The Importance of being Audience-Centric

BE AUDIENCE-CENTRIC

When I was working for a university in the Midwest,  research indicated the most effective way to reach our target audience (college bound high school students) was to advertise on the radio in three specific markets. We rotated our commercials, or “spots,” every two months. We would run the spots for two weeks, take two weeks off, run them again for two weeks, and so on. We did this for six months each year.

Each time the production team would send me a new spot I would share it with colleagues on the president’s cabinet. The president usually gave a thumbs-up. One VP, on the other hand, was a completely different story. Each time, he would find fault with the spot saying the music bed was inappropriate, or the content was inappropriate, or the voice was inappropriate, or even the radio station was inappropriate. Then I would ask, “Inappropriate for whom?” He would quickly answer, “For me!”

I wasn’t interested in him. I was interested in college bound high school students—not some administrator who worked in higher education for 30 years.

DON’T THINK THAT WAY

That type of thinking is unbelievably common in higher education and it often kills potentially effective marketing and branding plans. The most important ingredient in any successful campaign is connecting with your target audience. I’ll say that again. The most important ingredient in any successful campaign is connecting with your target audience. Who cares what the financial aid director or a tenured professor thinks? They are not members of your target audience. In fact, they are entirely too close to the school to make any judgments regarding what the target audience will like.

MR. DRUCKER SPEAKS

Longtime management and leadership guru Peter Drucker often referred to the importance of the audience in many of his writings. “In marketing one does not begin with the question: “What do we want?” One begins with the questions: “What does the other party want? What are its values? What are its goals? What does it consider results?” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Drucker 

IT’S NOT ALL ABOUT YOU

I have never been able to understand why so many intelligent people refuse to consider the target audience. Instead, many only consider themselves. A longtime employee doesn’t think the way a high school student thinks. Not even close. But, show that longtime employee your school’s proposed magazine ad or web site home page and he immediately decides whether it will be effective or not based on what he likes. That’s why so many university marketing committees fail. Often, several people on the committee see things through their lenses and not the lenses of the audience. But that’s a topic for another post.

THESE ADS ARE TERRIBLE!

Look at magazine ads for higher education. Talk about a complete disregard for the audience. Augh! You’ll find there are basically three types of ads for colleges and universities. The first type features a photograph of an academic building with pillars. The second type features a group of five students, representing various genders, races, colors, nationalities, and religions all looking at one another and smiling. The third is a tight shot of a good looking (but not too good looking) student facing the camera.

Do these ads actually connect with college bound high school students? Of course not. They appeal to administrators who think higher education means buildings or diversity. The ads are a complete waste of money because they do nothing for the target audience. We could remove the name of the school from one ad and replace it with the name of another school and nobody would know the difference. So, try something different. Something that clicks with your audience. To see some a good cross section of effective ads, check out, the “Admissions Marketing Report,” a monthly publication targeting professionals in admissions, communication, and marketing.

IT TAKES GUTS

Very few colleges and universities have the courage to run ads that actually appeal to the audience of prospective students. Why? Mostly, because it’s a difficult sell internally. If the decision makers at the school examine it from their viewpoints and not the viewpoint of the audience, then we’ll be seeing ads with buildings and small diverse groups of students forever.

DO THE RIGHT THING

Know your target audience. Survey them. Talk to them. Determine what they want and how they want it delivered. Then, let ‘em have it. Your campaign and other communication endeavors will stand out from all the noise out there and you will succeed.