What is the target

The term "target" literally means “target” or the goal that a company sets as a milestone to achieve a specific marketing strategy, that is, selling a product to a certain audience. The segmentation of the market does not lead to the definition of a single target, but to a group of consumers who have common elements:

•   Age;
•   Gender;
•   Habits;
•   Incomes;
•   Occupations.

This process is called Target Group.

Be careful not to confuse the marketing sector's target with that of communication, in the first case it refers to consumers one wishes to retain or acquire; in the second case, it refers to those who are recipients of your communication.

The target is fundamental for success on the web and beyond, indeed, defining a target is very important because each segment has its own “tastes,” therefore to satisfy them we must necessarily use different communication strategies, diverse approaches, and various types of positioning.

To define your target, you can start by asking yourself these specific questions:

•  Who are your customers?
•  What are their characteristics?
•  What drives them to purchase?
•  What do they think of your brand?
•  How satisfied are they with what you provide?

The target is challenging to hit, but the more complex it is, the more profitable it will be for your business.

In a nutshell, knowing your ideal customer allows you to reach them and convert them into a buyer.

The target for advertising campaigns is defined as the target audience, indicating that segment of listeners that one wants to reach with a specific advertising message; generally, it represents what is defined by advertisers as the useful audience, i.e., the part of the audience potentially interested in the communication and the offer advertised by a company and is divided into:

• Website-based targeting: targeting is carried out through a selection of websites and sections that are related to the campaign's target demographic or psychographic characteristics, based on an evaluation of media consumption data collected from official surveys or provided by the publisher;
• Audience-based targeting: targeting is performed per impression, thanks mainly to the wide availability of real-time contextual information which allows for high profiling of audiences.

How to create a target?

Speak to your target as you would with someone you know well, starting with the following questions:

• who they are;
• how old they are;
• where they live;                                              
• what their job is;
• how they speak;
• what educational and professional path they have taken;                                
• what their interests are;
• what problems they need to solve;
• how and where they make purchases;
• how you can help them with your product/service. 

You can define your target in six steps:

1. Succeed in analyzing which customer problems you can solve: indeed, the first step in defining your market is the analysis of needs. You must understand what problems your customers have that you are capable of solving, including identifying unexpressed needs;

2. Create a portrait of your typical customer: based on the identified problems, start listing the different types of customers who might feel these needs. At this point, begin to construct the image of these customers.

3. Which customers in particular will benefit from your offering? To be convincing, you must demonstrate that NOT addressing certain issues would be too costly. This way, your target audience will be more inclined to take action by turning to you.

4. Focus on the market group: the Web has revolutionized the world of personalized products and services, eliminating many distribution problems. For example, we are no longer forced to watch a TV program because we have a wide range of options available on the Web

In this manner, it will be easier to build your reputation and obtain extensive feedback.

Based on previously gathered data, start segmenting your market and ask yourself if you want to work with:

a)   Certain types of people;

b)   Within niche market sectors;

c)   In some geographical locations;

5. What skills can you offer?

A way to determine the right target is to reflect on your company and its employees.

Are you the only one offering a certain expertise, in your geographic area?

Are you more inclined to get along with particular types of people?

Factors like these could help you establish an interesting offer for a specific market segment. Use the information and knowledge at your disposal, investing in them as added value.

6. Who are your competitors?

At this point, you need to look around to better understand the market and figure out who your potential competitors are. Ask yourself if (and why) you are the only one capable of meeting a certain need.

Depending on your market, there may not be an answer. In other cases, depending on the industry or geographic area, you might be able to respond more easily.

It is useful to reflect on this aspect because, if you are unable to answer this question, you might have targeted the wrong market or audience.

In this case, you will need to go back to the previous steps to further refine your target research. To identify your reference segment, it is necessary to have a solid base of information which, as you have seen, comes from the market itself.