Knowing Your Target Audience & Being Realistic About Who They Are

Knowing who your target audience is, isn’t always as cut and dry as one may think. Here at Epic we’ve noticed many of our clients had an idea of who they thought their target audience might be, but more times than not they were targeting the wrong audience. It’s probably better to say that some of our clients knew who they wanted to target, but their target audience wasn’t necessarily going to be the best audience to grow their business.

When it comes to marketing your business, it takes time and—yikes—money. If marketing was fast and free, there wouldn’t be professionals who know and specialize in marketing—like us! In order to fully understand who your target audience is, you need to address and identify where you want your business to go. What are the goals for your business? Do you want to bring in more new clients? Do you want to increase your annual revenue? Having solid answers for these questions will allow you to know which audience to target.

For example, if your business goal is to be the top healthy living weight loss clinic, your target audience will be different than if your goal is to double the amount of new patients you see each month. The target audience for weight loss responds differently to marketing than the target audience to drive new patients to your clinic. Clearly defining your business goals will determine the best audience for you to target.

Another approach in analyzing the best target audience is to look at your current client base. Determine who your best clients are, which ones pay the highest case fees, and which ones are the most consistent with their treatments. This audience may not be exactly who you had in mind when thinking about how to market your clinic, but this audience already has a proven track record with your clinic. This may be the best audience to target for your business to grow.

Once you’ve narrowed down the goals you want to accomplish through marketing, and have a good idea of who your target audience is going to be to make that happen, you’re off to a good start. That’s right, this is just the beginning of the marketing process, now comes the task of figuring out how to connect to your target audience. The ultimate goal is to reach them in such a way that they believe in what you’re offering, feel they need it and want to pay for it.

Target audiences are tricky because they identify with and react to different types of marketing and advertising. However, effective targeting of the audience that will help you to meet your business goals will help your business to grow. So in short, first identify where you want your business to be in a month, six months, a year. Second, identify the patients/clients that are most likely going to make this happen. Third, start figuring out what is the best way to reach them so that they’ll do business with you. And finally, keep in mind that if this all seems a little overwhelming to you, we’re here to help.