When NOT to Go With Your Gut
Thursday, February 21st, 2008
Tailored targeting based on gut feelings and assumptions is all too common and, unfortunately, typically fails. You don’t have to be a marketing expert to know the more that you personalize your approach to your prospect, the more they’ll prefer your brand. And, what does that equal? More sales.
Companies that truly succeed at market segmentation use strategies built on facts — facts derived from solid segmentation studies. These studies explore many different variables to provide a host of insights including:
- the most promising segments on which you should focus your efforts
- the characteristics of those segments
- their buying and usage behaviors and preferences
- which of your offerings will likely appeal most to them
- the value propositions that best resonate with them
- the most effective marketing messages and tactics
Your research partner will help you structure the study to ensure the segments it explores are:
- identifiable,?? they have differing attributes that can actually be measured
- accessible,?? they can be reached through available marketing channels
- substantial,?? they are large enough to justify your dedicated resources
- unique,?? they are different enough to make segmentation practical
- durable,?? they change infrequently, thus minimizing your investment as much as possible
Like other types of studies, segmentation research requires expert analyses by a research firm, to deliver meaningful segmentation results. Certainly, it can be more expensive to slice your target into multiple segments and market to them each differently. But, it enables you to be highly relevant to your target audiences. And that means you’ll always hit the bulls eye!
