwhile if you want to expand your target group. So the first place to start is with your own target group. Once these have been defined, the next step follows.
Your target group on social media
An incredibly important source in this context is social media. On all social media portals, users exchange information about their buying behaviour. They share brands, talk about products or services, show videos and pictures and thus offer an overview of trends and which groups follow these trends without having to commission an elaborate AI to collect data. At the same time, you have the opportunity to look at your competitors and see who is commenting there and how. The same applies to YouTube and, of course, the business networks XING and LinkedIn.
What unites a target group?
What also unites broad target groups is the common denominator. You have to find that. It can be an ideal, a value, something extraordinary or a feeling that you convey with your products. For all the things you buy yourself, think about why you do it. Why do you reach for this yoghurt and not the other one? Look at advertising and think about what feeling it is trying to appeal to or what value it is trying to sell. It’s very exciting to see the breadth of people you can reach with something that embodies a certain value.
Speak the language of the target group
Social networks are also suitable for this research, because here you find out very quickly how customers want to be addressed and what appeals to them. Accordingly, you set accents on your website, or if you have your own TikTok or YouTube or Insta channel, then there. Sometimes the good old flyer is also good enough to approach new target groups.
And at the end?
If one goes back to the usual parameters and researches where the members of the newly identified target group meet, which places they visit, where they stay, where they shop – online or locally, and so on. So basically a new target group research, designed to successfully conquer the fresh clientele.
