MKT/571
Running Head: UNDERSTANDING THE TARGET MARKET 0
Understanding the Targeted Consumers
Regina Snedecor
MKT/571 Marketing Management
March 27, 2017
Heidi Kelley
Understanding the Target Market.
The target market is a market segment that has been intentionally chosen by a business organization to focus their marketing efforts. A company may have several target markets that will have a prominent market offer for each of them. Target marketing involves a three-stage process. The initial step is to outline and profile distinct customer categories (market segments) that may provide feedback to various service and product offerings. The next step is to select one of these market segments for aiming. Finally, you generate positioning strategies that convey unparalleled service or product's benefits, which are pertinent to those target audiences (Wells, (1975). The last two steps need a deep analysis of the two core target market elements: psychographic and demographic analysis.
Demographic analysis
The owners of businesses usually collect demographic information to include in the plans of business used to gather start-up funds and to direct the business launching process. Demographic factors include age, income, gender, race and educational level. Shopping habits, marital status, family celebrations like birthday, the number of children and other facts about the characteristics of the customer. A small business proprietor requires demographics to find the ideal customer for his/her services and products and generate strategies for marketing such as advertisements, pricing, business location and packaging of goods (Wells, (1975). A proprietor who is striving to adjust his/her marketing plan to changing demographics of the country. Might get it important to note that, per a report was done by Nielsen Company in 2010, Hispanic consumers have most of their expenditure resulting from baby items, African American buyers spend more on fragrances and ingredients for cooking at home and Asian-Americans are likely to shop at club stores and eat out.
Age can segment a market per the age of the customers. Its basis is the premise that a client's desires and needs with the change of their age. It classifies the consumer's age into children, teenage, middle-age, and older population. A child will need toys while teenagers will always like being trendy by embracing the latest fashion. For instance; in the United States of America, there are about seventy-six million baby boomers, that is people born between 1946 and 1964. This group forms a vast consumer market as they spent $400 billion more than other groups in 2009. A small business owner can benefit from this category. Income emerges the most valuable tool for market segmentation. The purchasing power of a consumer differs depending on the level of revenue. Based on this variable user are categorized into three groups low-middle and high income. Middle-income consumers will choose to buy durable and medium-priced while low-income consumers buy low-priced good just to satisfy they basic physical needs. The high-come tend to be luxurious like designer clothes (Beal, 2000). The size and number of family members proportionally the rate of consumption. The family size also influences the size of packaging.
Psychographic analysis
Psychographics refers to the personality, lifestyles, and interest of different people. These variables are also called IAO variables because they cover interest, activates, and opinion exploration (Diamond, 2011). Marketers have always considered behaviors, environment, and culture under this clarification. The key variables we can consider is lifestyle personality and motives: motives categorize behavior of consumers based on what compelled the customer to buy the item. The motivation may be health, status, affiliation, personal appearance, and safety. Motive will not only affect the product type bought but also dictates the local outlet choice from which the product obtained; lifestyles divides a consumer market by lifestyle of an individual rooted in the belief that that effect selection of a certain product (Diamond, 2011). When you ask an environmentalist his/her view of an enjoyable holiday, don't be surprised when he tells you the one with a hunting expedition.
Consumer analysis
Analyzing a customer enables a company to identify its potential market segment. The user study gives the basic notions on consumer benefit, market customer and customer profile. The product must render an advantage to the consumer, consumer benefit is proportional to sales and to profit too. Where there is no customer benefit, there is no profit. A client interest is a quality or value that the product offers the customer. The consumer interest is part of the unique selling advantage but not the Unique Selling Advantage (USA). Customers experience two types of benefits: psychological and functional benefits. Practical benefits are quantified in terms of time, duration, money and other physical measures for instance when a product is cheaper than another product, a consumer experiences benefit of money. When a new tool saves a quarter of consumers' time, the benefit is time. Psychological benefits offer the customer a nice feeling like the feeling of power, self-esteem and a pleasant view (Weiner, 1985). For instance, a product which looks beautiful and attractive will raise one's esteem. When a customer pays attention to buy an item, then it is regarded as a high involvement product, but if he pays not too much attention, low involvement product exists (Boyd, & Levy, 1963).
The customer profile is considered in consumer analysis. The client's profile outlines the properties of the user who could gain from your product. Under this, we can examine the characteristics of the customer, the buying process of a client, and market customer. Components include demographic characteristics like 20 to 30 years, healthy and male. Economic characteristics regarding income, geographical characteristics, and special interests. Customer buying process is also a point of focus. A company needs to consider who is making the decision, the season they buy, and how they pay (LaRue, Ivey, & Leonard, 1999).
Environmental scanning
Successful management of organizations relies upon the capability of the seniors to adapt as fast as possible to the external environment that is changing. Brown and Weiner define environmental scanning as "a radar to scan systematically and signal a new, the unexpected, the major and the minor." (Weiner, 1985). An organizational environment comprises of the internal and the external environment which must be scanned to evaluate development and issues which affect the success of an organization. First, the agency should collect information about the world in which it operates, including knowledge of the government, laws, demographic factors like population distribution and size, and economy. Next, the organization should focus on the competitors and lastly it should carry out an internal scan of the environment of the body. Find out the strength and weaknesses of the company. The discussed factors are very crucial in creating a good marketing relationship with the customers. They also enhance the appropriateness of a business strategy in an organization (Beal, 2000).
References
LaRue, D. L., Ivey, J. B., & Leonard, T. M. (1999). U.S. Patent No. 5,953,406. Washington, DC: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.
Beal, R. M. (2000). Competing effectively: environmental scanning, competitive strategy, and organizational performance in small manufacturing firms. Journal of small business management, 38(1), 27.
Boyd, H. W., & Levy, S. J. (1963). New dimension in consumer analysis. Harvard Business Review, 41(6), 129-140.
Diamond, J. (2011). Retail advertising and promotion. Fairchild Books.
Wells, W. D. (1975). Psychographics: A critical review. Journal of Marketing Research, 196-213.
Weiner, B. (1985). An attributional theory of achievement motivation and emotion. Psychological review, 92(4), 548.
