Target Audience Identification and Segmentation in Digital Marketing

Do you buy dog food even if you don’t own a dog? No, you don’t. You count yourself lucky that it’s one less monthly expense.  

The point is that if you’re marketing your product not everyone is supposed to want to buy your product. 

Even for those products — like toothpaste — that everyone needs, not everyone will end up needing the same toothpaste brand. A 12-year-old has no need for toothpaste with extra whitening strength. 

In digital marketing, knowing your target audience is one of the first steps in virtually any process. Whether you’re designing a single element like a logo, crafting an email drip campaign, or building an entire brand from scratch, target audience identification is crucial.

What is a Target Audience Exactly?

A target audience is a specific group of consumers identified as the intended recipient of a marketing message or product. 

These are the people who are most likely to be interested in and benefit from your product or service. Identifying the target audience involves analyzing various factors such as demographics, interests, behaviors, and needs. This focused approach ensures that marketing efforts are efficient and effective, resonating with those who are most likely to convert into customers. 

Knowing your target audience helps in tailoring messages, choosing the right marketing channels, and ultimately driving better results for your business.

An Overview of Market Segmentation

One of the main reasons why it’s so essential to do thorough target audience research is that it enables you to leverage market segmentation. Market segmentation is a powerful strategy, commonly used with email marketing, that divides a broad target market into subsets of consumers who share common traits like: 

• Needs
• Interests
• Priorities 

After dividing your target audience into these smaller groups, you’ll then tailor your marketing efforts to each specific segment. This way, you can create more targeted campaigns that speak to the specific needs and desires of each segment. 

The result: 

• Increased engagement
• Deeper customer relationships
• Higher conversion rates 

There are four types of market segmentation. These are:

Demographic segmentation

Demographic segmentation is perhaps the most straightforward form of market segmentation. Put simply, it tells you who your customer is. Applying this strategy, you’ll categorize audience members based on objective criteria such as: 

• Age
• Gender
• Income
• Education level
• Occupation 

As it’s more straightforward to identify the criteria, this type of segmentation is often the starting point for businesses. It also typically has a more direct influence on purchasing behavior. 

Here’s what it will look like in practice: 

Let’s say you’re a luxury skincare brand. In this case, you’ll likely target women older than 30 from a higher income bracket. You’ll create more premium marketing messages that resonate with this segment’s specific skincare concerns like the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles. 

Psychographic segmentation

Psychographic segmentation tells you why audience members buy. Using this segmentation approach, you’ll divide your broader target market based on criteria like: 

• Social class 
• Lifestyle 
• Personality traits

Your goal is to understand the intrinsic factors that influence a buyer's decisions such as: 

• Values
• Beliefs 
• Interests
• Attitudes 

Let’s use the example of a luxury skincare brand again. If you find that there’s a substantial percentage of audience members that value sustainability, you can adjust your marketing messaging to emphasize your brand's commitment to the environment, for example.

A personal care brand like Meow Meow Tweet does exactly this. As all their products are vegan, they specifically target consumers who value sustainability. 

Geographic segmentation

Geographic segmentation involves dividing the market based on location. You can choose to keep it broader and segment based on country or take a more focused approach using the region, city or even neighborhood. 

Needless to say, if you don’t have a global audience, segmenting it according to country will be futile. In this case, you’ll need to take a more granular approach and segment it according to region or get even more location specific.  

This type of segmentation works because it allows businesses to cater to: 

• Location-specific preferences and needs
• Weather conditions
• Cultural factors

For example, a global skincare brand can use geographic segmentation to market sunscreens to email subscribers who are currently bracing for summer. Sure, we’re supposed to wear sunscreen every day. But, let’s face it, who buys sunscreen in the middle of winter? 

Behavioral segmentation

Behavioral segmentation looks at patterns of behavior displayed by customers as they interact with a company or make purchasing decisions. It’s especially crucial for email marketing.

 It divides consumers based on criteria like: 

• Product knowledge
• Brand attitude
• Engagement with previous marketing campaigns
• Purchase history
• Website browsing patterns

For instance, the skincare brand might identify a segment of customers who religiously use their daily moisturizer. Special promotions, loyalty programs, and affiliate marketing can be used to reward, retain, and leverage these valuable customers.

That’s what Natura Bissé, an online skincare shop that specializes in luxury skincare products did. Using GetResponse, they apply behavioral segmentation by looking at the benefits that customers are searching for (aka the needs they’re looking to solve). 

For example, for customers looking for an anti-aging solution, their marketing campaigns look at the clinical results of their anti-aging creams. On the other hand, customers looking for an even-toned complexion, receive messages that focus on products with vitamin C and botanical extracts that can reduce dark spots. 

How to Apply Audience Segmentation

1. Gather data 

Source: linkedin.com

Data is foundational to effective audience segmentation. It’s the first step to understanding your audience. When analyzed further, it will reveal patterns and trends that can impact your segmentation. 

For best results, ensure that you gather data from various sources such as:

• Website analytics
• Social media insights
• Customer feedback, reviews and testimonials
• Surveys
• Interviews
• Focus groups
• A customer relationship management system (CRM)
• A market research agency

You want to focus on getting quantitative as well as qualitative insights. 

In other words, you want to get objective numbers like their average income, age, who knows, maybe even weight. 

Just as important is to look beyond the numbers and gather insight into customer sentiment and attitudes. For example, they might take away a six-figure salary, but what is their attitude towards money? According to their driver’s license they might be in their late 40s, but do they feel like they’re nearing 50 or closer to 21?

Try to collect both first-party (data collected directly from your customers) as well as third-party data. Not only is first-party data extremely useful for marketing campaigns going forward, but it also allows you to get answers to specific questions. Plus, having data from two different sources makes it easier to compare the accuracy. 

Define your segments

Use the data gathered to define clear segments within your audience. This could be based on any combination of demographic, behavioral, geographic, or psychographic criteria discussed earlier. 

For each segment, create a detailed profile. In short, it’s a summary that highlights their demographics, problems, and interests. This will help you to understand how to communicate with the different segments appropriately and effectively. 

Here’s an example of what a profile can look like:

Profile Name: Busy Mothers 

Demographics:

• Age: 25-45
• Gender: Female
• Income: $50,000 - $100,000
• Education Level: Bachelor’s Degree and above

Geographics:

• Urban areas
• Major cities

Psychographics:

• Values efficiency and convenience
• Health-conscious and prefers quick, healthy meal options

Behaviors:

• Frequently shops online
• Prefers mobile shopping apps
• Loyal to brands that offer easy returns and fast shipping

Apple only selling the budget MacBook Air through Walmart is savvy customer segmentation

people who are seeking to buy an Apple product go straight to them; people who could be swayed but are budget conscious go to Walmart

don't lose premium sales from Group A pic.twitter.com/uNfpnj00EL

— Kyle Russell (@kylebrussell) March 15, 2024

Customize your messaging 

Using the customer profile that you’ve created for each segment, you can now tailor your marketing messages. In addition to the actual wording, also consider the offer (aka content). 

For example, using data about customer interactions and purchase history, you can apply behavioral segmentation and highlight products that will complement a recent purchase. 

Let’s say the customer bought a daily moisturizer. In this case, sending a follow-up email suggesting a night cream to improve the results will get their attention, especially if you’re marketing to an older segment. 

For example, Hers, sends a follow-up email 21 days after a customer starts with a new skincare routine detailing what they can expect. 

Source: reallygoodemails.com

When looking at purchase history, you can also zoom in on buying frequency, especially for everyday consumables. If a jar of facial cream is supposed to last 30 days, consider sending a reminder 25 days after the previous jar was bought with an exclusive discount to build customer loyalty.   

In addition to using dynamic content in your emails, you can also incorporate it into your website and social media channels to display messages based on variables like buyer behavior or geographical location. 

For example, new website visitors might receive a welcome message along with suggestions for where to start their browsing journey. That said, for returning visitors, you can still display a “welcome” message. However, in this case, you’ll customize messaging to a “welcome back” and perhaps a call to action to continue where they stopped or to check out the new content which has been added since their last visit.

Chubbies, one of the best eCommerce website design examples, for instance, shows a customized popup to website visitors based outside the US to inform them about their international shipping options.  

Source: chubbiesshorts.com

Test and learn; review and adjust

For each different segment, you should implement targeted marketing strategies. Then, test each marketing strategy using A/B testing to see which works best. Based on the results, you can refine your approach accordingly.   

A/B testing, also known as split testing, is a method of comparing two versions of a marketing message to determine which one performs better. Here’s how to implement A/B testing effectively:

• Identify the goal of your marketing message, for example to improve open rates, generate more clicks, etc. 
• Create two different versions of your marketing message by changing an element like the subject line or heading, call-to-action prompt, layout, or images 
• Send each version to a randomly selected segment of your audience
• Use analytics tools to measure the performance of each version
• Use the insights gained from your A/B test to refine your marketing message and apply the winning elements to future campaigns

Digital Marketing Tools for Audience Analysis and Segmentation

Google Analytics

Google Analytics 4 (GA4) is one of the most powerful tools for segmentation. It has a segment builder that you can use to create subsets of: 

• Users (users who’ve already engaged with your website or app like potential customers who abandoned their carts, for example)
• Sessions (for example, sessions that came from a specific ad campaign)
• Events (for example, purchases made in a specific location) 

When creating a segment, you can:

• Create a custom segment using your own parameters
• Use a suggested segment based on common uses cases that you can then adapt to your needs
• Select a specific data point in your visualization

Facebook Audience Insights 

For demographic and interest data, you can check out Facebook Audience Insights. It offers demographic data about: 

• People connected to your page
• People on Facebook

Examples of the data you can get include:

• Age
• Gender
• Education levels
• Job titles
• Relationship status
• Interests
• Hobbies
• Location

Case Studies: Successful Engagement of Target Audience Segments

Apple Music

Music is highly personal. Apple Music acknowledges this by suggesting music genres and artists based on past streaming behavior. Aside from using behavioral segmentation, it also applies geographic segmentation and shares location-specific playlists. 

Netflix

Netflix takes a similar approach to Apple Music. Using subscribers’ viewing habits, it customizes content recommendations. This way, the chances that they’ll quickly find a show they like is much higher, reducing the chance that they’ll hop to another streaming service like Apple TV+.  

Coca-Cola

Coca-Cola’s iconic “Share a Coke” campaign remains one of the best examples of how to apply customer segmentation. By replacing its logo with some of the most popular first names among teenagers and millennials, it could appeal to its younger segment. 

Aside from using age, it also used location. The campaign was also launched in countries like Australia, South Africa, and Chile, with the names adjusted to fit these specific locations. 

For example, for the campaign launched in South Africa, it also added the phonetic version/pronunciation of names. This way, they could drive even deeper engagement.

Amazon

For an example of how to apply behavioral segmentation, Amazon serves as one of the best examples. Using purchase behavior and browsing history, it customizes its recommendations.  

TLDR: The Synergy of Target Audience Identification and Market Segmentation in Digital Marketing

Staying ahead of the curve means mastering the art of knowing who your audience is and how to reach them effectively. Two concepts central to this are target audience identification and market segmentation.

In digital marketing, mastering audience identification and market segmentation can make the difference between a good campaign and a great one. By understanding who your audience is and how to segment them effectively, you can create more personalized, engaging, and successful content. This will lead to higher conversion rates. 

Plus, thanks to the stronger connection customers develop towards your brand, they’re also more likely to return. This way, you can also optimize your ad spend as you know which segments are more likely to convert. 

Yes, it takes more work. The rewards, though, are worth the effort. 

About the Author

Koba Molenaar

Writer

Koba Molenaar brings nearly a decade of rich experience in content writing, specializing in digital marketing, branding, SaaS, and eCommerce. Her passion for helping brands, from solopreneurs to established companies, connect with their audiences shines through her work. As a member of the Golden Key International Honor Society, Koba’s commitment to excellence is evident in her work, showcasing her as a relatable and knowledgeable voice in the industry.