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Choosing Your Target Audience | Is Your Organization a Lighthouse or a Laser?

As we consume our days working to strengthen our brand and build trust with our customers and partners, we often view our organizations like a lighthouse—a beacon of light in the darkness, guiding for all to see.

Over the last few years, COVID-19 has highlighted several false narratives. One such story is the value of building, maintaining, and preserving our organizations as lighthouses. We have made dangerous presuppositions about the certainty of our world and businesses. Despite all of our endeavours to build robust strategies, we have forgotten that lighthouses can only tell you where not to go without providing any kind of precise direction.

As the new year approaches, it’s time for leaders to recognize that there is no absolute certainty. It’s time to start operating with precision and with deliberate direction—like a laser.

Defining your business as a lighthouse or a laser boils down to implementing the right strategy. From marketing initiatives to business culture, organizational transformation is necessary to transition away from the lighthouse mentality.

In this article, we’ll discuss how defining the right target audience is the first step in shifting your organization in the right direction. Keep reading to learn more! 

A Laser-Focused Outlook

When you think about your target audience, do you think like a lighthouse or a laser? Are you still trying to reach everyone with one messaging tactic? Are you sending your light far and wide like a lighthouse, or are you pinpointed and focused like a laser?

These crucial questions can help you determine if your organization is on the path to success. You have undoubtedly heard, “you can’t be everything to everybody,” and this is especially true when it comes to marketing. You might think hitting everybody with your messaging is a good marketing strategy, but instead, it only weakens your message. 

The Benefits of Knowing Your Target Audience

Understanding your target audience is vital. This information will define every marketing plan and strategy you execute throughout every level of your organization.

Knowing your target audience might mean your marketing efforts are seen by fewer people, but it ensures it’s being seen by the right people. Additional benefits of knowing your target audience include:

  • You’re better able to maximize your time & resources 
  • You can successfully position your organization in the competitive landscape
  • A clear road map can determine whether or not investors buy-in
  • It guides your organization as a whole

How to Find Your Target Audience 

Now that you know the benefits of knowing your target audience, how do you go about identifying the right audience for your organization?

Here are 7 ways to determine your target audience:

  1. Analyze your current customer base
  2. Conduct market research & identify industry trends
  3. Analyze your competitors
  4. Define who your target audience isn’t
  5. Rely on data & software 

Find the Right Support 

Identifying your target audience is just one of the many steps in creating a clear laser-focused path to guide your organization. To get your organization on track, it’s crucial to look at your organization as a whole, which can be a complex process. 

For most organizations, transformation requires continual adjustments, training, and approaches. If you need help bringing your organization to the next level, our organizational transformation experts at Adocera are always here to help. 

Contact us today or visit our website to learn more about our digital transformation courses and workshops.