Hey,
It's great to see so many of my Facebook friends now using Steemit. I wish you all the success with this cool platform.
I just wanted to give you some value with regards to focusing on your target audience. Creating content on here is great. A lot of you are doing awesome work already. However, just by thinking about your target audience a little, you will be able to create content that will be so valuable and will most certainly get those upvotes you are looking for.
So, it’s time to define your target audience for your Steemit posts.
You need to find out who you're actually writing for. What are the problems they face around your topic? Once you know what they’re struggling with, you can create content that your readers will love you for.
It is difficult to create content without knowing exactly who you are writing for. The more information you have about your target audience, they easier it will be to create content that will get upvotes.
Knowledge about your target audience will improve your writing style, quality of content, and may even mean the difference between success and failure on Steemit.
Research Blog Audience In Forums
A good way to get started on your research is by using good old Google search. Type your topic + the word ‘forum’ and then click on search. You’ll get a list of forums that are dedicated to people with an interest in your topic.
You can now join these forums, go through the threads and make note of the type of questions people are asking. These questions are basically the pain points of your audience. These are the problems that need solving, and you’re going to solve them with your content.
You may also want to check the Q&A forums Quora.com and Yahoo Answers
So the next time someone uses a search engine to find the answer to the same problem, your Steemit post will appear on the search list, ideally. Obviously, ranking on Google takes some time. However, if you use the right keywords within your content and optimise your post using rich media, there’s no reason why it shouldn’t pop up.
Just make sure you use the common keywords from the forum question and run them through a keyword tool to see how many monthly searches it’s getting. You can use Google Keywords AdWords Planner Tool to bring up the number of searches.
The members of niche forums represent your target audience. Engage with them and try and understand who they are. Are they professionals? Are they men? Are they women? How old are they? What are their interests? What kind of problems do they have?
Define their background and demographics by visiting their profiles, or by reading their comments.
Advanced Keyword Research
Keywords are the words people type into search engines to find solutions to their problems. By using these keywords withn your Steemit post, your content is more likely to be found.
I go a bit deeper with my keyword research by using an advance tool called LongTail Pro, which allows me to see the top 10 competitor sites that are ranking for the keyword that I want to target. I can then check them out to see where they’re failing.
I can also see their keyword competitiveness which helps me decide on whether or not it’s worth competiting.
If sites have a KC of below 30, I compete, any sites above 30 are difficult to beat. I can also check the number of external links it has to authority sites. The more authority links it has, the tougher it is to compete.
You can find out more about your audience by engaging with them on social media. You can go to to find out what kind of questions people are asking within your niche.
Try to identify their pain points and understand what they need. Once you know what your audience needs, you will find it much easier to provide create content that they will find useful.
By creating valuable content that solves problems of your target audience, you will have them return and also be willing to buy any affiliate products you recommend.
One way of understanding your target audience is by using this information to create an avatar to represent your overall target audience. Using an avatar will make it easier to create engaging valuable content.
Here is a list of things you need to research to define target audience:
• Background: Job, career path, family
• Demographics: Sex, age, location, income, education
• Goals & Values: Primary goal, secondary goal
• Challenges & Pain Points: Primary challenge, secondary challenge
• Sources of Information: Blogs/Websites, Books, Magazines, Conferences, Gurus
• Solution: To help achieve goal, to help overcome challenge
• Objections: Why may they object to buying the product your promote
• Marketing Message: How will you describe your solution to your persona
• Elevator Pitch: How would you sell your solution to your persona
• Objections: Objections to sale
You can create several persona profiles to represent a wider target audience. You can also visit social media pages related to your niche topic to find further information.
Ubersuggest
When building your presence on Steemit, you will need to think of lots of new ideas for Steemit posts related to your niche topic.
These posts also need to be what people are actually looking for on Steemit. This is where the next tool comes in handy.
This free online tool is called Übersuggest. You can use it to generate suggestions of long tail keywords from your seed keywords. It generates long lists of long tail keywords that you can then analyse in more advanced keyword tools.
The suggestions are from real search queries. All you have to do is enter the seed keyword, click a button and wait for it to flood you with a long list of long tail keywords. You can use these long tail keywords to get ideas for your posts.
Buyer Keywords
Buyer keywords are the words or phrases that people type in search engines when they are ready to buy a product or service. Usually they have already decided to purchase and are just looking for the product.
They could be looking for a specific product, or any product that resolves a problem they have. By targeting buyer keywords, you will be able to focus your efforts on people who are most likely to buy before leaving your post.
When researching on forums, look out for buyer keywords. For example, you may find a thread title like, ‘Where can I buy cheap domains?’
Go into these threads and identify more buyer keywords. Look out for keywords that include the words – buy, purchase, review, order, value, sale or discount.
Profitable keywords are ones that:
• Include the name of the product your promoting
• Suggest the visitor wants to buy a product
• Suggest the visitor wants to learn something
• Suggest the visitor needs to resolve a problem
People use the internet as a source of learning. When they need to know how to do something, their search usually begins with ‘how to’. In this case they are looking to learn how to resolve a problem and may be willing to pay for the knowledge.
Therefore including ‘how to’ within your keyword phrase will target the visitors how want to learn something and this can be profitable for you if that’s something you can provide.
People also compare products when they are close to buying. They may have narrowed down their search to two or three products and are looking for expert information that will help them make the right purchase.
You can compare the products by providing the pros and cons of them both. You can encourage them to buy a recommended affiliate product. By including ‘vs’ and the product names within your keyword, you can target people who are comparing products with the intention of buying.
Once you’ve decided on your topic, you can get started on researching your blog audience.
You’re probably itching to start creating content. However, it’s very important to pause for a second and ask yourself – Who am I planning to create content for? Who will be interested in what I have to share?
Researching your blog audience will help you to create valuable content and avoid wasting your time and effort.
You may have a vague idea, but it’s going to help you a lot if you take some time to understand the lifestyle, habits and pain points of your ideal audience.
If you can create an audience persona with all the characteristics of the type of person who will be interested in your topic, it will be a lot easier for you to communicate effectively and build a relationship.
So, in this article I’m going to help you to carry out some audience research so that you know you’re audience and creating content becomes a breeze for you.
The first thing you need to do is find out where your audience is hanging out online. By engaging with your audience, you will able to understand their needs and create content to meet those needs.
Research Blog Audience On Social Networks
Go over to Facebook and join groups focusing on your chosen topic. Once you’re accepted, start engaging with other members by commenting on posts. You can also try and add them as friends (for business purposes) and share some of your knowledge too.
Make sure you come across as someone helpful and likeable, not someone who’s trying to sell something. Don’t post links to affiliate products. Since there’s no relationship built yet, you’re links will not be appreciated and may be seen as spam.
You can also set up a Facebook Ad and use the demographics data that Facebook provides for your targeted audience.
Eventually you can share your Steemit posts on Facebook. But first you will have to build trust and a following.
Search for popular hashtags related to your topic and then follow people who have posted using those hashtags. Post short, relevant comments that show your knowledge and your passion for the topic.
By following other people who have lots of followers and are targeting the same audience, you will be able to study the way they communicate with their audience. This will help you to model after people who are already successful on Twitter.
By networking, you will have a chance of getting your tweets shared with their followers. Soon you will have relevant blog posts to share.
Post images that your audience will like. The images could be of anything, but ideal they should be related to your topic so that you capture an audience who is interested in the topic.
Snapchat
Get your Instagram friends to follow you on Snapchat by sharing your Snapchat url link within the bio of your Instagram profile page. You can also post your Snapchat url on Facebook to get friends from there.
The great thing about Snapchat is that you can communicate directly with your audience. You can share photos, and very short clips from your life. It’s a great way to build a relationship with your audience because you are sharing raw clips of you and showing them a glimps of your life.
Once you’ve built the relationship with your Snapchatters, you can get them to message you with their struggles and help them out with your snaps.
Later on, you can let them know that you have are on Steemit and that they may find your content interesting.