How to understand the target audience in your business and formulate a USP?

Knowing your audience and having a unique sales offer allows you to attract only those who need your products and are willing to pay for them. How to come to mutual benefit — we will understand in this article.

Why do I need to know my target audience?

Target audience (CA) — a group of people with common characteristics and needs that advertising activities are aimed at. It has highlighted:

• demographic indicators (gender, age, family status);
• geo-location (city, district);
• problems and tasks (buy high-quality children’s products, help with selection);
• social characteristics (nature and schedule of work, environment, financial situation);
• behavioral characteristics (how they make a purchase decision, what devices they use when making payments).

By selling to everyone instead of your audience, you won’t be able to:

• determine which items will be most in demand;
• develop a strong, specific USP;
• launch word of mouth,
• use your advertising budget effectively.

Central Asia is heterogeneous. You need to segment your customers into narrower groups and correctly build positioning — select arguments for each segment why it is better for the client to choose you, and not competitors. In addition to segments, the audience can be divided into cohorts — these are groups of people who have performed or can perform the same action in a given period of time.

In 2005, we decided for ourselves which target audience we want to sell to. Our target audience is educated young parents who want to buy high-quality and tested products for newborns. These are fashionable young mothers, adherents of organic views, who have received a higher education and are engaged in creative activities: writers, architects, designers, etc. These are mothers who want everything to be beautiful around them. It doesn’t matter if it’s a feeding bottle, a dress, or a closet. And they are also mothers who very carefully approach the choice of goods for their unborn child, for whom any nuances are important.

You need to understand which client you are willing to work with, because there is too much separation between the economy and premium segments right now. If earlier there was an average plus segment, now there is almost no such client. I don’t like working with the economy segment, because I can’t sell just to sell something. We can only sell what we really like.

You can build your positioning based more on the general portrait of the target audience, or you can build it based on the tasks that you help the client solve. So-called jobs to be done — “jobs that need to be done” and for which you” hire ” the product.

When studying the audience, we went from the opposite — from the product. We had a product that we genuinely liked ourselves, and the task was to find an audience that would want to buy it. A more ambitious task was to influence the tastes of consumers and make them like our products with the help of a lot of viewing. Of course, over time, the buyer’s profile was formed, but we started without it.

Ulana Kolesov,

co-founder of the concept store for children and parents Bunny Hill

When going to a children’s goods store, the buyer may want to:

• update your children’s wardrobe for the new season;
• buy school supplies;
• choose a toy as a gift.

For different audience segments, different tasks may be relevant — You need to have a good understanding of what exactly you are selling and to whom.

How to find a USP

At the previous stage, you were immersed in the context and got a set of problems. Further, with this in mind, think about debugging: what is so unique that you can offer the client?

A unique sales offer (USP) is a succinctly formulated reason why the client should choose you, and not competitors.

What can you deduce a unique sales offer from?

• Cost of goods
  – average receipt;
  – nth item as a gift;
  – discounts for regular customers, especially unexpected ones;
  – regular promotions.
• Quality of services in relation to price
  – guarantees of any kind, for example, an additional guarantee for clothing and shoes of certain brands.
  – natural materials.
• Service level
  – speed of service;
  – courtesy and care of staff;
  – professionalism of consultants;
  – the overall atmosphere of the store.
  – compliments (purchase gifts, treats for children, etc.);
  – client days.
• Location of the store
  – proximity to a transport interchange;
  – availability of Parking.
• Working hours
  – work during hours when no one else is working.

For customers in the online store, we have such a service as a vishlist. The expectant mother can add her favorite products to the list of desired purchases on the site and then send them by email to her friends and relatives. Items that someone has already selected as a gift will be removed from the list. Thus, this tool eliminates situations when the mother receives identical or useless gifts for the birth of the baby. We created the vishlist in 2006. I looked up the idea in one of the Italian children’s stores and implemented it here. Then this offer existed offline. A signed envelope containing a handwritten list of desired gifts could be left at the checkout counter of the store. Friends and relatives of the expectant mother came to our store, found the right envelope and chose something from the list. Purchased items were crossed out in the vishlist.

An entrepreneur should notice everything that can be useful to his audience. Even if someone else came up with it before you, you should definitely use it.

Market analysis is generous with hints: even if it seems that there is simply nothing to stand out for right now, the USP can be deduced from the neutral characteristics of the business — so far, this has not been done by competitors.

For example, you order children’s items that are combined with each other so that the buyer can choose a set. Many stores do this. Turn a fact into a positive revelation: let consultants tell you how to create images, put matching sets on mannequins, and post photos of ready — made images on the store’s social networks.

1. Use the castdev results

Problem-solving interviews, rather than problem-contextual ones, will help you formulate and test the USP in practice. They can be used to test hypotheses of solutions.

Starting from a set of customer problems, you develop a solution hypothesis — what you want to offer and at what price. Come with this to the same 50 clients and try to sell the product directly at the interview. If it doesn’t sell, adjust your hypothesis or formulate a new one and go back to getting feedback from the market. And so on until you find a working offer.

It is important to try to sell a product or service, because the non-binding question ” Well, how do you like this offer?” customers can respond positively out of politeness. And in the process of selling, real objections will pop up. For example, a high price, which will indicate either that the prices are really inflated, or that the respondents are not your target audience.

In the case of a children’s goods store, some hypotheses can only be tested by practice. But you can use indirect sales: launch lead forms in social networks, create a landing page with a special offer, or create an Instagram account with professional photos of your products. The point is to see the response to the offer. But you will get the real picture only after opening the store.

How to test hypotheses

A hypothesis is an assumption based on available data that can be confirmed or disproved. There is no recipe for an ideal USP, so it is better to deduce several hypotheses and test them in practice. And the faster, the better.

The problem and solution must be “hard-wired” in the hypothesis. For example, you formulated the following hypothesis:

Equipment for the children’s corner in the store hall will generate 100% more revenue.

Fifty of your respondents are likely to be divided into several segments. For example, you talked to women aged 25-40. It turned out that among them there are mothers who stay at home with their children, and there are mothers who go to work. You test the hypothesis on one segment and on another.

In the case of this hypothesis, the following can happen.

1. You suggested that each of the segments use the service of a children’s play area in the store hall.
2. It turned out that working mothers are not interested in USP. They often go to the store alone after work, and leave their children at home with nannies. At the same time, the extra noise in the hall only annoys them.
3. You noticed that mothers who stay at home with their children were more interested than others. At the same time, they are also afraid of strong noise in the sales hall, since they often come to the store with strollers, where the youngest child sleeps. You have brought out a new offer: a children’s playroom in the next room with an animator who will entertain the children while you shop.
4. We conducted an interview with the same segment again and found out that the new hypothesis works better
5. You check whether the offer works for a cooler audience. Search for similar moms, conduct interviews, and launch a survey in social networks and a test advertising campaign.
6. The results showed that the segment is interested in the service and that it seems big. You finalize the USP in the form of the slogan “Shop while your children are under supervision” and open the store.

In the future, you can select and find several more close segments and formulate separate USPS for them.

2. Use the Osterwalder Value proposition template

The second approach to USP development is the method of business model specialist Alex Osterwalder. It is useful to use both approaches.

The USP should make it clear which customer problem you are solving and how exactly you are doing it. Osterwalder identifies the following types of consumer problems::

• Unwanted results and properties

It’s hard to find the right size of clothes and shoes

All the shops near the house sell the same toys

Textiles from massmarket quickly lose their color after washing and wear out

• Obstacles

No time to go shopping

I don’t know how to choose children’s things so that they fit together

The shops I like are far from my home

• Risks

If I go to the store for winter shoes in the middle of the season, I won’t find the right size, or I’ll find that only the most expensive models are left.

I’m afraid that cheap goods from stores will quickly fall into disrepair

The main tasks of customers that they want to close in your store (the same JTBD) can be:

• Functional ones

Buy warm baby clothes for winter

• Social services

Buy your child toys that his friends have, so that he does not feel left out

• Emotional ones

Please your child with new things

Let’s fill out the Osterwalder template using the example of a home improvement store.

Review and update the template regularly to ensure that::

• find new segments and corresponding USPS;
• adjust your brand and marketing strategy;
• notice indirect competitors (for example, those who resell products via Instagram);
• plan ad campaigns.

Formulas-hints for creating a USP

You can create a unique offer using one of these templates.

“A product without something that causes fear in the buyer”

Children’s products are only made from natural materials. It works if your audience is willing to pay more for natural ingredients.

“If… then…”

This structure is used to promise guarantees: “If a battery-powered toy stops working in the first six months, we will refund the money.”

“Familiar product + additional benefits”

It is important that the benefits are not far-fetched, but based on the needs of the target audience. For example, a shoe care kit as a gift for buying shoes.

“Product + Feature”

The unique is contained in the product itself, a certain exceptional property. For example, a winter jacket that does not require additional insulation.

“For”

Specify a specific audience segment ― budget products for the whole family.

“Exclusivity”

Assumes that the product is available only to you ― the only distributor of a premium brand of shoes in the city.

The main thing

1. Study your target audience. Segment your customers into narrower groups and find arguments for each of them why they should choose you over their competitors.
2. Build your positioning based on the general portrait of the target audience or on the tasks that you help the client solve.
3. A unique sales offer (USP) can be derived from the cost of the product, the quality of the product in relation to the price, the level of service, the location of the store, and the operating mode.
4. Use the castdev results. Problem-solving interviews will help you test the USP in practice. Starting from a set of customer problems, develop a solution hypothesis — what you want to offer and at what price.
5. There is no recipe for an ideal USP, so make a few hypotheses and test them in practice. The problem and solution must be “hard-wired” in the hypothesis.
6. Use the Osterwalder value proposition template, as well as hint formulas, to create a USP.

get a free consultation from a marketer on promotion and marketing – go