Fusion Marketing - Your Target Audience

By: Pam Small, Owner of Refresh & Renew

The first step in establishing your Fusion Marketing Strategy is to decide what audience you will be targeting. If you've chosen your Fusion Partners wisely, you know they wish to target the same audience as you and they may already have determined the demographic they want to zero in on. You would be amazed at the number of small business owners who have not done the research to determine who is most likely to buy their products and services.

While some products and services span a wide range of potential customers, others require a very specific demographic. For instance, a gift basket company would have a wide range of potential customers while a lactation consultant would have a very specific demographic. Some broad demographic segments would include gender, age, income level, marital status, religious affiliation and location. The segments can be narrowed greatly by determining members of a specific group of people like club membership or which private school their children attend. You can research a population's makeup in terms of age, gender, occupation, family circumstances and income by checking out the most recent edition of the Country & City Data Book, published by the US Department of Commerce.

Where does your audience live? Do they make most purchases online or do are they loyal to local business? Do they spend most of their time outdoors? What have been their spending habits? Are you targeting professionals or people who own home-based businesses? Each partner in the Fusion Team should bring to their strategy meeting the demographic of their targeted audience and be prepared to determine the best way to reach this audience.

Next time, we'll explore some of the best methods of marketing to very specific market segments.

Pam Small is the owner of Refresh & Renew - A Resource for Women. Having a heart for women's issues, Pam is quickly becoming the go-to person for helping small business owners target their marketing efforts to this powerful buying group. For more info, visit www.refreshandrenew.com or email Pam at psmall@refreshandrenew.com.