Know Your Audience
But how do you get to know your audience? Is it as simple as finding out that teenagers prefer Twitter over Facebook? Men prefer words in their ads over images? The task of understanding the audience should be given a much more detailed amount of attention.
There are many ads that are visually interesting, but not all actually persuade their intended audience to make a decision on the subject matter.
If you grew up in Maryland in the late 80's and 90's you may remember this campaign…
The tag line implies that the message is targeted towards parents, when in actuality I believe it was targeted towards children. The word Virgin is written in graffiti (a culture for the youth) and it's the kid in the tagline who actually needs the lesson. I remember seeing this ad as a kid and it triggered an immediate reaction. Up until that point all I had known of the word was that it was associated with a topic I was not supposed to discuss. My classmates and I always giggled to the sound of that word. But seriously after seeing this ad, I soon stopped laughing and understood that it was a word intended to prevent me from future regrets. (I was a smart kid, I know)
I wonder though, if Virgin were written in Gill Sans and the tagline read "Hey kids, its not a dirty word" would I still have gotten the message. If that were the case, I'm guessing I would have ignored the campaign feeling like I was being talked down to by another adult.
To get to the point it's important to understand your audience deeper than knowing their age, gender, or what types of television shows they watch. It's more important to understand why we do the things we do. Some people are appalled by shows like Love and Hip Hop on VH1, but continue to watch (no, I'm not talking about myself). So why do I, I mean they continue to watch?
It's the question of why more, than the initial stats that help us become more in tune with how to connect to the intended audience.
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