One Size Fits All Marketing?

Levi Strauss has announced that it is going to go against conventional wisdom and run with a one size fits all product and ad campaign.  They are no longer going to alter the way their jeans fit and the way they are marketed based on the region.  Instead they are keeping the same fit and running the same ad campaign regardless of locale.  There are a number of speculations as to why they are doing this but the Wall Street Journal quotes Levi Strauss CEO John Anderson as saying that “the company is going with both a global fit and global campaign because it believes straight-leg jeans are a global fashion trend, and now is the time to establish the 501 as the obvious option for shoppers around the world.”  Traditional advertising rules state that you should tailor your product and marketing to fit your target market and that the more the audience relates to your message the better your ad campaign will be.  Maybe by using the global fit concept Levi will write some new rules.  It will be interesting to see how it works out for them.  In the meantime, I think it is still better to target your markets with a specific message tailored just for them.

That being said, I am going to imagine that as a small business owner and marketer you know who your target market is.  You may say that your target market is other small businesses, young adults, women, people interested in their health, and the list could go on forever.   There are very few of us that could say that our target market is literally everyone.  So since your product and/or service is not one size fits all, you need to make sure your marketing isn’t either.  The key to making your messages extremely relevant to your audience is to get extremely specific about who they are and what they need.

As I said above, when talking about who your target markets are you may say women or people interested in their health.  That is pretty specific but not specific enough.  Within each of those markets you will find other groups.  For example, if I were running a martial arts studio I could say that my target market would be people interested in martial arts.  But that is way too general and therefore difficult to develop a marketing message around.  Within that group of people are many other markets - you have women that want to lose weight, women that want to learn to defend themselves, men that want learn how to defend their women, men that want to fulfill their Bruce Lee fantasies, children that idolize the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Power Rangers, parents that want their kids to be able to defend themselves against stranger danger, people who simply love the martial arts for it’s beauty, strength and discipline, Mixed Martial Arts fans, Jiu Jitsu lovers, etc, etc.  Now that I have broken down my target market groups I can develop marketing that will be specific to each group…something that will have a relevant message just for them.

While an ad for women interested in learning to defend themselves might include images of seedy looking characters ready to prey on seemingly defenseless women, an ad targeting a pure martial arts enthusiast might include images of Shaolin monks practicing in ancient temples - both would be marketing to people interested in martial arts and both would be marketing my business.

By tailoring your messages to be extremely relevant to each market you hope to capture, you can avoid one size fits all marketing. 

The formula is simple:

• Identify your target audience.   (Ex:  People interested in martial arts.)
• Break it down into specific markets within that audience.  (Ex: Women interested in martial arts.)
• Break those markets down even further into sub markets if possible.  (Ex: Women interested in martial arts as a means to defend themselves.)
• Serve each group advertising that is extremely relevant to them.  (Ex: Ad showing images of seedy characters looking to prey on women with ad copy to match.) 

Your thoughts?

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