Marketing – Demographics V Psychographics
Your Ideal Target Market
In our opinion its 10% about knowing the Demographic profile and 90% about the Psychographic but what’s the difference?
Demographic Profile
When you identify the physical characteristics, sometimes referred to as a demographic profile of your client, you must have a clear picture in your mind of what your target customer looks like from a physical standpoint. In the future, this information will help you to pinpoint your target customer once you begin marketing to them, making it easier to find them and position your marketing message in front of them. Examples include:
| Age | In general terms, what is the age range that my product or service caters to? Kids? Teens? Adults? Seniors? |
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| Income | How much do they have to make to afford my product? Is this single or double household income? Low? Medium? High? |
| Gender | Does my product or service appeal to men, women, or both? |
| Generation | What is the generation of my customers? Based on the age range I identified, are they baby boomers? GenX? GenY? Where do they stand in the overall family life cycle? |
| Nationality | Is nationality relevant to my product or service? |
| Ethnicity | Is ethnicity relevant to my product or service? |
| Marital Status | Are my customers married? Single? Divorced? |
| Family Size | Does my product or service cater to large or small families? Is family size relevant? |
| Occupation or Industry | Does my product or service appeal to people in a certain occupation, or industry? |
| Religion | Is religion relevant to my product or service? |
| Language | Is language relevant to my product or service? |
| Education | What level of education do my primary customers have? Post-primary? University? |
Psychographic Profile
This defines the emotional make-up of your target customer. This is typically the most important of these two categories to define since prospects buy based on emotion. They only use logic to justify their purchase. This is where you want to identify what we refer to as their “hot buttons.” Hot buttons are the problems, fears, frustrations and concerns most prospects experience when they buy what you sell. You fear pain when going to the dentist. You’re frustrated by the typically long wait time at the doctors. You’re concerned when you take something in for repair, concerned that the final price won’t match the estimate. If you can accurately identify your prospects hot button issues, and then innovate your business to solve them forever, you have just created a market dominating position. You should also consider additional psychographic areas such as their health, their hobbies and interests, sports, education, personal causes they may be involved in, both political and social, as well as leisure activities. Examples Include:
| Lifestyle | What kind of lifestyle group does your audience fall into? Are they conservative or trendy, travelers or soccer moms? Are they thrifty or extravagant? |
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| Values + Beliefs | What are their values and beliefs? Would you consider them environmentalists or safety conscious? |
| Attitude | What kind of attitude do they have? Are they positive or negative? Open or critical? Easily led or opinionated? |
| Motivation | Are your customers opinion leaders or followers? Do they tell others what products they need, or do they need others to tell them what is trendy and what works? |
| Activities + Interests | What do they do in their spare time? What are their hobbies and interests? |
| Social Class | What social class does your audience belong to? Lower, middle or upper? How much extra money do they have to spend on luxury items? |