As of the way social media and local and mobile technologies the way marketers communicate has changed - there is an almost constant need for information. A challenge and a content marketing opportunity! Find out how to segment your audience, create personas and map your audiences needs to create targeted, relevant and engaging content for any communication channel your customers may use.

1. Content Marketing Basics – Know Your Audience
Simone Schuurer
Content Marketing & Social Media Manager
Bing Ads Product Marketing
Microsoft

2. Agenda
I. Content
II. Audience segmentation
III. Content planning
IV. Create and connect
V. Recap – things to do today
VI. Questions?

3. Content
 How the need for content has changed
 Valuable, relevant and consistent content

4. How the need for content has changed
Marketers used to create content when there was an internal need to and
they had fewer ways to share that message with that audience. So far so
easy to manage.
Today that model is almost unrecognisable not in the least because of the
rise of social, local and mobile technologies (SoLoMo) Social media
doesn’t ‘do’ one-way conversations. Customers talk to brands and
organisations just as publically as marketers used to talk to their audiences.
This almost naturally changes the nature of how brands and organisations
communicate with their audiences – they are always ‘on’ as customers
don’t only talk to you when you have a new ‘5-door-le-car’ to sell.
There is an almost constant need for content which has some clear
benefits: it helps drive traffic to their website, helps with their SEO rankings
and helps nurture existing relationsto mention a few.
This need also poses a challenge – how to create constant content for this
audience that is engaging?

5. Valuable, relevant and consistent content
From the Content Marketing Institute:
A key part of content marketing is creating and distributing valuable relevant content to acquire a clearly defined audience. To
know if your content is relevant you need to know who your audience is or who your audiences are – and what they need.
Before you start looking at different types of content and formats it is important to know whom you are writing for.

6. Audience segmentation
 Defining your audiences
 Classic ways to define audiences
 Example: Bing Ads geographical targeting
 Example: Bing Ads behavioural targeting
 Example of Bing Ads vertical (+geo) targeting
 Example: Engaging woodland owners – audience segmentation
 Surveys
 Example: Bing Ads survey questions
 Creating personas

7. Defining your audiences

8. Classic ways to define audiences
• Nations, regions, cities
even postcode areas. At
Bing Ads we have different
language blogs that carry
market and audience
relevant information.
Geographic
• Age, gender, the amount
of income, the ethnicity or
religion of the market and
the family life cycle.
Demographic
• Knowledge of, attitude
towards, usage rate or
response to a product
Behavioural
Source:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market_segmentation
• Activities, interests, and
opinions of customers. It
considers how people
spend their leisure and
which external influences
they are most responsive
to and influenced by.
Lifestyle
• Benefits sought by the
consumer or according to
perceived benefits which a
product/service may
provide.
Benefits

9. Classic ways to define audiences
• In the widest sense of
the word – think also of
on what devices people
consume information,
how they access
content.
Media
consumption
• Some companies look
at things like spend,
savings (banks) or what
sort of things someone
buys to target with
relevant content.
Customer
profile
• It can make sense to
approach your
audience by vertical
(insights, offers etc.)
By vertical

10. Example of geographical targeting

11. Examples of behavioural targeting

12. Examples of vertical (+ geo) targeting

14. Surveys

15. Bing Ads example
Who follows us
on social
media? How often
do people
visit our
blog?
Which % of
visitors is a
customer?
Do they use
the
competitor
too?
Which %
of visitors
shares
content?
What country
do visitors
come from?
Who are our
social
influencers?
Which % of
visitors works
for or owns a
small business?
Which % of
visitors works for
an agency or
large business?

16. Creating personas
Personas* are fictional representations of people that
represent different segments of your audience. Part based
on facts such as their demographic characteristics and part
based on an educated speculation on their histories,
motivations and concerns.
You don’t need personas to create targeted content for
segments of your audience but it can help to continue to
put yourself in their shoes and it can help to stay on course
if there are multiple people or teams creating content.
If you don’t have the resources to do an in-depth
segmentation as shown before personas can also be a
‘light’ way of segmenting your audience following roughly
a similar logic:

17. Creating personas
Start looking at the most common
buyers / engagers for your most
common products /services and
give each a detailed description
including job title, role,
demographic information etc.
Income
Where do
they live?
Family set
up
Where do
they
work?
Hobbies?
How do
they
prefer to
shop / do
business?

18. Creating personas
Based on the criteria that make sense for your organisation you
can then outline:
• What problems they are trying to resolve?
• What do they need most?
• What are they information are they searching (in what stage)
Analysing the path that a customer takes to become a potential
customer is a way to also think of the challenges he or she may
encounter.

19. Content Planning
 Mapping content (need) for your audiences
 Content planning
 Personalization advice from the experts
 Example: Woodland owners segmented messaging
 Example: RHS segmented content creation
 Example: Audience (message) segmentation Scottish
Widows

20. Mapping content (need) for your audiences
Identify
Personas,
concerns,
drivers, role
etc.
Questions,
what do the
personas ask
at steps in
their
engagement
process?
Answers
Answer the
questions
your
personas ask
Audit
Audit content
to determine
what’s useful
and what’s
not. Be
critical.
Map
Map content
available to
the questions
that the
content can
answer.
Identify
Holes. Ask:
where are we
missing
content?
Create
Content to fill
the holes

21. Content planning

22. Personalization advice from the experts
1. Monitor what contentis popular
2. Balance your targeting– relevant is good, creepily targeted is not. Make sure you offer a
mix of the following at least:
I. Information on how to use your product or service
II. Answer questions
III. Product information
IV. Insights (industry insights, styling insights, background information)
V. Content written by customers, reviews, blog posts, case studies etc.
3. Take it step by step – Start with ‘basic’ segmentation: by discipline, vertical or geography
and if that works for you add things such as behavioural targeting.
4. Curate more than create – It’s not always necessary to keep creating endless content:
you can also look at what good content you already have and curate in for example
emails or tweets specific content to specific audiences.
5. Understand your audience– It’s critical to know whom you are communicating with and
what the audience needs.

23. Example: engaging woodland owners – audience segmentation

24. RHS – Audience segmentation / content targeting

25. Audience (message) segmentation Scottish Widows

26. Create and connect

27. How to reach your audience?
If you create new content it’s best to think about how you best reach your
audiences with that message and via which channel.
From a social media point of view different networks have different
strengths and deliver the best results if content is created with those
strengths in mind.
For example:
Facebook: Visual: Shareable and likeable relevant pictures and infographics
etc.
Twitter: In the moment” and optimized for short form text. Conversational
blog; facts, numbers, tips, advice. Give back.
LinkedIn: Highly professional. Bespoke content for example access to
experts, ability to network, share professional knowledge, ask questions.
Don’t forget LinkedIn Showcase page and Slideshare.
YouTube: Demonstrate! Ideal for personal delivery of a message , to show
of products, how to videos etc.
Instagram / Pinterest etc.: Highly visual, lifestyle, association.
Blogs: Sharing of news with some detail, announcements that need some
depth.

28. Where are your audiences?

29. Creating the right content for the right channels

30. Creating the right content for the right channels

31. Creating the right content for the right channels

32. Paid targeting to reach audiences
Channel Target Objectives
Facebook Geographical location
(country, city, zip code),
industry, job title, language
or if they have a small
business page on Facebook
Page post engagement,
clicks to website, website
conversions, event
responses, offer claims
Twitter Geographical location,
interests, gender, device,
similarity to other users,
keywords in tweets, device
Get tweets in front of the
right audience, in the right
context, promotion of
events, deals, services. To
reach existing as well as
potential followers.
LinkedIn Geographical location, job
title, industry, language
Raise awareness, shape
perception, drive quality
leads, connect with the
world’s professionals.

34. Start doing today

35. Start doing today
1. Start thinking in a fresh way about who your audiences are.
2. Put yourself in their shoes.
3. Map out what they need, when and why.
What content do you have to address these needs
What content do you need to create?
4. Wonder what are your objectives are– where do they meet needs – how can you bring messages across?
5. Before you create content – spare a thought of where your audiences are most likely to engage.
Think of whether there is a way to create the needed content specifically for the channels that is most likely to engage
your audience.
6. Remember it’s the end of the world as you know it – the best channels vary everywhere in the world.
7. Consider some paid promotions as the targeting options are great and organically content only reaches so far.
8. Keep testing if your segmentation and content provided works.

36. Questions?
 Ask me anything… now, or later.
Simone Schuurer -
@SimoneSchuurer