We all know that effective advertising is about serving the right message to the right person at the right time in the right space. But it’s not as easy as it sounds. It takes a lot to achieve that golden goal. The first place to start is to make sure you know your audience. You may think you know your audience, and you may know who your ideal audience is. But without the hard facts and data to confirm or deny your line of thinking, your marketing efforts may be nothing more than a stab in the dark. That’s why we start every job for every client with a concrete consumer profile.
Thanks to in-depth information from Scarborough by Nielsen, we’re able to conduct qualitative research on consumer demographics. What does that mean? Well, it means that we can access self-reporting surveys from your target audience to see the big picture. This data lets us define your customers by more than their demographic information (age, ethnicity, income, gender, marital status, etc.) We can develop a fully realized snapshot of your average consumer profile. We can determine their lifestyle, habits, brand usage, hobbies, recreational activities, political affiliations and more.
Essentially, we find what’s important to your audience, then integrate your brand into those hobbies, interests, habits and preferences. And, while this information can get as granular as you want it to be (we could pull stats on men over 50 who drive a pickup truck, like to fish for trout and have visited your store in the past 30 days), more targeted consumer profile data doesn’t always equal better consumer profile data. You reach a point where the sample size gets so small that the information is skewed and not representative of your typical consumer.
Your Consumer Isn’t Static
This information is dynamic, meaning it can fluctuate throughout the year, based on seasonality, holidays and other factors. For example, a middle class mom who typically tries to shop locally or buy organic as much as she can may prioritize differently and change her shopping habits around the holiday season. So, it’s incredibly important to your marketing message that you keep up-to-date with this data.
Even more importantly, our data lets us know when and where your target audience consumes media. This is where it comes down to qualitative vs. quantitative. Just because a TV show has good ratings, or a website has high traffic, doesn’t mean it’s a good fit for you. Ratings, traffic, impressions — those are all quantitative. Real quality information tells us who is viewing, visiting and engaging.
The Final Word
It’s easy to fall into the trap of talking to ourselves or to who we want our audience to be. Success lies in remembering that your message is broadcast to real people with busy lives and varied interests. They don’t think about your brand every day like you do. But they could be, if you know who they are and how best to reach them.
Ready to make your marketing spend work smarter? Get in touch.
