Demographic profile

Demographic profiling has long been a tool utilized by marketers so that they may be as efficient as possible with advertising products or services and identifying any possible gaps in their marketing strategy. Demographic profiling can even be referred to as a euphemism for corporate spying (Hudson, J. 2002). By targeting certain groups who are more likely to be interested in what you are selling, you can more efficiently expend your advertising resources so that they may garner the maximum amount of sales (Arnott, D., & FitzGerald, M. 1996). This is a more direct tactic than simply advertising on the basis that anyone is a potential consumer of your product, as while this may be true, it does not capitalise on the increased returns that more specific marketing will bring (Jothi, A. L. 2015).Traditional demographic profiling has been centered around gathering information on large groups of people in order to identify common trends (GfK. 2016). Trends such as, but not limited to: changes in total population and changes in the composition of the population over a period of time. These trends could promote change in services to a certain portion of the population, in people such as: children, elderly, and the working age population. They can be identified through surveys, in-store purchase information, census data, etc. (Arnott, D., & FitzGerald, M. 1996). New ways are also in the works of collecting and utilizing information for Demographic Profiling. Approaches such as target-sampling, quota-sampling, and even door-to-door screening.

An effective means of compiling a comprehensive demographic profile is the panacea of marketing efforts. To know a person’s name, ethnicity, gender, address, what they buy, where they buy it, how they pay, etc., is a powerful insight into how to best sell them a product (GfK. 2016). The development of this profiling is the goal of many businesses around the world, who are pouring huge amounts of money into researching it. A recent discovery that has drastically changed the way we construct demographic profiles, is metadata (Needel, S. 2013). This is the digital footprint of everyone who uses online services, the more extensive your usage, the extensive the information available on you. Companies such as google and Facebook make enormous profits through the generation and processing of metadata, which can then be utilised by companies wishing to streamline their advertising to those best suited to seeing it. This is what controls the ads on a user’s news feed, or websites they visit (Needel, S. 2013), and means that for example, an avid mountain biker, is more likely to come across ads suited towards that interest. Metadata includes information such as the amount of time spent on a website, what websites you frequent, where you clicked and how many times, what you have purchased, whom you have talked to, what they have purchased and so on. It is so pervasive that most of what you do online contributes to the information being held about you by businesses, and will directly effect what is advertised to you and what mediums this is done through (GfK. 2016).

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