Market segmentation enables marketers to create groups of customers that share one or more key demographics. Identifying key market segments and gaining a deeper understanding of what common ties unite those customers gives marketers great power in their field.
Market segmentation can be described as the practice of splitting up a target market into smaller, distinct, and visible groups. What market segmentation enables marketers to do is create groups of customers that share one or more key demographics. This could be their: needs, hobbies, vocation, income level, gender, or any other behavioral or psychographic metric.
Identifying key market segments and gaining a deeper understanding of what common ties unite those customers gives marketers great power in their field. This information can boost sales, improve product development, and increase the overall effectiveness of marketing campaigns. Knowing what strategy works best for your needs as a business will allow you to develop better product offerings that attract your most sought after customers.
Market segmentation is a powerful way to the unwieldy task of developing an advertising strategy. The benefits provided to companies who employ effective market segmentation strategies include:
What do grocery stores, app developers, and the entertainment industry all have in common? They utilize market segmentation strategies to great effect; building their audiences, improving their customer experiences, and growing their business over time to better accommodate the ever-changing wants and needs of their audiences.
There are four main categories into which we can break down market segmentation. These distinct groups differ in the ways they highlight different parts of the buying process.
Demographic segmentation is a process involving grouping customers together on the basis of shared physical traits, beliefs, or values.
Demographic segments can be broken down along the lines of shared qualities like:
These demographic segments are some of the most visible and crucial of the segment types. Customers have a strong attachment to these facets of their being, and therefore respond strongly to products that match elements of their personal identity. Marketers use these traits to strengthen the effectiveness of their advertising - drawing customers into developing a greater sense of attachment to the brand.
Segmenting customers along their shared economic class or lifestyle gives marketers leverage over their target markets. Health & fitness, environmental consciousness, political activism; these lifestyle interests can be focused on to create powerful and evocative messages. Content that focuses on these meaningful and personal segments is far more engaging to customers than the undifferentiated kind.
As the name would suggest, this form of market splitting takes customers and groups them based on their shared location. Traditionally, most businesses were only capable of operating out of their immediate area, through brick and mortar stores. These days, any business has the capability of reaching customers across the planet - offering products to vast and diverse markets.
Developing unique strategies for marketing to geographically differentiated clients is a crucial activity when managing a global business. Customers in the mid-western United States will have different purchasing behaviors and values than customers in the east coast; and those customers will have greatly different tastes from those of a Chinese or Russian audience. Culture, regional history, language, and the income level of a community must be taken into account when trying to effectively reach a global audience.
This form of segmentation seeks to identify and differentiate customer groups on the basis of shared behaviors. Identifying key purchasing behaviors shared by customers enables marketers to identify how audiences interact with products, marketing, and the brand at large.
Firmographic segmentation is a type of demographic segmentation used by businesses specializing in B2B sales. This activity identifies businesses as clients, and looks to evaluate these potential clients by their size, market, and potential for sales opportunity.
Following these steps will put you on the path towards effectively segmenting your customer base.
The first step to creating meaningful customer segments is to clearly identify the market you’re operating in. This requires you to take an objective look at your business, and to ask yourself questions like:
Choosing from one of the five available market segmentation strategies will give you a jumping off point to craft your marketing plan. A combination of different strategies can also be employed to develop a unique marketing mix; many companies do this in order to diversify their brand and advertise more effectively.
Drafting an effective market strategy requires in-depth knowledge about your customer base. The best way to develop your own strategy is to gather quality data on your markets. Research polls, surveys, focus groups, promotions - these activities can garner both qualitative and quantitative data for your audiences.
After reviewing the data you’ve gathered in step 3, you’re ready to start creating your own customer segments. Identify the share traits you find most attractive for your business, and segment the customers that are the most relevant to your market.
Once your responses have been analyzed and your customers segmented, you’re ready to begin marketing. Test your advertising strategy on concentrated groups of customers - using continual monitoring and conversion tracking to measure the impact of your work. Continual testing is crucial for maintaining a coherent and adaptable market strategy that still works years down the line.
The process of segmenting audiences is not infallible. Creating ineffective, inflexible, or incorrect market segments can hinder your business efforts.
The most common error involves creating segments that miss the mark completely and fail to capture a true representation of your customer’s habits. Be sure to study your markets thoroughly before committing to a strategy.
Keeping your target markets defined and manageable is important for developing an effective strategy; however, beware making segments that are too niche or unsubstantial. Businesses that find themselves in this trap often expend effort and resources on extremely niche audiences that offer little financial return.
As a business grows and develops, so too does their audience - and thereby, their market segment definitions. Companies that are not rigid in their segmentation strategy, and allow themselves to change or adopt new segments over time, often perform far better on the market than their competitors.
Marketing segmentation is a powerful tool for helping brands develop unique strategies; strategies they can use to reach a broader scope of diverse audience members. Segmenting enables better engagement, increases the effectiveness of advertisements, and ultimately leads to the creation of a better product.
Products that are audience tested and built to their specifications will always sell better than those that aren’t. Think about what your business could be doing to more effectively market itself, and commit to making a change.
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