Strategic Target Acquisition

One of the most difficult concepts for a tech entrepreneur to grasp is that of targeted marketing. The need to focus on a narrow market, especially during product launch and throughout the first year, is a matter of life and death for your business.

Who specifically is your market; what exactly are they seeking and why; where do they “live,”; what makes them feel important in their personal/professional lives; how do they feel about your technology; what organizations do they belong to and why; what magazines or other media do they relate with and why; which blogs do they read and why; how would each of them like for you to market to them and why; how much will it cost for you to do that; for how long will you have to do this marketing until you reach break-even; what are the response rates for advertising through the media that they prefer; how much are they willing to pay for your product; and on and on and on…

All of these questions must be answered in order to develop an effective strategic marketing campaign. Then you must carry out that campaign. It is nearly impossible to do this for multiple or broad audiences with your limited start-up resources, and especially considering the fact that there will be an unusually high level of personnel and product-related issues to deal with in the first year. You must bite into what you can chew.

Here is an analogy:
Several cave men are about to go hunting with clubs. Their goal is to eat. In a field are rabbits, deer, moose, and wooly mammoths. Which would you suggest that they target? How would you suggest that they do so?

In a different scenario, several modern hunters are hunting with elephant-guns. In a field are the same prey. Which would you suggest that they target? How would you suggest that they do so?

The answer to the question of what prey to hunt is very different depending on the tools that you have at your disposal. You need to look at the tools that you have at your disposal and then decide whom to target in your marketing (hunt). Because you are not a corporate behemoth, the target market must be quite narrowly defined. The key here is not your product or even what you want to do, but what you are capable of properly marketing. Pick a focused market, understand it fully, and then hit it hard.

As your resources grow, your target markets can be expanded.