I suppose you could say that my first business failed because I was
not able to reach my target market. I was about six years old when I
set up a Cool-Aid stand, at the foot of our driveway in Seattle
suburbia. The drink was temptingly cool and refreshing - and the
weather man had predicted a scorcher. Little yellow sunshine stickers
were all over the weather map. I was set for riches! 

As the morning passed, I sat at the curb sipping away my profits in
the increasing heat. The problem might have been the location of our
house. Dead end streets are bad for business, I discovered.

By mid afternoon I had sold only 4 "dixi" cups of strawberry flavored
Cool-Aid, and had swallowed about two pitchers of the stuff myself. I
would have been very depressed about the failing business venture if I
hadn't been so wired on sugar! 

Entrepreneurs sometimes make the mistake of thinking that *everyone*
would want to buy their product if only they *knew* about it. We have
a nasty habit of over estimating potential demand. 

In that article, I proposed the idea that there are five stages
involved in converting a potential customer into a lasting customer.
For online businesses therefore, it is helpful to think of five
separate questions. 
 

1. how do people find out about your site?
2. why do they initially visit your site? 
3. what makes them stay? 
4. what makes them purchase? 
5. and what makes them come back for more? 

Today we will focus on the first of these problems: creating awareness
about your website. The goal, at this stage, is to maximize your
"Awareness Efficiency", which is the ratio of "aware surfers" to all
"potential customers". 
 

Potential Customers
So, who are your "potential customers"? Everyone on the Internet?
Probably not. It is important to be honest about your answer to this
question. Some people are tempted to think that their product or
service is so amazing/wonderful/perfect that it has universal appeal.
Of course, that is a case of entrepreneurial delusion. 

Still, sometimes it is useful to reflect on the overall size of the
Internet marketplace. At a minimum, this should be your
starting point. 

It is often said that if you ask two economists the same question, you
will get _three_ different answers. The same is true when it comes to
estimating the number of active Internet users. Here are some recent
figures, drawn from a number of sources:

Number of Internet Users According to Various Sources
Intelliquest    70 M
MRI             40 M
Nielson Media   58 M
Morgan Stanley  80 M
eStats          47 M

Of course, whichever figure you believe, the fact is that all of those
millions of people are not realistically potential customers. Even if
you are selling a very basic product, like toothpaste, something that
almost everybody uses - and certainly needs - the fact is that your
particular brand of toothpaste will not appeal to everyone. So, lets
narrow the focus, and think about who your potential customers are.

Define Your Target Market

Start by asking _yourself_ a few questions: 

Are your customers individuals or businesses?

If your customers are individuals, ask:

What are their interests?
What are their needs?
Do they fall into a particular age group?
What is their level of education?
What is their income level?
What do they value most: price, quality, delivery, personal
attention, image/status, other things?

If your customers are businesses ask:

What size of business?
Are they well established businesses or new start-ups?
What are their primary products or services, and what added 
value does your product deliver to their bottom line?
Who in the organization makes the relevant purchase decisions?
What does your business customer value the most: price, 
quality, other attributes?

If you cannot answer most of these questions, then you really need to
get to know your customers. 

Even better than asking yourself for answers to those questions, is
to approach your customers directly. You should conduct a survey of
your existing customers, and develop a profile of who they are.

All of these things are important when you are considering how to
*reach* your target market. 

Find Your Target Market: Building Awareness

So, how do people find out about your website? Search engines?
Free-for-all links sites? Banner advertising? Newsletter advertising?
You must find an answer to these questions if you want to maximize
your website efficiency. Here are a few tips:
 

1. Conduct a survey of website visitors. Ask them how they found out about your site.
2. Survey your existing customers for the same information.
3. Track your advertising. Run ads in various places and track the effectiveness of each.

The principles are simple: 

• Be where your customers are. 
• Use a language and style that they understand.
• Address your marketing message to their needs.

If they are in certain newsgroups, then you want to be there. If they
search for particular key words at search engines, then you want to be
there. Find out what works, and concentrate your efforts.

Additional Resources:
You can read more about reaching your target market right here:
http://www.inetexchange.com/articles/bus1.htm 

Download NetSubmitter and start listing your site in the major search
engines with this very powerful software.
http://www.inetexchange.com/netsubmitter/index.htm 

Reach over 36,000 internet businesses, online entrepreneurs, and
webmasters by advertising in Active Internet Marketing:
http://www.inetexchange.com/inet-mailer.htm 
 

------------------------------------------------------
Paul Needham paul@linkmedia.com
Co-Publisher of Active Internet Marketing.
http://www.inetexchange.com/inet-mailer.htm 
Business Intelligence for Successful On-line Marketers
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