Instead of chasing a new audience, a kids' brand was advised to add features for the parents who are already customers. This "Pixar" model—having content for adults—leverages the existing customer base for word-of-mouth growth into the new segment.
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To attract a more premium audience, don't change your successful broad-appeal content strategy. Instead, add a new, separate content stream as an experiment. This allows you to test the new approach without risking your primary lead source.
Don't try to force customers to adopt new behaviors, like a boot-buyer purchasing sandals. Instead, focus on encouraging them to buy a second pair, a newer model, or an upgraded version of the product they already love. This audience-focused approach builds on existing loyalty and is far more effective.
Spotify leveraged its brand love to successfully expand from music streaming into podcasts and audiobooks. This emotional equity provides the necessary consumer trust for diversification, turning brand into a strategic asset for growth beyond the core product.
Stuckey's, a nostalgic snack brand, wants to appeal to a new generation. The counterintuitive advice is to first double down on its existing, older customer base that already has brand recognition. Tapping out this core market is a more efficient first step than building awareness from scratch with a new demographic.
To grow an established product, introduce new formats (e.g., Instagram Stories, Google AI Mode) as separate but integrated experiences. This allows you to tap into new user behaviors without disrupting the expectations and mental models users have for the core product, avoiding confusion and accelerating adoption.
When testing a new target audience or content style, introduce it as an additional video rather than replacing your core programming. This allows you to experiment with new approaches without threatening the lead flow and revenue generated by your established, successful content.
Dough Guy, a pizza brand with a mostly male audience, should expand into related "male-coded" baking like cast-iron brownies. This targets the existing customer's identity and interests, rather than just expanding into the generic "baking" category, which might not resonate as strongly.
To attract a male audience without alienating its core female community, Poppy invested in partnerships with the Lakers and Fortnite streamers. Crucially, they kept this content off their primary social media feeds, allowing them to expand their audience in a segmented, non-disruptive way.
When a family-focused brand wants to target Gen Z, a simple, separate landing page or Shopify site can test the new product concept. This allows for targeted marketing and validation without confusing the core brand's existing customers or requiring a full-scale launch.
If your podcast has built brand equity but now serves the wrong audience for your business goals, don't scrap it. Instead, pivot by changing the guest mix. Drastically shift the ratio of guests to reflect your new target demographic while retaining a small number of original-style guests to keep existing listeners engaged.