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How Do I Define a Target Audience for My B2B Company?

Laura Ferruggia
January 27, 2017
5 min read
marketing papers on desk
If your marketing plan isn’t working, most of the time it’s because your targeting is too broad, not defined at all, or you’re not targeting the right people. A recent statistic made sense of why so many companies struggle to reach their target audience. Almost half (47%) of businesses who are doing marketing have no defined strategy. Without a strategy in place, any marketing tactics used will likely fall short. If your marketing plan is not generating leads or bringing traffic to your website, you can start by reevaluating your target audience. In this article, we’ll take you through three steps of reevaluating your target audience:
  1. Understand your target market
  2. Define your target audience
  3. Deliver the right content
See if you can answer the questions that follow and if your answers lead you to the kind of person you should be targeting. Let’s get started!

1. How to Understand Your Target Market

To connect with the right audience, you need to first establish your target market. What types of businesses are you trying to attract? Here are the questions you should be asking yourself:
  • What companies make up my best customers?
  • What do they do and who is their clientele?
  • How many employees do they have?
  • What is their annual revenue?
  • Why do they need us?
  • What types of needs do they have?
  • Are they dependent on us?
  • How does our service/product benefit them?
  • Where are they located?
  • Who are the key players in their organization?
After answering these questions, you should be able to create a list of attributes that make up your ideal target market. Now you need to focus on the key players and finding out more about them. These are the people that have an influence in their company’s decisions or are decision makers themselves. If you’re able to, you should contact these people. Ask them questions that will help you get to know them and their role better, including what their pain points are and what they love about your service. With this information, you can now start creating personas and defining your target audience.

2. How to Define Your Target Audience

To understand exactly what your audience is looking for, you will need to identify your target’s pain points and how your company’s product or service can help them. And – Why your customers choose you over the competition. What do they gain by choosing you, and what do you offer that makes your business unique? The best way to get this information is by engaging with your customers. Ask them questions like:
  • What is their role in the company?
  • Where did they come across your product?
  • Why do they use your product?
  • What problems does it solve for them?
  • Why have they chosen you over other options?
With this information, you’ll be able to create buyer personas by categorizing their roles, needs, and buying behaviors. This will make up your target audience.

3. How to Deliver the Right Marketing Message

If you’ve answered the above questions and feel you have been targeting the right audience, your next step is to evaluate your marketing message. If you’ve answered the questions above and now realize you have been targeting the wrong audience, your next step is to start researching more about the audience you just discovered. Get to know the market and define your new target audience. In either situation, your marketing message is the key to success. The foundation of all messaging is your positioning statement.  Work on clearly answering in one sentence to the following questions:
  • What your product or service does
  • Whom it’s meant for
  • The problems it will solve
Once your positioning statement is in place, look at how you can convey that message across all your marketing materials. From your website, to your AdWords copy, to social media posts, your message should remain clear and consistent. Make sure the content you create is educational, valuable, and relevant to the target persona you want to reach. Need help with your marketing efforts? Miles IT helps companies in a variety of industries find their target audience, research their needs, and craft the perfect message to get them to convert. Get in touch with one of our marketing experts today!

Meet Laura Ferruggia

Laura Ferruggia

Laura joined Miles IT in 2014, and in her current role of Marketing Strategy Director, she leads and supports our amazing and multi-talented team in providing high-quality consulting and services. With experience spanning from content writing to web development and paid advertising over 9+ years, Laura is equipped to take a holistic approach when discussing marketing and website solutions with businesses.

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