©iStock.com/weareadventurers
Good content isn’t good content unless it reaches the right people.
Audience relevance, along with quality web content and social media engagement, is an important part of an effective content marketing strategy.
The best content out there is like a finely tuned instrument–it hits all of the right notes with its target audience.
Unfortunately, there are many content writers who ignore audience analysis. As a result, their content is geared towards everybody and nobody.
A surprising number of content creators give little thought to their audience. They either create content that they themselves find interesting, or they mimic the content that they see others creating.
The hit or miss approach to content creation is no longer effective. To be effective, your content needs to be relevant and meaningful to the right people.
Who Is Your Audience?
Before you can make your content relevant, you must understand who you are writing for.
Do you know who your audience is? The answers to these questions can help you find out:
- Why are you writing? Are you writing to attract new customers for your business? Are you trying to establish yourself as a subject matter expert? Are you trying to create a news site? Your content should vary based on your purpose for creating it.
- Who is your current audience? Many content creators already have an audience–the wrong one. Even if you are writing to the wrong audience, it’s still important to find out who is reading your writing and how their interests differ from the interests of your ideal audience.
- Who is your ideal audience? Create a picture of the audience who will best help you achieve your purpose for writing. Are they customers and future customers for your business? How old are they? Where do they live? What do they like?
If you can answer these questions, you should be able to create relevant content. Now all you have to do is get it to your audience.
Reach Out to Your Target Audience
There are a number of ways to reach out to your target audience. Here are some of them:
- Connect through social media.Now that you know who you are trying to reach, you can connect with them through social media. As your social media connection, they are more likely to see your social media shares.
- Communicate with key influencers. You can also communicate directly with key influencers for your target market through email or social media. Be careful not to overshare. Respect their time.
- Use targeted guest posting. By publishing content on websites that your target audience already reads, you can get their attention. Be sure each guest post is your best work.
Your Turn
How do you reach the right audience for your content?
Share your tips in the comments.
7 responses so far ↓
1 Kristen Eckstein // Oct 4, 2013 at
Great intro to finding a target audience! One of my favorite tips is to know who hangs out where. Each social media system attracts a different type of audience, so knowing who you should be reaching combined with hanging out where they hang out creates a huge win. I go a lot more in-depth on this in my e-book Author’s Quick Guide to Finding Your Target Market… (you’ve been reading my hard drive again Penny!) 😉 You can find that & all my other Quick Guides at http://KristenOnAmazon.com.
2 Laura Spencer // Oct 7, 2013 at
Kristen Eckstein–Glad you liked the post. Thanks for adding your own tips. 🙂
3 Kathy Steinemann // Oct 4, 2013 at
Thank you, Laura.
“Even if you are writing to the wrong audience, it’s still important to find out who is reading your writing and how their interests differ from the interests of your ideal audience.”
That’s an interesting point. If you determine who makes up that wrong audience, do you fine tune your writing to gain similar readers?
4 Laura Spencer // Oct 7, 2013 at
Kathy Steinemann,
Thanks for the question. Often writers reach the wrong audience because they haven’t really taken the time to find out about their intended audience and/or they haven’t put a lot of thought into how their writing will reach their intended audience.
I guess the short answer to your question then is to know your audience and be deliberate about reaching them.
5 Best of the Web Book Marketing Tips for the Week of Oct. 7, 2013 | Author Marketing Experts, Inc. // Oct 10, 2013 at
[…] https://www.writingthoughts.com/targeted-audience/ […]
6 Blow-hards, try-hards and reluctant bloggers | marymimsm // Nov 18, 2015 at
[…] your audience is essential for successful blogging. This short post about writing for an audience raises three simple questions: why are you writing, who is your current audience, and who is your […]
7 Connecting with customers | reneepaige // Dec 6, 2015 at
[…] Culnan, McHugh and Zubillaga (2010) identified three effective elements of social media implementation: the need to match your adoption of platforms to your culture, your customers, and business objectives. Continually updating and providing content and monitoring and reviewing these channels allows you to understand and gain insights into your customers. The need to understand your audiences is essential to social media is discussed in a blog by Spencer (2013). […]