Who Are You Speaking To?

Top tips from Julie Strong,

our Social Media Manager from GOLD PR’s Orange County, CA office

It may be tempting as a marketer to create content that resonates best with you personally, but you have to ask yourself if you are actually the target audience. If you’re a Millennial woman interested in fashion and beauty products, but you’re selling a video game targeted to Gen Z males, the content that speaks to you isn’t necessarily going to resonate with your consumer. If you’re overwhelmed by the idea of social content creation and community management, rest assured—we have you covered. In order to develop the most successful social strategy, it’s as simple as first identifying your target audience, then narrowing it down to a specific social persona.

We’ve created this questionnaire to help you first identify your target audience:

What is the gender breakdown of your intended audience?
Is your product targeted to a specific age range?
Does your target live in a specific area(s)?
What is your target consumer interested in? What are their hobbies?
What is the price point of your product? What is your target’s average annual income?
What causes matter to your target consumer?
What competitors or complementary brands do they currently use?

The above exercise will help you hone in on the specific type of person you’re looking to speak to and connect with (the followers you want). This will then be the lens you’ll want to use when creating and viewing your content. This will also be very useful when creating audiences for paid social ads.

Now that you’ve identified your target audience, you’ll want to use that information, then take it a step further and develop the persona of the “person behind the computer.” This is the identity of the person writing the caption copy and replying to comments and DM’s. This is especially helpful for brands who use a variety of team members to help manage their social profiles. Once you have your social persona identified, you can share this with the interns, customer service team members, or social media managers who are participating in your social community management. While your target audience may be somewhat broad, your social persona is even more targeted to one specific tone of voice. It’s very important to keep this tone of voice clear and consistent so that followers are able to build a strong rapport with your brand.

We’ve also created a list of questions to help you identify this person:

Is your persona male/female or androgenous?
How old are they (this can be a range)?
Do you envision them as a specific celebrity or public figure?
What is their education level?
What is their relationship status? Do they have children at home?
What words describe their tone of voice? (i.e. are they witty and sarcastic or knowledgeable and sophisticated?) The more descriptive words you can add to this list, the better. It may also be helpful to include words that do not describe their tone of voice.

Now that you’ve identified both your target audience (who you’re creating content for) and your social persona (the “person” behind the computer) you have the guidelines you need to create optimum content that is compelling for your audience. You’re ready to effectively engage with the audience who will be most interested in your brand!

GOLD’s social media team are experts in beauty and health, CPG and working in regulated industries that include: aesthetics, pharma, medical devices and med tech. Our offices are located in Orange County, CA and New York, NYC. To learn more about how we can help you develop a social media strategy please send us a here.

Gold PR's Social Media Team