265 Reading: Demographic Factors Shaping the Global Marketing Environment
265 Reading: Demographic Factors Shaping the Global Marketing Environment
Using Demographics to Guide Global Marketing Strategy
Whether marketing to domestic or international markets, demographic information can provide important insights about a target market and how to address consumer needs. As discussed during our discussion of consumer behavior, demographics refer to statistical information about the characteristics of a population.
Marketers typically combine several variables to create a demographic profile of a target market. A demographic profile (often shortened to a “demographic”) is a term used in marketing and broadcasting to describe a demographic grouping or a market segment. Common demographic variables to consider for global and domestic marketing purposes include the following:
- Age: Age bands, such as 18–24, 25–34, etc., are great predictors of interest in some types of products. For example, few teenagers wish to purchase denture cream.
- Social class: Social-class bands such as wealthy, middle, and lower classes. The rich, for instance, may want different products than middle and lower classes, and may be willing to pay more.
- Gender: Males and females have different physical attributes that require different hygiene and clothing products. They also tend to have distinctive male/female mindsets and roles in the family and household decision-making.
- Religious affiliations: Religion is linked to individual values as well as holiday celebrations, often tied to consumer preferences and spending patterns.
- Income brackets: Indicating level of wealth, disposable income, and quality of life.
- Education: The level of education is often tied to consumer preferences, as well as income.
- Geography: Area of residence, urban vs. rural, and population density can all be important inputs into marketing strategy and decisions about where and how to target advertising and other elements of the promotion mix.
Demographic research may include a variety of other characteristics used to separate a country’s population into groups that fit a company’s target customer profile. A demographic profile also provides enough information about the typical member of this group to create a mental picture of this hypothetical aggregate. For example, a marketer might speak of the single, female, middle-class, aged 18–24, college-educated demographic.
Researchers examining demographics typically have two objectives in mind: first, to segment the market by determining which subgroups exist in the overall population; and second, to create a clear and complete picture of the characteristics displayed by typical members of each segment. Once these profiles are constructed, marketers can use them to develop the targeting strategy and accompanying marketing strategy and marketing plan.
With demographic profiles about target segments in hand, marketers evaluate the marketing mix. They make recommendations about whether to change, decrease, or increase the good