1:29 AM

What Does Your Market Want?

It’s critical that you understand who your market is and what it is exactly they are after if you want to be successful in marketing your site. So let’s delve into what does your market want?

The first step is to get absolutely clear on the ‘people’ in your market and the issues that are important to them – this is important for:

Discovering keywords that may not have been immediately apparent when you first started looking at search volumes
You can then target your audience better as you will understand what they are thinking

Most people have very similar problems, concerns and issues that they need answers for – hence they come to the internet to find solutions. It’s our job, as an internet marketer, to find out what these issues are and provide those solutions.

Find Out What People Need

If you are marketing a topic or product that you know a lot about, then you may already be familiar with the issues or ‘pain points’ of your audience. However if that’s not the case, you need to get around the people that will give you the answers.

Most affiliates will first look at search volumes for relevant keywords. Let say for example you were thinking of starting a site about dog grooming, you would firstly put in ‘dog grooming’ into your keyword tool (just as Jaaxy) or into your search engine and see what sort of dog grooming keywords people were searching.

(Learn how you can uncover the most effective and relevant keywords in our lesson on How to do Keyword Research!)

Must Watch: How A 28-yr- Old Got Fired &Then Built A $500k-A-Month Business ⇒

Using Forums

Although keyword volumes are an excellent way of getting an over view of your market, your real power will come from speaking directly to your audience about their problems (and offering solutions).

It makes sense to then head to forums that are already full of your audience. Forums give you a chance to hear what people are talking about and get a really good feel for the relevant topics and concerns of your market. You can also pick up related topics and look for different angles you may not have thought of yet.

Finding a relevant forum for your topic is as easy as putting ‘forums’ for your subject into Google. I do suggest you have a good read of a forum first before getting involved as there are a lot of unorganized forums – if that’s the case move on – reality is, if you get a bad feeling or impression of a particular forum – so will everyone else.

When you have found a good forum, have a look at the forums index page to give you ideas on article topics… much like looking in Google or Yahoo.

Dig Deeper To Find Ideas

Once you start reading and getting some good ideas for general categories, dig a little more and see what people are actually talking about, what are their questions and concerns. This is a great starting place for articles on your site!

Just note that if you take these new ideas and go back to your keyword research tool you may find the search volumes are not what you were hoping for. Its then up to you to decide if you think it’s worth pursuing. Do know that targeted, niche terms do way better than general search terms, and it’s easier to rank highly in the search engines – search out longtail keywords if possible.

‘Who’ Is Your Audience – Creating An ‘Avatar’

Ok if you really want your audience to listen to you, you should pay attention to who they really are. You can research all you like, but please use your common sense also. Try to keep the following things in mind when you put your site together:

Age:The age of your readers is super important. Have a think: are they mostly young, mostly middle-aged, or do they come from several age groups? The language you use with a younger crowd will be different to how you talk to an older person. You may also consider a different colour or layout for your site according to the age you’re aiming at.
Gender:This is important as it will affect the look and layout of your site and how you approach content and even advertising.
Location:As you may know, the largest online market is the US, but don’t alienate other countries by filling your site with US-centric content. I do highly recommend sticking with American spellings however. If you are aiming at a local market, or a specific country, then of course accommodate that particular country.
Prior Knowledge:Target your content accordingly. If you are aiming at a ‘newbie’ (such as this site) then make the content appropriate. If you are aiming at more experienced readers, again give them more meaty content to chew on.
Expectations:Don’t lose your audience by not providing what they are expecting on your site.

For example: if they’re expecting lessons, don’t offer them reviews; if they’re expecting an informative article, don’t just try to sell to them… keep in mind what you are trying to achieve, are you wanting to sell, build a business, or just offer advice?

You might not think it’s a bit deal if someone leaves your site as you will still retain some people, however do note that Google looks at your ‘bounce rate’ to see whether your site is offering quality content. If you have a high bounce rate it will affect your search engine rankings.

Make sure your title tags represent your content correctly and this will certainly help and keep including your keywords.

Needs: Many affiliates can go into overdrive and provide far too much information into the backgrounds, history and uses of their products including testimonials – when their audience may just want to actually ‘see’ the product. On the flipside, a site may just provide stacsk of product images without giving enough information for their audience who may want a review of the product.

This is where understanding your ‘avatar’ or audience is crucial – really think about what your visitors want and need, to facilitate them in making a purchase.

Competition:Check out similar sites to yours and make sure you take the time to be polished, have great designs and really well targeted information – as you know, people do not just visit one website – so make sure yours is good!
Tone:This is where common sense plays a part – you wouldn’t put smiley faces or cartoons on a financial review website – or you wouldn’t use a huge vocabulary if you’re reaching out to children. Make sure your site is audience appropriate. It helps to get someone to look over your site for you and give you a bit of feedback and perspective. As I build a lot of my sites on the Wealthy Affiliate platform I have the advantage of getting feedback from the community there.

Conclusion

Ok so in conclusion, you need to really put some thought and research into your audience – who they are (their demographics), what their issues and pain points are and also the need to make your site ‘fit’ your avatar.

Do these things and you’ll be well on the way to building a successful website.

P.S. Take a look at this video and and learn how to earn a full-time income from home.