Social media can be a very effective tool for marketing, but you need to have a strong social media presence. To do that, you need not only to understand your audience and what appeals to them but also who your target audience is, what makes them unique, and how to appeal to a specific niche to give you an advantage.
Pinpointing Your Audience
One of the most difficult—yet crucial—tasks for any business is to specify a target audience and narrow it down to a niche market that will benefit from your business and find your products or services appealing.
Having a specific target market should already be part of your business plan. However, as you start your business, you will be able to make an even better analysis based on those that are interested in your products or services and interact with your posts. This allows you to narrow down your target audience and market to those who are most likely to buy your products. You’ll find that the people in your target audience have common characteristics or interests, such as demographics, behaviors, or hobbies.
You must define your business’s target audience as clearly as possible because this will help you benefit from targeted advertising, which allows you to be extremely specific. This way, you spend advertising money only on those most likely to be interested in making a purchase. This not only boosts your sales but also makes the return on investment for every dollar spent on marketing worth it.
However, an important question you should ask is, “How do I figure out who my target audience is?” It is not enough just to have an idea of who your products would be suitable for; there are ways to find out who will benefit from your business and are part of the target audience you should be addressing.
Characteristics to Help You Define Your Audience
● Age
You need to understand which generation you are targeting. This will help you adjust your content accordingly, even in your tone of voice, visuals, and especially your ad campaigns. Age is also a factor in deciding what platform is the most suitable and will generate the most profit because different age groups tend to use different social media platforms. It is not essential to pinpoint a specific age, but just an average range to help you make better decisions when it comes to marketing.
● Gender
In some cases, you could find that one gender finds your business more appealing than the other, and knowing this will help you market specific products and posts to them.
● Location
One of the advantages of Facebook is that it is a global network that allows you to target anyone in the world. However, if your products or services only cater to a specific location, it’s essential to highlight that. This will allow you to consider several factors, such as geographic areas to target for your promotions or advertising. It will also help you determine the time zone of your audience, allowing you to be present when your customers are most likely to be active so that you can answer their questions and provide excellent customer service through engagement and interaction. It’s also imperative for you to accommodate the time zone when scheduling your social media posts as well as ad campaigns.
● Language
Your target audience may likely be speaking a different language. Say your business provides Middle Eastern desserts in North America. You could find that your target audience speaks Arabic rather than English, and so, it is important to take into account their dominant language.
● Budget and Spending Habits
It is beneficial to gather information about the spending patterns of your target audience. This will help you understand how to price your products and whether your budgeting is effective concerning your audience. Understanding how much they are willing to spend on a product, as well as how frequently they buy items within your price range, will help you get a better idea of how you should approach your pricing and how successful your marketing will be with promotions and sales.
● Interests
There are numerous advantages in determining the interests of your target market. You can do this by analyzing the people who regularly interact with your posts and figuring out what they have in common. You could find that most of them like yoga pages, or have a sweet tooth, or even like to travel. These interests, no matter how specific, will really come in handy when it is time to target your social media ads to a specific audience, helping you gain a wider reach of suitable users.
All of the above is extremely useful information that will really help your business, but where do you get that information from? And how do you determine all these factors to help you narrow down who your target audience is? It is simple: analytics. Going on each platform and checking out the available insights will not only help you determine who your target audience is but also gain the necessary insight into which platform to use for which target audience.
Growing Your Audience
Once you are familiar with your target market, the next question you should ask is, “How does my target audience know that my business exists?” Being able to reach and grow your audience is essential for your business to succeed. Luckily, social media can really help you grow your audience, as it allows you to target ads at them specifically once you have gained valuable insight into their characteristics and interests.
Set Fixed Goals
Key factors that will help you grow your audience are a set plan and strategy that will enable you to reach specific users according to their habits. For instance, while Facebook remains the most widely used social media platform, the majority of millennials and younger users are usually found on Instagram, Twitter, or Snapchat, making it more effective to channel your advertising there if that is the age range you are interested in. However, if you’re looking to grow a specific platform for business purposes, you could still work on targeting them as they tend to access various platforms.
Having a plan will enable you to create content that will help you reach your goals and work on specific targets. If you are familiar with your target audience and have the specific goal of reaching a broader audience on Facebook, then you can go about creating engaging content, addressing your audience, and filtering your targeting options to ensure that your paid reach is beneficial. This can result in more people interacting with your posts, and liking your page, or buying your products.
When setting goals, one of the most common and effective methods is the S-M-A-R-T method, which stands for the following:
Specific:
Make sure that you have clear, defined goals.
Measurable:
Set goals that can be measured so that you can analyze your level of success and monitor your achievements.
Achievable:
Avoid setting impossible goals and make sure that what you aim for can actually be achieved with the resources you have.
Realistic:
Be realistic about the budget, the expected time frame to achieve your goals and the outcome.
Time-Sensitive:
Follow a detailed schedule to help you determine how long it would take you to achieve your goals.
Analyze Your Competitors
To stand out, you need to study the market and figure out what your competitors are doing. Once you have analyzed them, you can start identifying the key factors that make their methodology work—what is it that attracts their audience and appeals to them? Answering these questions can help you understand what your business needs to do. You do not necessarily have to copy them, but you do need to understand what their edge is. This way, you will gain more insight into your target audience and work on coming up with a different edge or finding a gap in the market that you can focus on to attract more followers to your business rather than your competitors.
By looking at the content they share, their engagement, and the frequency in which they post, you can create and apply a successful strategy. Choose more relevant content that is more engaging and will appeal better to your target audience. You can analyze your competitors by searching for the probable keywords on each platform.
Create a Brand Voice
There is a certain lingo, tone, and way of speaking that will attract different age groups. So, once you are familiar with your specific target audience, you should start studying how they text, post, and speak, as well as what their interests are to help create a voice for your brand. This will make them feel more encouraged to interact with your posts and build a connection with your business.
You can even use a caption from a trending TV show that this age group watches, or lyrics from a song they listen to when you find it relevant. This will encourage them to engage with your post and therefore help you reach a wider audience.
Enhance Your Reach
There are several factors you need to take into consideration when it comes to reaching a wider audience. From paying for advertisements to posting at the most suitable times that promote the best engagement, you need to make sure that everything you do is verified, studied, and will help you reach that goal.
Here are the best times to post on each platform:
Facebook:
While 10 a.m. – 3 p.m. on weekdays are usually the safest times to post on Facebook, the most effective time is usually Thursday, between 1 p.m. – 2 p.m.
Instagram:
Just like Facebook, Thursday is also the best day to post on Instagram, whereas the safest timings for this platform are from Tuesday to Friday between 9 a.m. – 6 p.m.
Twitter:
The best time to post on Twitter is on Friday, around 9 a.m. – 10 a.m.
LinkedIn:
Between 3 p.m. – 5 p.m. on Wednesday is the best time to post on this platform.
Scheduling posts for these timings will allow you to capitalize on the most engaging times of each platform and give your posts an extra push to help them reach your target audience, growing it in the process.
Following these proven strategies to identify and grow your target audience will really help boost your sales, strengthen your social media presence, and make your brand look more authentic and appealing to new followers. Once you have figured out who your target audience is and how to appeal to them, the rest is just a piece of cake.