Knowing your target audience: A beginner's guide for PRs

The team at Target Media Directory has put together a comprehensive guide to understanding your target audience.

PR is an industry that thrives by forging relationships between brands (i.e. your clients) and their consumers. Therefore, knowing your client’s ideal consumer will allow you to focus your communication efforts and ensure you reach the right audience.

Follow these three simple steps to ensure that you attract the correct target audience:

1. Define your client and their niche

As the PR pro, you need to ensure that you’re communicating your client’s brand effectively. And in order to do that, you first need to get to grips with exactly who they are and what they sell.

The best way to go about this is to think about what the client offers, where they share their brand messages and the kind of relationship they want to have with consumers.

2. Define your client’s unique selling point

Now that you know who and what you’re working with, it’s much easier to determine what makes your client unique. The unique selling point will inform the brand message and, more importantly, it’s going to be the thing you communicate to your target audience.

Take some time to consider the features and benefits of the product or service, the consumers emotional need that’ll be fulfilled by your client, and lastly, the unique aspects of your client and their offering.

3. Describe your client’s ideal consumer

With step one and two out of the way, you now have a solid foundation upon which you can build your target audience. It’s time to construct an idea of the type of person who not only has a need for your client’s product or service, but who is also most likely to buy it. Think about the following factors:

• Geographic location – Consider how the product or service you’re selling can be made for audiences in a particular geographic location. For example, if your client manufactures quality raincoats, you’ll be more likely to sell them in a region that experiences a high volume of rain as opposed to one that is typically dry and sunny. Therefore, you should look to communicate to an audience that lives in an area that suits your product or service.

• Age – Have you thought about who, in terms of their age, is going to want what you’re selling? Consider who may be too young or too old to appreciate the product or service. For example, you may need to communicate the benefits of a brand new life insurer that tailor makes policies for those in retirement. This means you need to focus more attention on an older crowd as opposed to people who are only just starting their careers.

• Gender – Is this product or service better suited for a specific gender? This may be something very important for you and your client to consider. An example of this would if you’re working with a client who sells feminine hygiene products. Think about how you can tailor your communication to attract female consumers.

• Occupation – Consider the purpose of your product or service – does it improve daily operations in a specific industry? For example, you may be working with a client who distributes basic medical supplies, such as needles, syringes and bandages. Think about who would be interested in buying those products and if they would want to start a relationship with your client. That’s your ideal consumer.

• Income level – Think about the price and overall purpose of the product or service that you’re selling. Consider whether this product or service is beneficial for people of a high, middle or low-income status. For example, perhaps you’re working with a client who offers luxury airport transfers – their ideal consumer would be someone who earns a medium to high income, or who travels frequently for business.

Once you have a good idea of who the consumer is in terms of their demographics, it’s important to consider how your product or service will fit into their lifestyle. How and when will they use the product or service? What features are going to be the most appealing to them? What media platforms do they turn to for information? Do they read the newspaper, search online or attend particular events?

If you can answer all of these questions, you’ll have a much better understanding of the kind of consumer your client should be targeting.

PR is an industry that flourishes by staying on top of the latest trends and technology. To make sure you’re prepared for what this year will have to offer, check out our Five exciting predictions for the PR industry in 2019.