The Complete
Internet Marketer
Internet Marketer
Online Customer Segmentation
Made Easy
by Jay Neuman
This article is an excerpt from: The Complete Internet Marketer: A Practical Guide To Everything You
Need To Know About Marketing Online
Online customers are as diverse as the general buying public. Web folklore used to say that typical
web “surfers” are mostly male youth and techies. Those days are long gone. Web users today are
business professionals and grandparents, women and men. A successful website has to appeal to
the unique wants and needs of each group.
In most cases, there will be more than one customer type who you are reaching out to through your
website. Each is coming to your website for a different reason. The site must be able to draw each
one into a path that leads them to the things they need and want. In marketing terms, groups of
different types of customer are called segments.
Identifying customer segments is an essential part of any marketing plan. The same is true for your
Internet Marketing plan. You will use this knowledge for many things, including: what content you
will include on your website, what features you will need, where you will seek to get traffic and to
plan your targeted marketing efforts.
Defining Your Target
To develop an Internet Marketing program that effectively reaches all of your customers, the easiest
approach is to ask the five basic questions that all news reporters know: Who, What, Where, Why
and How. These are known as “the Five W’s.” By taking time to answer these five questions up
front, you will be able to make the most effective use of limited resources, as you build a website
that meets the needs and wants of all your customers.
Who Are Your Customers?
In the first question, you want to define the basic characteristics of the people coming to your
website. You will ask questions like: How old are they? Are they men or women? Are they
business professionals, students or veterans? In marketing lingo, this kind of information is called
demographics. If your customers are businesses, then you will ask questions like: Are they retail
stores or service suppliers? Are they Fortune 1000 corporations or mom & pop shops? Are they
local or national? These are called firmographics. They are the same as demographics, but for
firms.
You will use this information to create targeted content on your website and targeted messages for
your marketing promotions.
What Are They Interested In?
In the second question, you want to identify what motivates your customers to want what you have
on your website. If you are selling shoes, are your customers fashion conscious people who want
new shoes to match their new outfits? Are they parents, who are buying shoes for their kids to wear
when they go back to school?
You will use this information to figure out what your customers are looking for and to create targeted
marketing campaigns for your most profitable groups.
Where Will They Come From?
In the third question, you want to find out where your traffic is coming from. All websites rely on
traffic from search engines. But do not stop there. If you will rely on current customers visiting
your site, then you may want to send email or advertise your website in their billing statements. If
your customers will also be visiting specialty content websites, then try advertising on those sites.
An online shoe store, for example, may advertise on a fashion magazine website.
You will use this information to create a strategy for driving traffic to your website from as many
sources as possible.
Why Will They Come to Your Website?
In the fourth question, you want to know what needs and wants your customers are seeking to fulfill
when they come to your website. You will ask questions like: Do they want to buy products online?
Do they want to contact customer service? Will they be gathering information prior to a sale, and
need to see product reviews? Will they be ready to buy, and want to see available deals and special
offers?
You will use this information to design the architecture of your website to make sure people are able
to quickly and easily find what they are looking for.
How Will They Use Your Website?
In the fifth question, you want to determine how people will interact with your website to do the
things they want to do on the site. If they are buying products, will they want to browse through
categories or search by keywords? If you are collecting sales leads, will they be more likely to fill
out a needs assessment form or request a white paper requiring their contact information prior to
downloading?
You will use this information to create a user interface that is intuitive and user friendly.
You will typically answer these questions through a series of interviews and brainstorming sessions
prior to building your website. As you gather this information, you will begin to discover patterns
that let you create a program to successfully meet the needs and wants of all your customer
segments. In Web-speak, this is called, Knowledge Discovery.
Identifying Your Customer Segments
After you have gone through the knowledge discovery process, you will have a lot of information
about your prospective online customers. The next thing to do is to start identifying groups of
similar customers. These are called segments. If you have done a thorough job of recording all the
information you gathered from the five questions, you will probably notice some obvious groupings.
By identifying specific customer segments, you can plan content and promotions targeted to their
specific needs and wants. You will also be able to measure the results of these efforts and
determine which segments are the most profitable for you. This is an iterative process. You can
continue to improve the results of your Internet Marketing efforts by targeting the most profitable
segments. You can also continue to research your customers to refine and improve the specification
of your segments.
Naming Your Segments
It is a common practice for marketers to give their customer segments cute names that are easy to
remember. That allows you to visualize a personality for each group. This helps when you go to
create targeted content or marketing campaigns. Having segment names also makes it easy to
measure results by segment and present the results to others who will make marketing decisions
based on the data.
You will put together a brief description of each segment based on the answers to the Five W’s.
Then you will give each segment a descriptive and memorable name that sums up what you wrote
about them in the description.
A simple example will demonstrate how easy it is to identify your customer segments. Assume you
have launched an online shoe store called, “Leslie’s Shoes.” You have determined that there are
four major types of online shopper who will come to your website. Take a look at Figure 2.3 to see
how you might define your customer segments.
Notice how defining your customers this way puts a face on the people coming to your website.
Once you have defined and named your customer segments in this way, they quickly take on a life
of their own. You are likely to begin treating them like people you know rather than just numbers
on a sales report.
You are now able to put together a clear picture of who your customers are and what they will be
looking for when they come to your website
==========================
This article is an excerpt from The Complete Internet Marketer: A Practical Guide To Everything You
Need To Know About Marketing Online by Jay Neuman.
Since 1994, Jay Neuman has been helping businesses as varied as Fortune 500 companies, startup
Dot-Coms and nonprofit organizations overcome their Internet Marketing and Database Marketing
challenges.
Jay is currently Sole Proprietor of the KnExT Consulting Group.www.knextconsulting.com.
He can be reached at jay.neuman@knextconsulting.com
Made Easy
by Jay Neuman
This article is an excerpt from: The Complete Internet Marketer: A Practical Guide To Everything You
Need To Know About Marketing Online
Online customers are as diverse as the general buying public. Web folklore used to say that typical
web “surfers” are mostly male youth and techies. Those days are long gone. Web users today are
business professionals and grandparents, women and men. A successful website has to appeal to
the unique wants and needs of each group.
In most cases, there will be more than one customer type who you are reaching out to through your
website. Each is coming to your website for a different reason. The site must be able to draw each
one into a path that leads them to the things they need and want. In marketing terms, groups of
different types of customer are called segments.
Identifying customer segments is an essential part of any marketing plan. The same is true for your
Internet Marketing plan. You will use this knowledge for many things, including: what content you
will include on your website, what features you will need, where you will seek to get traffic and to
plan your targeted marketing efforts.
Defining Your Target
To develop an Internet Marketing program that effectively reaches all of your customers, the easiest
approach is to ask the five basic questions that all news reporters know: Who, What, Where, Why
and How. These are known as “the Five W’s.” By taking time to answer these five questions up
front, you will be able to make the most effective use of limited resources, as you build a website
that meets the needs and wants of all your customers.
Who Are Your Customers?
In the first question, you want to define the basic characteristics of the people coming to your
website. You will ask questions like: How old are they? Are they men or women? Are they
business professionals, students or veterans? In marketing lingo, this kind of information is called
demographics. If your customers are businesses, then you will ask questions like: Are they retail
stores or service suppliers? Are they Fortune 1000 corporations or mom & pop shops? Are they
local or national? These are called firmographics. They are the same as demographics, but for
firms.
You will use this information to create targeted content on your website and targeted messages for
your marketing promotions.
What Are They Interested In?
In the second question, you want to identify what motivates your customers to want what you have
on your website. If you are selling shoes, are your customers fashion conscious people who want
new shoes to match their new outfits? Are they parents, who are buying shoes for their kids to wear
when they go back to school?
You will use this information to figure out what your customers are looking for and to create targeted
marketing campaigns for your most profitable groups.
Where Will They Come From?
In the third question, you want to find out where your traffic is coming from. All websites rely on
traffic from search engines. But do not stop there. If you will rely on current customers visiting
your site, then you may want to send email or advertise your website in their billing statements. If
your customers will also be visiting specialty content websites, then try advertising on those sites.
An online shoe store, for example, may advertise on a fashion magazine website.
You will use this information to create a strategy for driving traffic to your website from as many
sources as possible.
Why Will They Come to Your Website?
In the fourth question, you want to know what needs and wants your customers are seeking to fulfill
when they come to your website. You will ask questions like: Do they want to buy products online?
Do they want to contact customer service? Will they be gathering information prior to a sale, and
need to see product reviews? Will they be ready to buy, and want to see available deals and special
offers?
You will use this information to design the architecture of your website to make sure people are able
to quickly and easily find what they are looking for.
How Will They Use Your Website?
In the fifth question, you want to determine how people will interact with your website to do the
things they want to do on the site. If they are buying products, will they want to browse through
categories or search by keywords? If you are collecting sales leads, will they be more likely to fill
out a needs assessment form or request a white paper requiring their contact information prior to
downloading?
You will use this information to create a user interface that is intuitive and user friendly.
You will typically answer these questions through a series of interviews and brainstorming sessions
prior to building your website. As you gather this information, you will begin to discover patterns
that let you create a program to successfully meet the needs and wants of all your customer
segments. In Web-speak, this is called, Knowledge Discovery.
Identifying Your Customer Segments
After you have gone through the knowledge discovery process, you will have a lot of information
about your prospective online customers. The next thing to do is to start identifying groups of
similar customers. These are called segments. If you have done a thorough job of recording all the
information you gathered from the five questions, you will probably notice some obvious groupings.
By identifying specific customer segments, you can plan content and promotions targeted to their
specific needs and wants. You will also be able to measure the results of these efforts and
determine which segments are the most profitable for you. This is an iterative process. You can
continue to improve the results of your Internet Marketing efforts by targeting the most profitable
segments. You can also continue to research your customers to refine and improve the specification
of your segments.
Naming Your Segments
It is a common practice for marketers to give their customer segments cute names that are easy to
remember. That allows you to visualize a personality for each group. This helps when you go to
create targeted content or marketing campaigns. Having segment names also makes it easy to
measure results by segment and present the results to others who will make marketing decisions
based on the data.
You will put together a brief description of each segment based on the answers to the Five W’s.
Then you will give each segment a descriptive and memorable name that sums up what you wrote
about them in the description.
A simple example will demonstrate how easy it is to identify your customer segments. Assume you
have launched an online shoe store called, “Leslie’s Shoes.” You have determined that there are
four major types of online shopper who will come to your website. Take a look at Figure 2.3 to see
how you might define your customer segments.
Notice how defining your customers this way puts a face on the people coming to your website.
Once you have defined and named your customer segments in this way, they quickly take on a life
of their own. You are likely to begin treating them like people you know rather than just numbers
on a sales report.
You are now able to put together a clear picture of who your customers are and what they will be
looking for when they come to your website
==========================
This article is an excerpt from The Complete Internet Marketer: A Practical Guide To Everything You
Need To Know About Marketing Online by Jay Neuman.
Since 1994, Jay Neuman has been helping businesses as varied as Fortune 500 companies, startup
Dot-Coms and nonprofit organizations overcome their Internet Marketing and Database Marketing
challenges.
Jay is currently Sole Proprietor of the KnExT Consulting Group.www.knextconsulting.com.
He can be reached at jay.neuman@knextconsulting.com
