An audience strategy is a journey plan
A segmentation is a map. A strategy says where you're going, which way, and when you'll check the route again.
3rd December 2023
A segmentation tells you what's out there. It doesn't tell you where to go. That's the difference between a map and a journey plan, and it's the difference between audience research and an audience strategy.
A journey plan has four parts. So does an audience strategy.
A destination. Not "grow", but a named outcome: which audience, doing what, by when. More awareness among people who've never heard of you, more repeat purchase from the people who already buy, a first foothold in a new market. Pick one to lead. Without a destination you can't tell when you've arrived, and you can't choose between routes.
The terrain. Who's out there, what they need, how they behave, which groups matter and which don't. This is the research and the segmentation. It's necessary, and it's descriptive. A map doesn't have an opinion about where you should go.
The route. There's always more than one way to the same place: which audience to lead with, which channels, what to change in the product, which partners to bring. The plan picks one, given what you actually have to work with, and says why. Listing the options isn't the strategy. Choosing is.
Re-planning. Audiences move. Tastes shift, a competitor arrives, a channel stops working. A plan made two years ago describes ground that has since changed. So a good plan carries the date you'll look again, and the signal that would make you look sooner.
The metaphor earns its place because it separates three things companies tend to blur: the map, the plan and the trip. It's quite possible to own an expensive map, never write down where you're going, and never agree what would make you change route.
What to do on Monday
- Write your audience destination in one sentence: which audience, what behaviour, what date.
- Take your segmentation and mark which segments the route goes through, and which it deliberately skips.
- Put a re-planning date in the diary, and write down the one change in your audience that would trigger it early.
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