Chicago AMA | For Marketing Professionals

Zeroing In on Target Markets

MARKETING RESEARCH MAKES THE MOST effective contribution to strategic decisions affecting the marketing of products and services to consumers when it is combined with true understanding of the target consumer. In trying to reach African-American and Hispanic consumers, among others, such insights not only help minimize risk -- they can mean the difference between marketplace success and failure.

A segmentation study can help provide rich understanding of a category, says Dr. Abel Jeuland, Charles H. Kellstadt Professor of Marketing at University of Chicago Graduate School of Business, for "the marketer who is astute and wants to understand that richness."

Lorraine Miller of Burrell Communications Group agrees, noting that, to maximize marketing opportunities among African-Americans, researchers must incorporate "sincerity, commitment and common sense -- and rarely do I see all of these happening in research of this segment.

"Researching African-Americans," she emphasizes,"is simply market segmentation with ethnicity as the key distinguishing variable."

Miller advises keeping one critical factor at the fore when considering marketing to African-Americans: "Black-skinned people are not simply dark- skinned white people. Keeping this in mind, researchers can then use standard research techniques. There's no need to reinvent the research wheel."

She also counsels against using qualitative research to constitute the totality of any real research effort and suggests, "Put your money where your questions are" noting that some costs " can be minimized if you research smarter -- such as selecting a mall in an area of high black population for mall intercepts."

Importantly, she says, marketers should "Look for insight, not just support. Most people use ethnic market research the way a drunk uses a lamp post...more for support than illumination."

According to Maureen Linder-Shirley, Marketing Manager for The Quaker Oats Company, her organization learned some very important lessons in working to market its Cap'n Crunch cereal brand to Hispanic consumers.

She shares some of the key lessons, as follows:

the fear of making mistakes and offending can be paralyzing more analysis and no action means opportunities lost
be aware that people have preconceptions in their heads (such preconceptions) are not necessarily negative; human beings "categorize" by nature
use research as the basis of, and backup for, recommendations know the target consumer bring objectivity

These insights by Jeuland, Miller and Linder-Shirley were shared in a recent Chicago AMA program presented by the Chapter's Marketing Research Division.

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