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Social Media and Your Target Market

So you want to start promoting your business using social media? Slow down – it isn’t as simple as it might at first appear. Too many companies run into a campaign blind. They think that a personal Facebook profile and Twitter account means they understand social media and can use it effectively as a marketing tool. However, while this experience might be of help from a technical standpoint; when it comes to communicating with your target audience, it’s as good as useless. This is the reason many companies feel that employing the assistance of an online marketing company or social media agency is the best route. However, if you want to go it alone, read on.

So how do I get started?

Before you begin, the first thing to consider is your target market. You’ve probably already established this when your business was taking shape, however when it comes to social media, you need to look at your target market in a new light.

Different social demographics use different social media outlets, and for different reasons. While we can safely say that Facebook attracts users of all ages, genders, nationalities and interests (making it a great place to start), Twitter has in general, a much younger user base while the new Google+ currently has many more male than female users.

These of course are only a small number of the social media outlets that are available to use. If you’re unsure of what sites are best suited to your target market, and how to use them, you may benefit from the help of an online marketing company or a specialist social media agency.

What’s next?

It is also important to consider what your target audience are using social media networks for, and how to communicate with your target market in order to gain the best response.

While it can be assumed that nearly everyone uses social media as a communication tool (since essentially, that is what the sites were created for) social media has grown into an apparatus for information, competitions and even gaming. This is where the user demographics start to separate.

It is mostly younger demographics that use social media sites as a gaming platform. If you’re targeting under 18’s you should keep this in mind. Integrating a game into your business Facebook page could gain you many ‘likes’, however if you don’t have the resources to design and implement a game, simply making your page as interactive as possible should gain good results. Try posting polls, quizzes or brainteasers in order to keep your younger audience entertained.

Young adults are more likely to be interested in information or ways to save money. They might want to know about a company’s ethical policies or have questions about other aspects of your business. They may also like reading news or other articles of interest.

When it comes to those of a more mature age, keep in mind that much of your target market might be quite new to technology. They’re unlikely to be interested in gaming, but may very well be interested in factual information and developing a personal relationship with their favourite companies.

However age is only the first step in gauging your target demographic. Other factors to look at include gender, location, salary, marital status and social class.

When you have established these factors the next step is to explore the potential interests of your target demographic. For instance, what television programmes are they likely to watch? Would they prefer reading books or magazines, and what sort of books and magazines? Will they be more concerned with spending or saving? Will they have a lot of free time and what might they enjoy doing in their free time?

Running a successful social media campaign involves a lot more than talking about your company (in fact, doing too much of this could be your downfall). You need to post things of interest to your customers, making this the reason that knowing your target market inside-out is so important.

If you’re struggling to identify your target market, or to use social media to communicate with them effectively, you can get assistance from the professionals. An online marketing company or a specialist social media agency can help you to get the campaign off the ground running and to make a real success of it.

This post was written by James Harper on behalf of Boom Online Marketing. James advises organisations of all sizes on how to get the best return from the internet.