One of the sacred cows of marketing is using demographics as the basis of describing the target consumer for your brand. Demographic data typically describes consumers in terms of their age, gender, region, and income.
The idea originated in the heyday of television advertising in the 1950’s and 1960’s and was based on the premise that consumers in a particular demographic group were just the same as everyone else in that group. Today we talk of Baby Boomers, Generation X, Y and Z, Millennials and Centennials but the year that someone was born tells you little about how likely they are to buy your brand. How simple life would be for brand owners if this was true! Just as identical twins are never the same we need to go beyond demographics to really gain insights into our consumers.
Netflix, the online streaming service, has moved significantly beyond using demographics to understand its users, having learned this information was “almost useless” as an indicator of behavior. “What we have learned over time is: it’s not who they are in the superficial sense – like gender, age, even geography. It’s not even what they tell you, It’s what they do” said Todd Yellin, Netflix’s VP of Product Innovation. By getting users to rate the shows and movies they watched, Netflix has increased their understanding of what users to target with different products.
In grocery retail what was once typical is now increasingly irrelevant: the rise of the discounters is not solely attributable to lower socio economic groups seeking value, higher income shoppers also shop there. The growth of online shopping was assumed to be attributable to the rise in usage among the young and affluent segments of the population. However, according to MyWebGrocer, lifestyle needs transcends age and income. So for a busy mother who can’t arrange childcare or elderly people who lack the physical ability to shop or young urbanites who rely on public transport, grocery shopping online provides convenience.
Data from social media allows us to identify what our consumers’ interests and values are by looking at where they shop, what brands they associate with, what interests they pursue, what causes they support. All of this leads to greater insights into who our consumers really are as people.
Indeed allowing your brand to focus exclusively on demographic targeting may limit your business. The Let Toys be Toys campaign is lobbying toy manufacturers and publishers to stop limiting children’s interests by promoting some toys and books as only suitable for girls and others only suitable for boys.
Bord Bia has produced several studies that give deeper insights behind various demographic groups – tweens, millennials, and older consumers. For example, Bord Bia’s recent Ageing Well study concluded that consumers aged 55+ are far from homogenous and age should be used in conjunction with other facets to create a complete proposition. The study identified 6 typologies of “older consumers” where different strategies were required. Older people are taking gap years. A quarter of all new start-ups in the UK are by people aged 50-65.
Bord Bia’s study on Millennial identified different need states that you should consider if targeting this group along with 10 guiding rules in developing a brand which appeals to this demographic.
So knowing your consumers’ age, gender, and income whilst interesting is not enough. Demographic profiling alone is too crude a way to segment your consumers. You need to go beyond who your consumers are to an understanding of what they do and why they do it (what Harvard Business Review called the “messy complexity of human life”). You need to think about the consumers’ mindset, motivations, values and life stage. Using these deeper insights beyond demographics is akin to performing surgery with a scalpel rather than a butter knife. Here at the Thinking House, we can help you develop those deeper insights into your consumer target.
For more information please contact siobhan.collins@bordbia.ie
