Finding Your Target Audience (and why it’s so important).

If you’ve published or want to publish any work, whether it’s a novel, a blog, or an essay, you need to know your target audience. While it’s important to reach as many people as possible, and it often seems like focusing only on certain segments of the population is limiting, you need to be direct. We’ll go through the why that is, what it is, and how to go about it.

Why

You can put every effort into marketing your book, and although you might get some response, it will not be anywhere near as successful as it could be if you’re targeting the correct audience. In simple terms, a target audience is just breaking down who you believe your book’s audience is. It may sound like common sense that if you write a children’s book you’ll want to market it to children. And if you’re writing a youth novel you’ll want to target teenagers.  A cookbook will want to do the same with cooking enthusiasts, and so forth—You get the idea. But a lot of new writers actually don’t practice this.

It’s a bit naive to think that everyone will enjoy your book thus you should make your marketing efforts as general as possible. Advertising your book to the incorrect audience will be wasted effort, time, and not produce the desired results or reflect the true potential of your work. Now that you understand the why it’s important, let’s dive deeper into what it is and how you can figure out the ideal audience for your book.

What

A target audience can be as vague or as specific as you’d like. As you can imagine, the more specific, the more likely you are to get the results you want. Let’s take a look at children’s books. You might be thinking it’s as easy as just saying your target audience is children. In reality, two people could write a children’s book and have completely different target audiences.

Here is an example.

Person 1:

“My target audience is children between the ages of 8-12.  The topic is appropriate for both genders. My book incorporates a lot of American customs that would confuse readers from other countries. Therefore we’ll focus on initial advertising in U.S. elementary schools”.

Person 2:

“My children’s book is appropriate for kids 3-7 years of age. It’s fiction and can be easily understood by all cultures and genders. They’re easy rhymes that can be used to teach kids to read. Therefore, I should market to young parents and new grandparents in English-speaking countries”.

Now that you understand more of what a target audience is and why it’s important you may be wondering how to figure out the ideal target audience for your book. Let’s dive into it.

How

You can get as specific as you want with your target audience. The more you understand who your readers are, the more likely you are to get the results you want from your marketing efforts. If you’re struggling with figuring out who your target audience is, ask yourself these questions:

• Demographics
  • What ages would enjoy reading my book?
  • Is it tailored to one gender more than the other? Which gender?
  • Is it easily understood by other cultures?

• Location
  • Where are the potential readers located?
  • Does global, local, or country-specific targeting make sense?
  • Are my readers online, in bookstores, school libraries, etc? 
• Behaviors and Interests
  • What reading style is trending within the age group (ebooks, audiobooks, etc)?
  • Where do my readers enjoy spending their time?
  • What hobbies or interests are common in my readers?

You’ll find knowing your audience is so helpful. If you know where your readers love spending time, let’s say a coffee shop, you can plan to do book events there. And now knowing their preferred reading format you can make sure you provide your book in that style. Knowing the age range as well is very beneficial because you can tailor your advertising to fit the most effective ways they respond to. The possibilities are endless once you understand your target audience.

Additionally, a great way to make sure your target audience stays as accurate as possible is by asking a reader to fill out a brief survey after purchasing your book. You can start the survey by asking how they heard about your book. This lets you know which of your marketing efforts are bringing in results. Finish it by asking them demographic questions (age, gender, etc) and their location (state or country).

Still feeling like you need help figuring out how to target the right audience? That’s where we come in. Consider our internet advertising services where we customize a target audience for your book and show the ad to 10,000+ potential customers.