Market Segmentation Can Help You Grow, or Gain, Market Share

You dont need to buy market share, you need to learn how to earn market share. Market segmentation is one of the functions within the overall marketing plan that will help you earn your share of the market. By segmenting your market into more targeted buyers or groups of buyers you will be able to grow existing sales and build new sales; and grow them without cutting price. The goal for market segmentation is to target the most likely to buy and understand your target market enough to focus in on what it needs.

There are a number of different levels of market segmentation: mass marketing, segment marketing, niche marketing, local marketing, one-to-one or direct marketing - each level has different attributes.

In mass marketing, you produce one product that serves all markets and that can be produced in mass and distributed in mass. For example, paper clips, which can be mass produced, mass distributed and can serve all its markets business, financial, school, etc..

In segment marketing, your product can appeal to buyers in different groups or segments. These buyer segments have similar needs and wants. Segments are determined by assessing certain criteria. For example, product-usage patterns, demographics, psychographics, and geographics and more. The benefit of segment marketing over mass marketing is that you can narrow the product offering to specifically address the needs of the market segment you have defined as your primary, or secondary, or tertiary market. The other elements of marketing mix; price, promotion and distribution can also be more focused to deliver the needs of the market segment.

In niche marketing, you will narrow the market segments even further to find smaller markets that are less populated by competitors and that are under-served by others. To find your niche market, assess the market segment for similar needs and wants and divide the segment into smaller niches. To do well in niche marketing you must understand your customers extremely well and you must be able to understand their business, or their needs and wants well enough to provide solutions. Specializing in niche markets often results in higher costs not the economies of scale that you find in mass marketing, and even to some degree, in segment marketing, and also higher profits if customers recognize and accept the value your product brings.

In local marketing, you will focus on a local area or region to market your product. This does not mean that your product is not sold globally, it means that you focus on building marketing programs or tactics that address the local area needs and wants for your product. For example, shopping in Vancouver, British Columbia typically is at street level so storefront displays are large and dramatic; while shopping in Calgary, Alberta often happens inside malls because of weather conditions, resulting in smaller storefronts inside the mall and smaller scale displays.

One-to-one or direct marketing is the latest marketing segmentation strategy and it comes from a segmentation approach called individual marketing. One-to-one marketing is a segment of one, compared to a segment of many. Building your marketing concept is focused on how to identify the needs of one individual and how to target that one in your marketing plans. To be successful in direct marketing you must be able to either collect or acquire data on individual buyer behavior, habits, and attitudes many loyalty card programs collect that type of data. Computer technology has enabled this type of market segmentation.

To best identify your market segments, you will need to conduct research surveys, perhaps by using focus groups or other exploratory interview techniques; you will need to analyze the data you gather; and then you will need to develop a profile of each segment that you identify. Be aware that consumer and business market segmentations use somewhat different approaches to reflect the differences in consumer and business markets.

Once you have identified your market segments, you must evaluate and select the target marketing segment and approach best suited to your product, and to your business objectives, strategies and resources. Your small business growth objectives can be supported by a strong market segmentation approach.


About the Author

Kris Bovay owns Voice Marketing Inc, the business and marketing services company. Kris has worked for, and with, a range of small, medium and large businesses and has been able to help business owners focus on their challenges and improve their business results. For more business advice, visit

Relaited Links:

• Getting Inside Your Customers Heads
• The Keys to Developing Successful Marketing Strategies
• Getting Inside Your Customers Heads

How To Drum Up More Business In Essex

Graphic design in Essex is a huge competitive market in and there are many companies offering the same type of services to the public. This leads to an extremely close market and the best business will be the one that offers the best all round service. Graphic design covers a huge area and there are many factors that are involved when trying to create the best design for all the different types of business.

The market spans from website designing to leaflets and advertising boards to exhibitions and multimedia. This means that a graphic design team has to have a huge variety of skills as each different task needs a different output and look to the next. Because this is such a huge market there is plenty of money involved and a highly disciplined and organised design team can be very successful for a business.

For a company designing a product, the graphics team will play a big part with the success of that product, and the main features are key to allowing the product sell to its expected level. For example, a graphic design team will help develop the advertising of the product including brochures and leaflets as well as billboards and websites.

First they help identify the product to the public by making it stand out to the people that pass it. This might be by designing a very attractive layout or colour design or highlighting the product in a special way such as making it very big in the centre of the advert. If you have a very attractive advertisement campaign then the potential customers are going to be more interested in your company than your competitors. This will dramatically increase the companys sales and may increase the value of the business.

With marketing a product you need to know how you are going to set about showing the product to the public and what methods you are going to use. This is because if the public do not see the product properly then they do not know that the product exists and therefore dont buy it.

For Essex based businesses, with presentations and leaflets a company expert in graphic design in Essex will set about making the product stand out and grab the publics attention. Their main aim is to make the product the key feature in the picture and to be able to make it look like it is very good, this is also called making a good first impression. This is because if the product makes a good first impression on people that are walking past then they are more likely to purchase the product. This is what the graphic design in Essex team main aim is and to do it properly you need to be planned and organised to allow time to develop the ideas into a proper advertising campaign.

With a proper graphics design team leading a good advertisement campaign they are twice as more likely to see their business grow than a company that doesnt allow these steps. This is the main reason why graphic designers are as important to a business as without them the business could simply not survive or work to its full potential.

This is generally why the market is growing and expanding because more businesses need graphics design in Essex to help design everything to do with their products and website. A website with graphics and colours in correct places will allow customers to be drawn to the services or product and it ensures that the website will become appealing to the people that visit it and can easily identify what the business is selling or offering.


About the Author

Financial expert Catherine Harvey talks to marketing guru James Parker about how

Relaited Links:

• Law Firm Marketing Strategies to Use after Securing the Client
• Do You Need Help Designing A Better Yellow Page Ad?
• How to Drive Free Traffic to Your Website - Part One