If you’re still targeting the exact same market as you did last year, it’s time to redefine your target audience. That’s the only way to create an effective SEO strategy and inbound marketing plan that actually brings you customers.
One way to narrow down the people you target with your marketing efforts is through market segmentation.
What is Market Segmentation?
This is when you take your group of customers, email subscribers, blog followers, etc… and divide them into smaller groups. Each group is based on related needs and characteristics. There are numerous ways to segment your market.
Here are just a few ideas for segmented groups:
- By demographics – Where are they?
- By age – How old are they?
- By sex or ethnicity – Who are they?
- By needs – What are they interested in?
- By wants – Do they just want specific content or products only?
Market segmentation allows you to create products, services and online content marketing campaigns that focus on your current and potential customers’ needs.
For Example: To avoid losing B2B email subscribers, put them in a separate group from B2C subscribers. That way, you don’t bug them with irrelevant B2C-focused newsletters.
That’s effective market segmentation.
Benefits of Segmenting Your Markets
The best way to segment your market into various, valuable groups is to determine their perceived value for the solutions you provide. In other words, who really wants what you have to offer?
That way, your marketing messages are tailored to meet the needs, wants and desires of each specific group. Here are some tips for redefining your target audience by segmenting your market:
- Determine which market segments your skills and resources can successfully service
- Analyze your markets to figure out which segments you are incapable of effectively servicing or is costing you money
- Use the segmented data to help you understand how to expand your solutions so you can effectively service an untapped segment
Now, you can determine which one specific segment you tend to help the most or would like to help more with your solutions. Then, you can work with these customers exclusively as your ideal clients.
Or you can work with all customers, but create content that speaks directly to this new target audience. This is a priceless method for redefining your target market. Now, target that specific audience with your online marketing tactics.
4 Major Benefits of Market Segmentation
The key to your online marketing success is to promote your services and products correctly. That means getting your solutions and content in front of the people more apt to buy them. You need to reach the right target audience… the people already interested in what you have to offer.
Breaking your market up into segmented groups based on who they are and what they need helps you reach them better. That’s because it gives you a better understanding of how to fulfill their needs.
Segmenting your market gives you the ability to:
- Put your focus on the right market. Segmented data helps you market your solutions to people who actually need and want them. So, you don’t waste time and money trying to reach the wrong people.
- Explain how solutions benefit the audience. With segmented groups, you can create content that specifies how the solution benefits a particular group of customers based on their needs.
- Create premium solutions. Market segment research helps you identify customers that may pay premium prices for specialized products and services. This also helps you understand what types of specialized solutions they want and need.
- Improves SEO efforts. Anyone can write content using general industry SEO keywords. But when you redefine your target audience through segmentation, you get a better understanding of which keywords your target customers are using in online searches.
How Does Redefining Your Target Market Improve Your SEO?
Online marketing helps you get your brand, products and services in front of people using the Internet. And let’s face it, that’s just about everyone. If your business doesn’t have an online presence, how will people find you when they search for your solutions on Google and other search engines?
Having an online presence helps you get leads that are actually interested in what you have to offer. It also gives your brand a personality. Your images, video, graphics and written content tell your audience what your brand is about, and why they should care.
But how do you reach these people through your content?
Search engine optimization (SEO) is the key to success when building your brand’s presence online. This is the process of gaining traffic from Google and its competitors through the words you use in your text.
For Effective SEO, You Must Know Who Your Target Audience Is
But to do this effectively, you have to know what keywords your target market is using in online searches. That requires knowing who they are! There’s no way to directly reach the people interested in your solutions without identifying them and learning about their problems.
The bottom line is… they are online searching for services and products just like yours because they are trying to solve particular problems. You need to let them know, through your content, how your products and services help solve those problems.
However, you have to identify them before you can begin to offer solutions to their problems. SEO keywords help you reach them by using the same words in your online text content that they use in searches in Google and other search engines.
If you’re not reaching the people already online searching for what you’re offering, it’s time to redefine your target audience… because, more than likely, you’re talking to the wrong people.
How Do You Reach Your Target Audience Using SEO?
SEO is the process of optimizing online content, including webpages, blog posts, graphics, videos, audios and images, so it’s visible to people using certain keywords in search engines.
That means optimizing your content, so it includes phrases people in your target market use in searches to find your solutions.
Ranking for specific keywords is a process that takes time. If you want to rank for very popular keywords, such as ‘online marketing’, you may never reach your destination.
There are thousands of brands who came before you that already own those broad keywords. You need to redefine your target audience fast.
But try ranking for something like ‘online marketing for nonprofits in las vegas’ and you have a greater chance of tackling the market. Narrowing down your target market is the best SEO practice you can perform.
Why?
Narrow Down Your Target Market
Well, by narrowing down your target market, you can now create content that includes variations of that key phrase. And you don’t have to be an SEO expert to do it. Just keep your target audience in mind when writing blog posts, webpage content, image, video, service and product descriptions, etc…
That way, you infuse the right SEO keywords into your content and reach the right people online. DIY SEO can be very effective when you narrow down your target market properly, especially when you implement market segmentation.
Ready to redefine your target audience? I can help with that. I’ve created a process that helps you tap into the souls of your brand and solutions to determine who you serve best.
Let me help you reach the people already searching for your solutions online. I will help you redefine your target audience.
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