Mapping target groups? This is how you do it!

It probably won't surprise you: we love digital craft. What do you need to put a craft into action? Exactly, tools! Our tool is the Sterce Model. In this section, we walk through the entire model with you.

Our first three blogs in this section dealt with the internal analysis of an organisation, the first part of our model. Now we are down to the external analysis of an organisation. Where the internal analysis results in a strengths and weaknesses analysis the external analysis results in an opportunities and threats analysis. The first part is about the target group.

A target group is a group of potential customers - who in many cases will have specific similarities - that an organisation targets. In this blog, we will assume that you have already identified the target group, but have not yet fully mapped it. So how do you map it out? Let's take a look at the concepts of segmentation, funnels, AIDA, persona, unique buying reasons and customer journeys.

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Segmenting

What is segmenting? Segmenting is dividing a market into different groups (segments). You do so by classifying potential visitors according to specific characteristics. After all, everyone reacts differently and it makes sense to map that behaviour, or at least predict it. Segments are created for this purpose, based on geography, sociography, psychology and much more. This is how you decide which style to use and how to address that particular visitor. 

Funnels

A typical funnel (Dutch: trechter) metaphorically represents the steps a person goes through from getting to know your brand to brand ambassadors. There is a large number of people who are familiar with your brand (awareness), but a smaller number who have actually considered doing something with your brand (consideration). Even a smaller proportion have actually bought a product (conversion) and of all those buyers, only a proportion buy repeatedly (loyalty). As a final part, you then have to deal with loyal buyers who also shout from the rooftops that others should buy your brand (ambassadorship).  

All nice and well, but of interest is what this means for a target audience. At each stage of the funnel, you approach the target group differently. Do you approach the target group in the awareness phase via Adwords, then approach them in the conversion phase via e-mail, in the loyalty phase via Facebook and in the ambassadorship phase you come to their home with a gift, so to speak.

More about funnels and how to use them read in this blog!

AIDA

Not insignificantly, there are many funnels. Another commonly used example is the funnel of the AIDA model: attention, interest, desire and action. We will use this later when translating it to the website.

• Attention represents the attention you attract or want to attract from your visitors. How do we make sure the visitor notices my product or service?
• Interest stands for the interest you generate from the visitor. How do we bring our product or service into the mind of our visitor in a positive way?
• Desire stands for actually preferring your product or service to other products and services. We often approach this from the perspective of benefits. How do I convey to the visitor that we have greater benefits than anyone else?
• Action stands for actually buying or taking your product or service. On a website, we usually see this as a conversion: a completed contact form, a phone call or a model/brochure downloaded. We can measure all these conversions for you!

Persona

Okay, so you've now mapped out the funnel for your organisation. Now it's time to create different personas in those funnels. A persona is a representation of your target audience in a persona description. On Facebook and through Google Analytics, you can already collect a lot of data to create a persona. This helps you keep an overview of the different target groups in different situations. This makes it a lot easier to communicate specifically to a target group and makes it easier to solve the problem of the consumer or organisation.

For example, a persona describes the profession and position, demographics (age, gender, salary, education) and possibly even hobbies, interests and values. Most of the data is already in Google Analytics in the form of statistics or declared keywords. To supplement information, you can add Facebook to paint a clear picture of that.

Unique buying reasons

We know what a target audience is, that we can recognise where in the funnel the target audience is and how to target them more specifically. But what does the target group really want? For that, there are unique buying reasons (also called Unique Buying Reasons). You probably know your brand's Unique Selling Points. UBRs are almost the same, but they focus on the customer. What does the brand have to have to be bought by me? This will differ for each persona, which is why you can use this question to create a clear format with what you need to target to appeal to that persona.

How do we then classify those reasons?

We distinguish herein functional reasons, emotional reasons, economic reasons, symbolic reasons and final reasons. 

• Functional reasons: all reasons related to problem solving, e.g. faster, better, easier, more comprehensive or more beautiful.
• Emotional reasons: all reasons related to intuition-based decision-making processes, e.g. appreciation, surprise, pleasure, relaxation or stress reduction.
• Economic reasons: all reasons related to financial benefits, e.g. saving time, value of possession and value of relationship.
• Symbolic reasons: all reasons related to symbolism, e.g. conferring status, social acceptance and CSR.
• Final reasons: all reasons related to self-fulfilment, e.g. independence, wealth, health and eternal youth.

Customer journey

A customer journey illustrates what a customer does and experiences in the process of becoming aware and buying a product or service. A customer goes on an adventure and encounters different situations. Set a goal - for example, "I want a responsive website." - and you can probably already imagine that there are several steps to overcome in this adventure. Mapping the customer journey provides a better understanding of the context for designers and developers and clearly shows how the previous funnel is or will be filled in practice.

To illustrate, I like to discuss a simplified example about Company X. Company X wants a responsive website. The journey then looks like this, for example. 

Pre-engagement:

1) Marketing Manager Oscar reads in the data of a survey conducted that Company X's website is not performing effectively enough.

2) Oscar then discusses this with his team and finds out that many visitors do leave the site without interacting with the website on a mobile phone.

3) Oscar tests the website on his phone and finds out that the website is displayed all wrong and you can read everything badly.

4) Oscar searches on Google for the underlying reason and finds that websites nowadays need to be fully responsive to keep meeting the needs of different devices.

Commercial:

5) After doing some reading, Oscar sees Sterc's Adwords campaign and clicks on the URL.

6) Oscar discusses the information with his team and decides to fill out a contact page.

7) A phone call follows.  

Consultation:

8) Not much later, an introductory session is scheduled in which Sterc and Company X find out that they can both help each other.

9), 10), 11) Several sessions are held to do the internal and external analysis for Company X.

Initiation:

12) Several of the sessions determine where Company X can focus and how it can position itself.

Process:

13) Eventually this leads to the translating sessions and 14) achieving sessions.

Completion:

15) Finally, the website is ready and we will review results with Oscar.

Retention

16) Oscar is so happy with his new website that he will come back to Sterc. 

17) He asks for guidance on how to achieve his goals. So we continue to have 'touch points' in the form of email marketing, dashboarding and social media. 

Conclusion

Analysing your target audience - from the funnel of buying processes to the entire customer journey reveals what you as an organisation need to focus on in all its facets. Ultimately, you create the website, tool or app for a user. If you do not focus on them, it is logical that your communications will not have the desired effect.