Because Your Target Audience is Everything
So you’ve decided you want to produce an explainer video, corporate video, animated video or marketing video for your business. Great. The first thing you need to establish is who you’re targeting this video to. But figuring out who your target audience is isn’t always as easy as you might think.
What is a Marketing Persona?
One way to hone your target audience down is to imagine them it in the form of an actual person, or a marketing persona. Personas are the result of a combination of actual data and educated guesses, representing different people your business is trying to communicate with and sell to. Not only do personas help you to envisage your target audience, they also help you hone the messages you want to communicate in your marketing material – like videos.
The tricky thing about a target audience is that sometimes it’s not actually an ‘a’. Many businesses communicate with and sell to a range of audiences, so often one communication style isn’t appropriate for all audiences. The solution? Create 3-5 marketing personas to identify the different kinds of people you’re targeting.
Getting Started on Your Marketing Persona
The first step is to visualise these ‘people’ as actual people. Give them names, ages, family, jobs, salaries, interests, education achievements, locations, even political persuasions if you think it’s appropriate. All of these demographics are firstly based on key data you know to be true about your audience, then expanded with calculated guesses to turn statistics into more relatable ideas. For example, if you sell makeup, chances are your primary target audience is female. If you’re a brand like M.A.C, you’re perceived as being quite young, hip and funky so the women who buy from you might be aged 18-39, be in long-term relationships but not have children, and have well-paying jobs with lots of expendable income. Now, expand your stats – and don’t be afraid to get creative. Your first target persona is called Lotte (short for Charlotte). Lotte is 23 and has been with her boyfriend for two years. She rents a room in a Grey Lynn flat, she works in social media in a trendy boutique marketing firm in Ponsonby, she loves online shopping, and her favourite hobby is pilates.
On the other side of the coin, perhaps you’re a brand like Avon which might be considered older, classic and less likely to experiment with makeup trends. Therefore, the women who buy from you might be aged 39-69, be married or divorced with teenage or grown-up children and be nearing retirement. This persona might be called Christine. Christine is 59, is a nurse, and has been a nurse since she left school aged 18. She and her husband own their family home in Christchurch plus a rental in Tauranga, and they have two grown sons, both of whom are married (and one of whom has a child of his own). Christine is starting to think about retiring, because she’d like to spend more time in the garden and playing with her grandson.
How to Use Different Personas in Your Videos
Lotte and Christine are very different people. In the same way, the messages they respond to are very different too. When it comes to producing a video, it’s important to establish very early on who will watch this video, and what response you want from them. If you’re M.A.C, you might produce a video about a new range of neon lipsticks that’s creative, fun and fast-paced because those are the kinds of things that people like Lotte might respond best to. If you’re Avon, you might produce a video about a classic range of foundation that’s a bit slower in pace and reserved in theme because that’s more like Christine. Marketing personas give video producers an exact idea of who their target audience and the communication style that will best suit them, so they can come up with creative ideas that will see direct results.
If you’re in the market for a corporate video, explainer video, animated video or marketing video, firstly establish who your target audience is, the message you want to get across and the response you want the viewer to take. Then, give the friendly team at Onepost Video Production a call; we’d love to help you turn your ideas into reality.