Target Audience Research

Identifying your target audience is step one. Success in business requires much more: It's one thing to know who you're selling to. It's another thing to know: - Where they spend their time - What mindset they're in when they encounter your message - What triggers them to take action That's the message behind this Lamborghini quote: Don't spend money trying to reach buyers in the wrong places. Most brands ignore this principle. They launch campaigns and run ads without asking fundamental questions: ➡️ Where does our customer actually spend time online? ➡️ What moment are we trying to reach them in? ➡️ What problem are they trying to solve when they see our message? The platform matters as much as the message. But so does the context. If you're selling enterprise SaaS to tech leads... They're searching Google for solutions. That's intent-driven behavior. Instagram won't capture that moment. If you're targeting founders running DTC brands... They're listening to podcasts during commutes,  checking Slack between meetings, and reading emails at night. They're not passively scrolling TikTok looking for business tools. If you're marketing luxury wellness retreats... Your buyers are researching through referrals and testimonials. They want proof from people they trust,  Not direct response ads interrupting their feed. Understanding this changes how you allocate budget. Your customer isn't everyone. And being present on a platform doesn't mean they're in buying mode. Someone scrolling Instagram at 11 PM is in entertainment mode. Someone searching Google at 2 PM is in solution mode. It’s the same person, but with a different intent and conversion likelihood. That's why relevance is a critical component of any scalable advertising system. At Ad Pros, we map out three things before launching anything: ✅ Audience behavior:  Where they spend time and what they're doing there ✅ Platform mechanics:  Which platforms reward the type of content that fits your message ✅ Timing and intent:  When they're most likely to act and what triggers that action The right message is only half of the work that needs to be done. To convert, you need the right message, at the right time, on the right platform. Ready to add $1m/month to your eCommerce business? Join the waitlist: https://lnkd.in/e-Av-tdY Do you know where your audience spends most of their time?  Leave a comment below with your thoughts. ♻️ Repost to share this reminder with your network.  Follow Nehal Kazim for more advertising strategy.

Why Cultural Intelligence (CQ) is a CEO’s Big Asset: When I took over as Chairman of Unilever Philippines, I was facing a "fierce competitor" (P&G) in a much more intense market than I had ever seen. I realized that to rally my team, I had to go beyond the language of spreadsheets and PowerPoints. I had to speak the language of the Pinoy spirit. Leading in an "alien" environment requires us to: 1. Listen to the History, Not Just the P&L: Understanding that the Philippines was colonized twice—first by Spain, then by America—explained the unique amalgam of lifestyles. It explained why they value tradition as much as they love the latest global trends. 2. Be an "Immersant," Not a "Tourist": Many expats make the mistake of sticking to their own circles. My wife, Mona, and I made it a point to see the country through the lens of its citizens. When you embrace the local culture, the local team embraces your leadership. 3. Respect the "Invisible Borders": Every country has unwritten rules. In the Philippines, the warmth toward outsiders is matched by a deep sense of national pride. If you don't respect the latter, you will never earn the former. In a market dominated by fierce competitors, understanding the local heartbeat is the difference between satisfactory performance and market leadership. • Resilience: Brands that actively support communities during natural disasters build an emotional bond that transcends price. • Cultural Resonance: Products and campaigns that tap into the pride of Pinoy heritage, their love for fiestas, and their familial values win deeper loyalty. • Relevance: Understanding consumers lifestyle, beliefs and behaviours becomes non-negotiable for relevance. Read more about cultural understanding, competitive battles, leading in an alien environment and much more in my soon to be released book “ A CEO’s BREW”.

What makes India’s festive season so unique is how it reveals consumer behavior in real time. Flipkart’s Big Billion Days 2025 offered a perfect example. In the first 48 hours, the platform clocked 606 million visits, a 21% jump from last year, with unique visitors rising 28% year on year. Gen Z alone contributed 201 million visits, growing at twice the overall pace, while metros still expanded by 23%. The most striking story was in appliances. Through early September, shoppers browsed but held back. Once the sale started and GST 2.0 reforms became visible, demand surged overnight, making appliances the fastest growing category. Beauty and personal care had already seen 20–30% unit growth before the festive week and accelerated further during BBD, especially from tier-2 and tier-3 towns. Fashion reflected two different tracks, with Millennials driving branded categories and Gen Z chasing what trends. To me, this year’s numbers highlight how Indian consumers are no longer impulsive. They are informed, deliberate, and confident, waiting for the right moment when policy, timing, and value align to act at scale. #EcommerceIndia #FestiveEconomy #ConsumerBehavior #GenZShoppers #MillennialTrends #DigitalIndia #GSTReforms #RetailInsights https://lnkd.in/gFtGuadx

After sending over a billion emails for 600+ brands… here are my 7 top tips for selecting the right audience. You can have the best email creative in the world — but if it lands in the wrong inbox, it won’t convert. Audience is everything. Here’s what we’ve learned at esbconnect after years of powering customer acquisition for brands like Tails.com | B Corp , AA Insurance and ASOS.com : 1. Target by behaviour, not just demographics Look for people who open, click, and act. Intent beats age and gender every time. 2. But… don’t always go for the obvious behaviour When Tails.com wanted to reach new pet owners, you'd assume targeting people engaging with pet brands would outperform, right? Wrong. They were being over-targeted. Instead, we found higher conversion by targeting segments engaging with health, home and subscription offers — less crowded and more curious. 3. Test broad, then narrow Start wide to understand what actually performs — then double down. Too niche too soon and you lose scale and surprise wins. 4. Layer in recency Someone who interacted with an email yesterday is more likely to convert than someone who did 3 weeks ago. Recency = relevance. 5. Don’t ignore ‘non-buyers’ Sometimes your best audience is one that’s never bought from the category — yet. Think curious, not converted. 6. Think beyond income — target by contextual wealth We’ve seen clients waste budget by targeting £100k+ earners assuming they’re affluent. But some of the wealthiest people are those on modest incomes with low outgoings — think high equity, long-term property owners with few financial ties. 7. Make it locally relevant A £1m house in London doesn’t signal the same wealth as it does in Scotland or Wales. Tailor your audience selection to geography and cost of living — precision wins. Audience strategy isn’t guesswork. It’s data, nuance, and constant testing. Want help finding your best segments? We’ve got 17 million opted-in UK profiles and years of experience to test with.

Job titles don’t attend events. Real people do. We keep saying events are personal. Yet, our audience definitions aren’t. We default to demographics & titles: - "Our event is designed for senior marketers at B2B firms." - "We cater to IT leaders at Fortune 500 companies." - "This experience targets founders raising Series B funding." The best event marketers I’ve met start differently. They zero in on what's actually driving their audience’s decisions: - How will this event advance their career or their business? - What conversations aren’t being had elsewhere? - Why is this event the trusted source for information and advancement? Titles and demographics help build attendee lists. But they're not enough. Great events aren't built by targeting generic profiles. They happen when you deeply understand, and speak directly to, the struggles your audience can't afford to ignore. Targeting demographics won't make your event stand out. What will? Understanding the problem your event addresses.

"What’s the ideal audience size for LinkedIn ads?"   ↑ An important question I get every few weeks, and it recently surfaced in the Fibbler community. Without the right audience, advertising is pointless. So what is the answer? For years, I defaulted to the classic rule of thumb: ~50,000 per audience segment, but 3 years ago, I stopped as it's misleading. I've been in and around over 1,000+ accounts now and have seen audiences from 1,000 people to 12m (y𝘦𝘴, 12 𝘮𝘪𝘭𝘭𝘪𝘰𝘯) achieve top 1% results. 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐨𝐧𝐥𝐲 𝐫𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 𝐚𝐧𝐬𝐰𝐞𝐫 - your audience size is your audience size, it's just tactic dependent. The question people 𝘴𝘩𝘰𝘶𝘭𝘥 be asking is "how do I know I've targeted the right audience?" The variables in targeting the right audience are: → Strategy (why this audience) → Segmentation (can you split it up) → Penetration (do you want new reach or to be frequent) → Tactics (brand tactics require looser audiences than activation) When thinking about 𝐬𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐠𝐲, the questions you need to ask are: → Who is this offer for? → Who is actually going to care? As LinkedIn is mainly B2B, I match the answer to these questions to targeting and I ALWAYS first start with the company. The 3 options: ↳ Company list (most accurate) ↳ Company size + industry (next best) ↳ Company size (for those with industry-agnostic solutions) Then I work on defining who the people we need to target are. Some variations we often use (there is no right answer here): Functions + Seniority + Skills + JT Exclusions Supertitles + JT Exclusions Functions + JT Exclusions Supertitles + Skills + Excl Function + Groups + Excl 𝐒𝐞𝐠𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 is the next thing to consider. The reasons you should segment: → Geography i.e. do you advertise to different time zones? → Internal structure i.e. having priority companies based on size? → Buying committee i.e. is MQL:SQL rate higher for certain functions? If the answer to any of these is yes, you should consider segmenting your audience pool by that variable. If you have a mass market product, then I'd suggest staying with as large an audience as possible. 𝐏𝐞𝐧𝐞𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 is achieved only by a very simple ratio Budget:Audience The higher the budget and narrower the audience, the higher the frequency. The lower the budget and wider the audience, the lower the frequency. You can control this by ↳ How many targeting variables you add ↳ How many AND layers you apply ↳ How many exclusions you appy ↳ How much budget you spend Finally, you need to consider 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐭𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐜 - in short, the most important point is how tight or loose you WANT to be with this targeting. Be looser with roles for brand awareness and tighter if you have say an incentivised offer. — Bottom line: Only segment for logic and understanding, not to satisfy a rule-of-thumb number. Your audience should be exactly as big (or small) for your company/goal - nothing more, nothing less.

90% of a presentation gets forgotten. So how do audiences decide who's worth remembering? Let’s be honest. Most presentations are totally wiped from people's brains by the time they have their morning coffee the next day. Audiences don't do this maliciously. They do it because their brains are exhausted and trying to filter out the noise. I have sat through enough presentations and delivered enough myself to know one thing: Smart content simply isn't enough. If you don't pass the audience's silent filtering process, you become background noise. That process has three stages: 1️⃣ The Relevance Filter This is where people ask: "Why do I care?" ↳ Talk about their messy reality: Address the exact headache they were complaining about this morning. ↳ Stop zooming out: Nobody wants another 30,000-foot macro trend. Give them the ground view. ↳ Ditch the generic intro: Skip the long wind-up and dive straight into the problem they are facing right now. ↳ Keep it grounded: Use examples that make people nod along and think, “Yeah, I've been there.” ↳ Read the room: If the energy drops, drop your script and address the actual vibe in the space. Once people see your message applies to them, they move to the next filter. 2️⃣ The Resonance Filter This is where people ask: "Do I actually feel this?" ↳ Aim for the gut, not just the brain: Facts change arguments, but emotion changes how people behave. ↳ Lean into the friction: Don't just share a lesson. Share the stakes, the tension, and what went wrong first. ↳ Paint a mental picture: Use analogies that people can physically picture in their minds. ↳ Stop being perfect: People don't connect with flawless case studies. They connect with human slip-ups. ↳ Show the before and after: Paint a crystal-clear contrast between the current pain and the relief you're offering. Feeling something isn't enough. People also need to remember it. 3️⃣ The Retention Filter This is where people ask: "Can I actually repeat this later?" ↳ The 10-word boundary: If your main idea can't fit on a t-shirt, nobody is going to remember it tomorrow. ↳ Ruthlessly kill the fluff: Cut out the extra side stories that dilute your single biggest point. ↳ Give a next-day win: Give them one tiny thing they can literally test out tomorrow morning at 9 AM. ↳ Say it more than once: Don't be afraid to repeat your core catchphrase three or four times. Repetition builds memory. ↳ Make it visual: Give them a simple mental map or sketch that they can easily scribble down in their notes. Great presentations don't overload people with information. They give people something worth remembering. Which of these filters do you see speakers trip over the most? Let me know in the comments 👇 📌 If you want more leadership content like this guide: 1. Follow Lauren Murrell 2. Save the post. 3. Repost to your network. 4. Subscribe to: https://lnkd.in/eRMwPuYk

Consumers are not spending less. They are spending deliberately according to our recent IBM Institute for Business Value 2026 Consumer Research Study ‘Own the agentic commerce experience - Consumers are ready’. Economic pressure is widespread. More than half of consumers globally feel it, including 39% of affluent households. Yet behaviour is not simply defensive. One in three consumers report trading down to cheaper alternatives. 32% say they actively make trade offs to stay within budget. 29% are buying more private label. At the same time, 25% still choose trusted brands even when they cost more. Among Affluent AI Leaders, that rises to 41%. Among Conscious Connectors, 30%. One in five consumers describe themselves as price sensitive in some categories while selectively indulging in others. The lipstick effect is real, but more intentional. Wellness is a major anchor. 30% say diet and nutrition shape purchasing. 26% cite health and fitness goals. Health and wellness and beauty categories are now seen as essential on par with groceries and household goods. This matters because these behaviours generate the data that will train shopping agents. AI will learn not just what people buy, but when they compromise and when they refuse to. Value is no longer cheap versus expensive. It is justified versus not. — The IBM #IBV is the global number one rated consulting thought leader that delivers research led insight at the crosshairs of business, technology society. Sign up to the IBV here: https://lnkd.in/eav5Dc6R Our Consumer 2026 report combines surveys of 18,000 consumers across 23 countries and 200 retail and consumer products executives across 11 countries to examine how AI enabled shopping, trust and precision spending are reshaping commerce. Read the report here: https://lnkd.in/eCvGijDa The paper was authored by me and Dee Waddell, Richard Berkman, Hiroshi Hasegawa, Carlos Capps, Sabu Gopinath, Joe Dittmar, Milad Safadi, Jeremy (Jez) Bassinder, Shantha Farris and led by the inimitable Jane Cheung, our Global Leader for #ConsumerIndustries at the IBV. We are extremely grateful to the Industry Leaders who contributed to this report including Katherine Cullen of The National Retail Federation, Byron Ells of Sobeys, Matthieu Houle, CIO, ALDO Group, Stanislas Vignon, Head of Insights at Louis Vuitton Moët Hennessy (LVMH) as well as the numerous other clients who were interviewed. Also the IBM contributors: Hugo Catarino, Pierre Charchaflian, Kostas Didaskalou, Karl Haller, Mark Innes, Colm O'Brien, Mary Wallace, and the IBV team Sara Aboulhosn, Steve Ballou, Douna Daou, Kathy Martin, Thiago Sartori and Joanna Wilkins. #AgenticCommerce #AIinRetail #ConsumerBehaviour #AI #Retail #ConsumerProducts #CommerceStrategy #Luxury #RetailInnovation #AICommerce #DigitalCommerce #CustomerExperience #ItsAGreatTimeToBeAnIBMer #IBMIBV #Consumer2026

After the dinner I organised between Chinese investors and Saudi officials, a Saudi advisor messaged me. "The dinner was excellent. But the Chinese laughing loudly at how the Arabs were eating hot pot was inappropriate. It could damage the partnership." I had already noticed this during dinner and quietly addressed it with the Chinese delegation. They were genuinely surprised, in Chinese culture, laughing together over food mishaps builds rapport. They thought they were being warm and inclusive. But in Arab business culture, laughing at someone's unfamiliarity with food can be read as mockery, not friendliness. Both sides had good intentions. Neither understood how the other would interpret the moment. This is why I spend so much time on cultural briefings before bringing delegations together. One moment of misunderstood laughter can undo months of relationship building. The Saudi officials remained professional throughout, and the Chinese investors sent enthusiastic follow-up messages about collaboration. To an outside observer, the dinner looked successful. But I know that trust develops or breaks in these small cultural moments, not in formal negotiations. My Saudi contact is now arranging cultural training for Chinese workers joining an Aramco project next month. We'll use this as a case study, not as criticism, but as learning. After twenty years of facilitating cross-border partnerships, I've learned that cultural intelligence determines deal success far more than financial terms. The consultants who studied the Middle East will never catch these moments. Cultural fluency comes from being in the room, reading the signals, and managing both sides in real time. Successful partnerships require someone who understands what each side actually means, not just what they say. #CrossCulturalBusiness #MiddleEastBusiness #SaudiArabia #ChinaBusiness #CulturalIntelligence #InternationalPartnerships #BusinessStrategy #GCCMarkets #DealMaking #BusinessNegotiation #GlobalBusiness #MarketEntry #BusinessLeadership #StrategicPartnerships #CulturalAwareness

AI does not force us to buy. But it can make the invitation more personal, timely and difficult to resist. Search for one product and similar recommendations can soon appear across shopping sites and social media. AI is increasingly helping businesses decide not only what consumers see, but which message may be most persuasive to them. My new article for The Conversation UK explores: • how AI is changing marketing from broad targeting to personalised persuasion • why online shopping can shorten the gap between wanting and buying • how this can contribute to overconsumption and waste • how mindful consumption can help people pause and make more considered choices The article draws on my research into mindful consumption, which views it through awareness, caring and temperance - recognising when enough is enough. My related academic work was published in the Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science. The issue is not simply whether AI makes marketing more effective. It is whether personalisation can remain useful without weakening consumer autonomy or encouraging unnecessary consumption. Read the article here: https://lnkd.in/eKRsamBs Why AI wants you to buy more – and mindfulness could help you buy less I would be interested to hear your view: where should businesses draw the line between helpful personalisation and excessive persuasion? Cardiff Metropolitan University Cardiff School of Management British Academy of Management Sustainable and Responsible Business SIG The Conversation #ArtificialIntelligence #Marketing #ConsumerBehaviour #MindfulConsumption #ResponsibleMarketing #Sustainability