Week 4 :: Defining a Target Market

The business I am choosing to work with is appliance repair. The owner is the technician and his wife helps with some of the phone calls and office duties.

Trying to determine the perfect client/market was interesting exercise.

Appliance Repair Business

Target Market -

Potential clients, anyone that owns, or uses appliances -

Homeowners

Apartment/Condo complexes

Small businesses

RV owners

Demographics are the quantifiable statistics of a given population -

I narrowed the potential clients down to residential homeowners.

Age  …..  25 yrs - 75 yrs

Education  …..  Minimum - high school

Ethnicity  …..  N/A

Gender  …..  I think most of the time business would be dealing with the wife, or the stay at home person. That may be biased but in my experience I think it’s accurate.

Income  …..  $40,000 +

Religion  …..  N/A

Describe your target market psycho-graphically -

People that care about their homes & families, taking care of their appliances

They lead busy lives, with work or family or both. They need to depend that their equipment will be in working order when they need it. Additionally, they may entertain frequently and need to have everything working properly.

Describe your target market behavioristically -

For many people, brand and company loyalty is important, both with the appliances they own and the repair people who come to the home to service them.

I think most homeowners value convenience, a good price, and quality, probably in that order.

What is the problem your product or service solves?

The problem our service is solving is fixing something that does not work. Most of the appliances in the home, esp. the large ones are needed on a daily basis. Most households would have a huge problem if they had to do without for any length of time.

Using Red Ocean vs. Blue Ocean Strategy -

I spoke with the business owner and you could conceivably create a niche market servicing one brand of appliances, or one type of appliance, however, he was concerned that approach would severely limit his income.

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I have never used social media (with the exception of a very small amount of time with Instagram) but I really liked the idea presented in the text about creating a community on Facebook. Sounded to me like that would be a good way to get to know people in a very non-threatening environment. 

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