Question

Topic: Strategy

Developing An Audience

Posted by Amanda Kaiser on 10/26/2011 at 12:51 PM ET 250 Points
What are some good ways to develop an audience/tribe/following when you have few connections in the target audience. Assume I am starting from scratch (with no-low budget) trying to develop a completely new audience.
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RESPONSES

  • Posted by Jay Hamilton-Roth on 10/26/2011 at 5:39 PM Member
    Are you trying to sell something to that group of people or trying to learn something from them? Socially, the best way is to join the audience, listen, ask, and learn from them until you understand their needs and can be "selling from within". If you're trying to lead an audience, find out who the influencers are, and open a discussion with them, but only do so when you've first done your homework (otherwise it's basically a cold call where you're asking them to help you figure out how to define what the audience wants and then sell it to them).
  • Posted by Gary Bloomer on 10/29/2011 at 4:30 PM Accepted
    Dear Amanda,

    Who do you want to connect with and why? What have you got (in terms of your offer) that appeals to your audience in such a way as to make them want to cross over to join your tribe?

    Why must you develop a new audience? What existing audiences are there that you might tap into?

    Generally, people like people that remind them of themselves, or they like people that paint pictures of the people that they (as the audience) want to be more like—if you see what I mean.

    So, create these bridges and you'll encourage people to cross over. But, in order to do this, in order to cross, there must be a reason that's good enough and socially appealing enough to make people WANT to cross, or to make them NEED to cross.

    The pay off—the reward for crossing, for joining— MUST be enough to keep people engaged. If it isn't, the offer falls apart, the bridge crumbles, and your brand finds itself stranded.

    Gary Bloomer
    Princeton, NJ, USA
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