Oftentimes when businesses come to us, the first thing we ask them is what is their target market? Because that’s what we use in order to find out what data they need and give them a count and quote. Today I’m going to break it down for you in three simple steps of how to identify exactly who your B2B target market is.
Step 1: Location
The first thing you want to figure out is what location are you targeting? Is your product something that can be delivered nationwide, or is it something that’s a lot more local. Especially for service providers, you might not want to be targeting even regionally. You might want to keep it local to your city or town, or maybe you have branches. Maybe you can travel.
These are the types of considerations when you’re choosing what location your target market is in.
Step 2: Industry
The industry is really important to figure out exactly who your target market is. You want to think about your best customers and what industries they’re in. Sometimes it’s difficult to identify the industry. So if you are having trouble, get in touch with us. We use the ANZSIC classification, but we also have our own custom industry list that is a little bit more intuitive, which we can use if you’re not entirely sure.
The ANZSIC classification does have some limitations, so definitely get in touch with us and we can help you figure it out, and get your head around ANZSIC.
Step 3: Size of the Business by # of FTE
The final one is the size of the company. And this is again, really key because depending on what you’re selling, some companies are going to be able to afford your service and some companies are not.
Your first instinct is probably to do this by revenue. We want to identify the size by how much money they make a year. This is actually a really hard way to identify companies. And the reason for that is that in New Zealand there’s no revenue reporting requirement for businesses. There’s no reporting standard for any business unless they are registered on the NZX or are a charity. If the businesses that you want to target don’t fall into those two very small niches. You’re out of luck.
The way we like to identify the size of the business is through the number of employees they have. And that kind of varies from industry to industry. In a retail situation, maybe each employee doesn’t necessarily account for that much revenue and in a childcare situation that might be the same thing. But maybe in an IT firm, one employee could actually account for a considerable amount of revenue.
By identifying the industry, you can use the number of employees as a proxy for revenue to narrow down your target market.
Those are the three steps you can identify your target market. For a more in-depth look at this, check out our #DataBasics Article on Target Markets.
If you’re ready to get a count and quote, just fill out the form below and our team will get back to you.
