Identify the Target Audience for a Stronger Website

Identify the Target Audience for a Stronger Website
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Before a web site begins any sort of design and development, planning must take place. Part of this required planning is defining the target audience. The target audience is the most important part of a website, as knowing about the people using the website will put the designer one step ahead in the design and development stages. Defining the target audience will take time, effort, and research. Here are some tips to help define the target audience of a website.

Start with the website purpose

Before deciding anything about the target of a website, one must first look at the purpose. The website purpose will give designers good starting ground for each of the things which must be considered as defining the target audience occurs. Once a designer knows exactly what the website is for, he or she will be able to better decide who it is meant to target and begin filling in details from there. For example, if a client wants a website to sell his new computer gadget, the designer immediately knows a bit about what needs to be done and can flesh it out with some thought and research before design begins.

Consider website objectives and goals

Continuing with the computer gadget example,what the website needs to do will narrow the focus of the target audience and refine the definition. For instance, if the goal is to increase sales and awareness of the new computer gadget, the designer will know to attract people who will buy the product and focus less on people who may or may not buy the product.

Once you have these things figured out, you can move on to the second part of our series, considering demographics. This will help you begin getting details of the target audience for a website. For more information on the target audience and quality web design, check out: Tips to Improve Web Design Quality.

This post is part of the series: Defining the Target Audience

Learn about defining the target audience of a website. Learn about the importance of a clear target audience definition and how to arrive at the the definition before beginning design.

  1. Website Planning: Target Audience Definition
  2. Web Planning: Target Audience: Demographic Considerations
  3. Web Planning: Target Audience: Technological Considerations
  4. Web Planning: Target Audience Process
  5. Web Planning: Benefits and Measurement of the Target Audience Definition