“My target audience isn’t on social media, I already tried.”

I’ll let James McAvoy and Michael Fassbender recreate the reaction a coworker and I had when a lead recently made that definitive statement:

This argument is incredibly common, especially in “non-sexy” industries, and many companies resist digital marketing because they’re convinced that it won’t work for them. I hear this most in the B2B space and from those who market to older populations.

If you think this, I have some facts for you to check.

Social Media Usage By Age

In 2014 social media was used by

• 89% of adults 18-29
• 82% of adults 30-49
• 65% of adults 50-64
• 49% of adults 65 and older

By now, at least half of each age demographic will consider themselves users of social media. Except maybe babies.

Social Media Usage By Income

In 2014 social media sites were used by

• 79% of adults making under $30,000
• 73% of adults making between $30,000 and $49,000
• 70% of adults making between $50,000 and $74,999
• 78% of adults making over $75,000

Socio-economic class doesn’t seem to make too much of a difference on overall social media usage.

Social Media Usage By Gender

In 2014, social media was used by

• 72% of men
• 76% of women

It’s not all Taylor Swift gifs and low-calorie recipes!

Social Media Usage by Education Level

In 2014, social media sites were used by

• 72% of adults with no more than a high school degree
• 78% of adults who attended at least some college
• 73% of adults who had at least 1 college degree

Once again, there isn’t much fluctuation.

So Why Hasn’t It Worked For Me?

The fact is, members of your target audience are absolutely on social media. In many cases, though, they’re just not talking about you. 

 

 

A 55 year old woman will log on to Pinterest, but she won’t be re-pinning menopausal or incontinence products. An industrial construction project manager will log on to Facebook, but he sure won’t be sharing office organization solutions on his friend’s wall.

That’s why it’s important to know more about your audience than what they want out of your product. They’re online. I promise. You just have to find them and talk to them about things they want to talk about on social media.

The key is in becoming an organic part of their social media consumption. Share the type of content that your audience actually wants to interact with in the way that’s most intuitive to them. I’ll be honest, that usually means deviating from traditional approaches. It may not make sense to salespeople or to advertisers or to the c-suite, but it isn’t supposed to. It’s supposed to make sense to the consumer.

 

To talk more about your elusive audience and tactics to reach them, reach out to us. We love this stuff!

(All statistics were from Pew Research)