The key to connecting with your target audience or buyer
persona is through identifying what makes them tick, what are their goals and
aspirations? Scott (2013) states, “By segmenting millions of voters into
distinct buyer personas, candidates built marketing campaigns and PR programs
that appeal specifically to each. Contrast this approach with a
one-size-fits-all campaign that targets everybody but appeals to nobody” (Scott,
2013, p. 140). Without understanding your target or specific buyer personas,
marketing becomes one way communication from the company to the masses, and
misses an opportunity to engage with a specific target audience.
One brand that has identified a buyer persona for their
target extremely well is Dove, the health and
beauty brand from Unilever. Dove has
built its brand equity on delivering beauty products to help bring out what’s
beautiful in real women all over the world. By using real women in all of their
advertising and online communication,
Dove is able to connect with their buyer persona who is a real woman, not a
supermodel, who does not want to compromise beauty while caring for her
body. Dove connects with these women on
social media, through posts that get at the very core of how their key target
thinks and wants to feel.
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| image via facebook |
Dove is also active on Twitter
encouraging women to share what they #feelbeautifulfor. In 2014, Dove released
an online video to show women how they perceive their own beauty and then how
it’s perceived by others. Dove
Real Beauty Sketches sparked a social media frenzy that received news
coverage on major
national outlets.
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| image via youtube |
This type of advertising and social media activity connects so
emotionally with Dove’s target in such a way that sparks buzz about the brand
and engages the consumer with a brand they already know and love.
Hendrick’s Gin is another brand that is unique and caters to
a very specific type of drinker. On their website,
Hendrick’s encourages drinkers to “join the society of the unusual”. Hendrick’s
has a unique flavor profile as a that is “oddly infused” with rose and cucumber.
A gin that is unlike any other gin out there.
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| image via google.com/images |
The buyer persona for this brand is a very niche
gin drinker, but because the flavor is so unusual for a gin drink, the brand
can sway vodka drinkers to try gin as well. Because of the very specific type
of drinker that this brand attracts, if I were running the social media for
this brand, I would use mainstream social media to raise awareness of the
brand. Then, I would use blogs to reach this very niche target. Scott (2013)
states, “If you write a niche blog…then you’re not competing with 112 million
other blogs…If you have a small niche, you may interest only a few hundred
readers. But you’ll reach the right readers” (Scott, 2013, p. 239).
Success for this type of brand that engages with a niche
audience begins with sales. But that is not the end. Given the niche target,
success looks like gaining influential bloggers to begin writing about Hendrick’s,
to share the story of this brand. Getting the story out there is just the
beginning of influence. “…Influencers don’t even need a massive number of
followers or years of experience on Twitter. They just have to make things
happen” (Schaefer, 2012, p. 8). Influencers endorsing Hendrick’s through blogs
or on Twitter can allow Hendrick’s to reach the right people who fit the target
buyer persona.
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Schaefer, M. (2012). Return
on influence. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Scott, D. M. (2013). The
new rules of marketing & PR: How to use social media, online video, mobile
applications, blogs, news releases, & viral marketing to reach buyers
directly (4th ed.). Hoboken, N.J.: Wiley.
Allie,
ReplyDeleteYou’ve given two excellent examples of connecting with a target audience through the use of buyer personas to drive social media activity.
Dove is a fantastic example of a brand that truly understands its buyer persona. As I clicked through the links in your post, I found myself watching video after video on Dove’s YouTube page since I was so drawn in. I don’t use many Dove products myself, but their attempts at drawing me in are incredibly successful as I fit right into one of Dove’s buyer persona profiles. You make a very important point when you say that Dove connects with women emotionally through their social media campaigns. According to Shepard and Swisher (2013), “fifty perfect of every buying decision is driven by emotion” (para. 1).
This emotional connection becomes even more important to the marketing strategy when this specific buyer persona is being targeted. “Emotional connection is even more critical if your target market is female. Women already control or influence over 80 percent of the purchases in the United States…They base their decisions primarily on emotional characteristics such as relationships and on what your product will do for them personally. They don’t like reading lists of numbers, specs and statistics” (Emotional Connection, 2006). The Dove Real Beauty Sketches campaign did not contain any of these things, only real, raw emotion.
Dove also has a ‘Dove Men + Care’ brand. Do you feel like the company does as good of a job connecting to their male buyer persona on social media?
Hendrick’s Gin is also a great example of a company with a niche buyer persona that could benefit from both broad and direct customer targeting. I think using mainstream social media to generate brand awareness is a great idea. As you said, this gin can appeal to more than simply gin drinkers, and it can’t hurt to generate buzz. Blogging is another good way to reach the niche buyers; showing thought and brand leadership through content marketing will only strengthen the Hendrick’s brand identity, making the company more likely to be a “household name” of sorts from within the niche spirit community.
Great thoughts on this week’s topic!
Brenna
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Sources:
Emotional connection can build strong brands seven ways. (2006). Hiebing. Retrieved from https://www.hiebing.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/4_EmoConnection.pdf
Shepard, T. and Swisher, S. (2013, October 1). 8 keys to creating an emotion connection between products and people. Fast Company. Retrieved from http://www.fastcocreate.com/3017976/industry-pov/8-keys-to-creating-an-emotional-connection-between-products-and-people
Hi Brenna,
DeleteI do think that Dove Men + Care does a good job at connecting with their audience emotionally. Did you happen to see any of the Super Bowl advertising from DM+C? I believe they are trying to show men that DM+C can care for men, who work so hard to care for their families. The ad was focused on men playing with their children. It was really touching and did well to connect emotionally to both men and women (who are more likely than not the ones doing the purchasing).
Thanks for the thought!
Allie
I loved your comment that “Without understanding your target or specific buyer personas, marketing becomes one way communication from the company to the masses, and misses the opportunity to engage with a specific target audience.” I think that’s the area where most companies fail at social media. In preparing for this week’s post, I found so many companies constantly try to sell their products or services. It's all about them. They don’t engage the consumer, find out their likes and dislikes or truly build relationships with them. As Kerpen (2011) stated, “We’re talking about defining and finding the narrowly targeted, correct audience and then beginning to engage them in conversation, so that when they are ready to buy, you’re the obvious, logical choice” (p. 35). Dove has done a great job at identifying their buyer personas and engaging their audience.
ReplyDeleteI also really liked that you pointed out from Schaefer that you don’t have to have a ton of followers to influence. I think most organizations look at the number of likes and followers and judge success upon those numbers. If you have the right audience and can make things happen, you don’t necessarily have to obtain the massive numbers.
Nice examples this week!
- Mandy
Kerpen, D. (2011). Likeable social media: How to delight your customers, create an irresistible brand, and be generally amazing on facebook (& other social networks). New York: McGraw-Hill.
Hi Allie,
ReplyDeleteGood post! I especially like that you chose the niche-marketed Hendrick's Gin. Before social media, keeping such a unique brand afloat would have been much harder and would probably have to depend on word-of-mouth through liquor stores and advertising in magazines for liquor connoisseurs, I would assume. However, with social media, and a niche blog as you suggested, it is much easier to find your desired buyer persona and have them come to you. Like D.M. Scott says in the excerpt that you reference, you may not reach a massive amount of readers, but you would be reaching the right readers, which is what really matters for a niche product like this.
Dove is also a great example, I remember the campaign that you referred to about women perceiving their own beauty and how others perceived it. It was a very powerful, uplifting message, and definitely encompasses Dove's buyer persona.