Where and Who Is Your Best Market?
April 11, 2009 by Jean Murray
Filed under Business
You have a great idea for a product or service you want to sell to people. But you need to know about the people who live in your market area. 
Why is Market Important? This is a tough question for any new business owner. You need to know your marketing area so you know where to put your advertising dollars. If you spend a lot of money advertising to a large area, you may have a lot of waste. That is, you will be wasting your money on people who won’t come to buy your product. Same thing on the Internet. If you spend dollars advertising via Google on websites, you want to be sure the people you want to reach visit those websites.
Local Market Information. Fortunately. there is a great deal of information out there for you to use in marketing. Here are three great sources of information about the people you are marketing to in your area.
The best source of information is your local Chamber of Commerce or business development organization. They have all the facts about consumers in your area.
Another online source of data about most U.S. cities is city-data.com. You will find just about everything you need to know about the population in the city where you are located.
Even more precise data is available by zip code. Neilsen (the ratings people) have a site called “My Best Segments” which allows you to enter your zip code and see how many people and in what market segments live in your zip code. The information about each segment is interesting; you can find out what TV shows these people watch and even what cars they drive. It’s a perfect way to determine who might be in your area and give you some ideas of how to market to them. (Basic information on demographic groups is free; you must pay to see the details.)
First determine your market area then learn about the people in that area. Then go to work figuring out how to reach these people. It isn’t easy but figuring this marketing stuff out will help you spend your advertising and publicity dollars wisely.
Image source: sxc.hu
