Stereotyping

Stereotyping Can Effect Business Communications

To avoid communication barriers, business owners must learn all they can about the business's present and potential customers. The knowledge acquired from answering questions six through ten reveals the different types of communications and media required to communicate effectively with targeted markets.

1. How do the public demographics covered in questions one through five enhance communications?

Knowing segments like age, occupation, income, gender and national origin of a target market reveals a wealth of additional characteristics. Putting these characteristics into a table or matrix reveals the characteristics most repeated across segments. The four or five characteristics most repeated or shared provide good appeals for the market. Just considering one segment is similar to stereotyping. But gathering information across segments adds detail. It enables business owners to better understand market members and to more effectively communicate with them.

2. How can these appeals best be expressed verbally?

Knowing a public's shared characteristics provide communicators with detailed ways to improve verbal and visual communications. Writing style and level as well as verbal appeals must conform to shared characteristics.

For instance, self-improvement and how-to-information articles written in a simple style communicate well with lower class members because such articles help them to meet their needs on limited incomes. Middle class people can be better reached with articles written in a more complex style about advancing their careers and financing their children's education.

3. How can these appeals best be expressed visually?

Preferences for graphic design techniques, colors, and art also vary by shared characteristics. For instance:

• Generations X and Y prefer centered typesetting for headlines while Baby Boomers and the World War II generation prefer aligned left headlines.

• Young single women prefer earth tone shades while married women with children prefer pastels.

• People who are well educated and in the higher social classes like abstract art, while less educated, working class people prefer realistic photographs.

4. What communication vehicles best reach the public?

Different public characteristics also provide keys to selecting communication vehicles and topics. Consider the differences below by social classes and generations.

• Working class - prefer lively advertisements and promotions, self-improvement and how-to articles.

• Middle class - want information about living graciously on middle class incomes, bettering their careers, improving their homes and family life.

• Upper class - primarily seek investment and financial information.

• Generations X and Y don't trust the media and prefer person-to-person communications.

• Generation X - prefers communications through music and over the Internet.

• Generation Y - prefers loud and quick moving visuals, and humorous and emotional representations of their lifestyles.

• World War II - prefers print publications that provide information on staying healthy and managing their limited incomes.

5. How can business owners best use this information to meet their purposes and improve their communications? Business owners can improve their communication effectiveness by using the Matrix Market Segmentation process to determine the best appeals for any market.

Get a free report of the Matrix Market Segmentation process at http://www.StrategicMarketSegmentation.com/blog.

By Linda P. Morton, author; Strategic Publications: Designing for Target Publics
Linda P. Morton, Ed.D, APR, introduced her segmentation process in her book, Strategic Publications: Designing for Target Publics. She wrote a column on the process in Public Relations Quarterly from 1998 through 2006.