Welcome back y'all, now that we're building a relationship, it's about time we talked about the next A:

Audience

Know your audience. Any marketer worth half their salt will tell you this. Breathe in oxygen. Know your audience. This couldn't be more true in today’s world, where the "spray and pray" method has been virtually driven to extinction. You best believe consumers expect your messages to be tailored directly and immediately to each of them as individuals.

Thanks, technology!

Okay, so what does this really mean, “know your audience?”

You've got to recognize them as fully fleshed out people. As human beings. Know what they see, hear, think, and feel every day - especially as it relates to whatever service you’re providing them.

As a skilled marketer, you're well familiar with personas. You've got your personas all ironed out for your audience. You know what they drive, what they smoke, where and when they do pilates.

1. Have you built an Empathy Map? It's a supplement to the persona. It maps out everything a consumer perceives as it relates to your service or product. That includes the things they see, the things they hear, even their feelings and internal thoughts. "Surely you can't get that deep into a stranger’s mind," you would say, and astutely so. Yet there are Pareto estimates you can make effectively. Put yourself in their shoes sincerely. That can get you pretty far. Next, surely as a marketer you're always monitoring feedback from your consumers. Consider the feedback you've already received from people in similar positions from a similar cohort.

2. Start concepting from the audience back. Since your real goal is to make positive change in people’s lives, you’ll have no problem here. Discover a particular need of your audience. Resolve to deliver them a helpful resource. Do the research to create something useful for them. Build a headline based off that specific need, then fill in the blanks. The best way to predict the future is to create it. The best way to create the future is to just do it.

3. Build a human connection with your audience. When you know your audience, you can reveal facets of yourself that help build rapport with them. You yourself, of course, are a multifaceted human being with worlds of thoughts, feelings, aspirations, anxieties, and contradictions inside you. There are tons of personal notes you can touch on, if you would share them. They'll relate you to your audience. You might have a green thumb that would make Martha Stewart jealous. And you might be a semi-pro bowler in addition to your passion for content marketing. But if you’re talking to the dog-focused crowd, the audience is going to want to hear more about your 3-year old rescue mutt Riley than about your dexterity at swinging your balls.

Your content may be well-researched, well-written, grammatically on point, and pragmatically useful. But if it isn't directed to a specific audience you're trying to help, it's worthless. It just won't move the needle. And if it doesn't include any human elements to connect you with your audience, you're not going to get the traction you need to make lasting change.

Know your audience! Good things will happen for them and for you.