The "For Whom" Test

All star businesses are very clear about who their core target market is and tend to identify their target market in the tagline of the company.

The problem with many businesses is that they are not focused enough to leap out at the intended audience. For example, the tag-line for Maxim the magazine is - "The best thing that ever happened to men … after women!" The tag-line is clever and makes it clear that the magazine is for heterosexual men. But it's less clear about how it's different from all the other men's magazine's out there. Is it for college students? Is it for older men? Is it for men on holiday? Can you carry it to your work-place?

One example of a good tag-line is from Slashdot. Their tag line says, "News for nerds. Stuff that matters." It's very clear who the target audience is.

The key-word when defining your target market is sacrifice. You need to be willing to sacrifice 99% of the market in order to appeal to your 1%. For example, the folks at Slashdot probably realized that they were losing out on the universe of people who were looking at the business side of technology. But no matter. By being focused on a narrow niche, they increase their appeal to that narrow niche. In fact, nerds are probably happy that the website does not appeal to non-nerds.