How to define your target audience - a critical health care
marketing success factor
Focus and define with precision to produce the greatest
results
with precious resources.
Medical marketing efforts that attempt to reach
anyone, anywhere-are doomed to produce only a squandered budget.
Carefully and precisely identifying the target audience is
a critical success factor in brand strategy development. You
know whom you want to reach, where they are located, what
makes them tick...and how to speak directly to them.
The process of branding in healthcare marketing
involves many moving parts. And for your brand to both sound
and be effective, a fundamental step is to know who you want
to talk to—who is it that you want to attract to your doorstep.
A clear and well-defined target audience is also fundamental
to your advertising; what media to use and how to shape a
compelling message that brings response.
Defining the target audience is a critical success factor
in branding
Vividly picture your target audience as a person, someone
who is or could be real to you. For any healthcare organization
and practices of all types—hospitals, manufacturers, physicians
and surgeons, dentists, pharmaceuticals or groups—the more
specifically you define the target audience, the greater your
ability to inspire a positive response.
The power of your brand relies on the ability to focus, and
there are four primary criteria in defining your target audience
so you know them inside and out.
Four ways to define your target audience
There are many ways to describe target markets. But it is
likely that you'll want to use all four of the following primary
categories.
- GEOGRAPHY — In short, where are they?
What is the actual territory that you want to own? Most
commonly, this is defined by ZIP codes, within a realistic
distance between them and your location or locations. Keep
psychological and physical barriers in mind as you define
your geography.
- DEMOGRAPHICS — What is the target audience's
age, gender, family composition/size, occupation, education
and household income?
- PSYCHOGRAPHICS — What is the general
personality, behavior and lifestyle? What is their repetition
of need? What loyalty characteristics are likely? Are they
receptive to new ideas and innovative technology?
- BEHAVIOR — What are the needs and wants
of the patient? What is their level of knowledge, information
sources, consumer patterns or response to the product or
service?
Given these factors, your target audience might be initially
defined as:
Male and Female married adults residing within (specific)
ZIP codes; between the ages of 21 and 35; at least one child;
owning a condo or home; education above high school; and earning
a household (combined) income of $65,000 or higher. Psychographically,
these are busy young couples who consider their time to be
a valuable and limited resource. They are active physically
and positive in their outlooks. Behaviorally, they are often
leaders in making purchase decisions, and they will likely
look first to the Internet to acquire information.
The more specific you can see your target customer, the more
effectively you can build your brand...and you'll reach them
more efficiently.
Reality check: where to find audience information
There's a wealth of information about the local population
within easy reach...and a lot of it is free of charge. After
all, it is unlikely that you will successfully build a brand
for "young married couples" if the population base
is dominated by people 50-plus. Similarly it would be extremely
insightful to know that there have been significant shifts
in residential patterns.
Census Bureau data is online and free at: www.census.gov.
Also from the Census Bureau, AMERICAN FACTFINDER helps with
easy to find population, housing, economic, and geographic
data at: http://factfinder.census.gov/home/saff/main.html?_lang=en,
and QUICK FACTS with maps at: http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/index.html.
Statistics about people, households, personal income, labor
force, and housing — organized by ZIP code — is available at:
http://www.census.gov/epcd/www/zipstats.html.
Beyond these resources, we often guide clients using cluster-marketing
models that group consumers into defined clusters based upon
where they live. These models typically break down consumers
into 50 to 70 cluster groups with descriptive names like "Executive
Suites" or "God's Country." One of our favorite
resources is
http://www.claritas.com/MyBestSegments/Default.jsp?ID=20.
Of course, we can work with you to incorporate all this data
into actionable marketing strategies and tactics.
And remember, these articles are made possible thanks to
the support of paying clients.
So give us a call today at (800) 656-0907
and we'd be happy to help you
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