You want to be loved by your target audience like a rockstar!
It's very important, to know your target audience, since it's your audience, that buys from you. You should align your content as good as possible to the needs and wishes of your audience. To be able to do this, you'll want to know, who your audience actually is.
I want to show you the process I went through, to define my target audience for my eBook.
The first thing I've done is to define the topic of my book. Obviously it's related to getting started in online business, because that's what I'm passionate about. But there are lots and lots of really great books for this topic, so I'd enter a market with really high competition. Just enter the term "online business" in Amazon and see, how many books come up. So I needed to refine my topic a little bit to lower the competition.
A really big thing in my history is to overcome the fear of actually getting started in online business. I founded a webdesign company in April 2012 and I recognized very soon, that it wouldn't work out as expected. But I kept on going for a year until I decided to finally quit my 9-to-5 job and start an online business.
I know, that other people do have this fears, too. Lots of people are hesitating to start their own business, because they are scared of the unexpected. I decided, that I want to write for those people, because they need a book like mine to overcome their fears. They need the personal experience of someone who has conquered his fears and did start an online business. So I did another analysis and noticed, that I can easily find lots of english books that help their readers to overcome fears.
So my target audience needs to be more detailed. In Germany, there are not that many german speaking authors related to online business. That is my key to the target audience. Since I'm a native German it would be easy for me to write a book for the German market.
With this process I came to the point, that my book is going to be written in German and targeting those people, who let their fears limit their opportunities to live the life of their dreams. I know, that it's a possible market to make money in, because there already people selling products. Competition is a good sign, because it shows, that you can actually make money.
Ask yourself, what pains and problems do exist in your chosen market. This is key, because when people search for solutions, they're willing to pay for them. There are big main topics, that people are always looking for: health, wealth, relationship. So if you can relate your products and services to an existing problem or pain, your audience will love you. You must be aware of their needs, when you enrich their everyday life, they will be glad to pay you for your products.
Think about yourself. When you want to learn something and find an expert, that teaches you exactly what you want, would you buy his course? I would do some research about that "expert" and try to verify his position. If I find out, that he exactly knows, what he's talking about, I'll buy his course and enhance my knowledge.
Let me give you an example out of my business:
I know that many Germans have the wish to write a book, but don't know how to do it. A friend of mine is a freelance writer and since I'm writing a book right now, we both can combine our knowledge. We plan to create an online course for people who want to learn writing. That membership will bring us passive income, because it adresses an urgent problem.
So for my ebook, I'll provide several solutions:
Creating a persona for your target audience is the last step in defining the audience. The objective of creating a persona is to visualize who you're talking to. Simply ask yourself questions like:
So what does my persona for my target audience look like?
Since I gave my persona a name, I know who I'm writing for. While I'm writing, I try to read the text out of Michael's position. I imagine, what questions he might have and what solutions he's looking for. I've created this persona by using a checklist of the Internet Business Mastery Academy. But of course there are lots of available resources online 🙂
That's it!
In these three steps you can define your target audience, like I did for my ebook.
Now take action, go out and think about your target audience!
Jan
