Target Audience

You need to know whom your web-site is targeting. If you already operate a web-site, you have probably already completed a user survey or two, which means you know something about your average user. You can choose to talk to the same audience, or move to a slightly different audience.

Some parameters for user groups that you should think through:

Business to business	Business to consumer
Are you aiming for customers in a particular field?	Are you aiming for users of a particular gender?
Are you aiming for companies of a certain size?	Are you aiming for users in a certain age group?
Are you aiming for customers in a certain place?	Are you aiming for users in a certain place?
What position in his/her company will your reader hold?	Are you aiming for users with specific interests?

These kinds of parameters are not as descriptive as they used to be. Yet, it is still a good idea to set up a basic profile of your reader that you can use to help you make decisions in the design of web communication.

You can and should check the quality of your communication once the site is up and running by using the "persona" technique: Imagine a concrete person in your audience and try to see your web-site through the eyes of this "persona". If you have several audiences, look with each "persona".

Once your audience is defined, you can start thinking about the message.