What Are Customer Demographics – & Why Are They Vital For Marketing?

You probably feel like you know what customer demographics are, but let’s get back to the basics. What exactly are customer demographics – and what makes them so valuable to marketers?

What Are Customer Demographics?

The definition of demographics is statistical data relating to the population and particular groups within it.

That tells us something, sure, but it isn’t all that useful for our purposes.

Instead, let’s define customer demographics in a marketing context.

Customer demographics are statistical data relating to the unique identities and identifiers of individuals.

This data can include:

• Basic information such as gender, age, marital status and education

• Location, including postal address and zip code

• Purchase intent, such as clothing, electronics and furniture

• Lifestyle information, such as cord cutters and DIY-ers

• Buyer type, such as deal seeker or online shopping

• And more

Customer demographics can be submitted through a webform when a user signs up on your website, collected through a survey you might send them or purchased from trusted third-parties, such as TowerData.

Why Are Customer Demographics Vital for Marketing?

Today’s customer expect a personalized experience – just think about custom Netflix queues and personalized Amazon offers.

By adding context and color to a person and their behavior, customer demographics help marketers better understand who a person is. Marketers who understand their customers’ demographics can offer more personalized, relevant content because they know their customers’ interests and can anticipate their future needs.

This kind of personalization is proven to pay off. Personalized offers stand out in a crowded marketing mix and see higher engagement. Emails with a personalized subject line see a 26% higher click-through rate, and marketers have seen a 760% (yes, that’s right) increase in revenue from segmented campaigns.

What Customer Demographics are Important?

The short and not so straightforward answer: It depends.

Every business is different. For example, say I make and sell homemade dog scarves on my online shop. I would need to know who is a pet owner and who shops online. I may also like to know who is a “Big Spender” so I can target them with my luxury cashmere dog scarves. Maybe I’d like to send a dog scarf look book in the mail. Adorable and engaging.

But let’s say my friend is an independent video game developer. As she launches her first downloadable game, she will want to target gamers and millennials who are in market for video games. She also might want to append email addresses to her list of mobile device IDs that she collected during her last game. Score.

What now?

Consider how customer demographics can benefit your business. Remember: the more you know about your customer, the more personalized and useful offers you can send them. This will result in stronger brand affinity, loyalty and ultimately, a higher ROI for your marketing efforts.

Ready to get started? Get up to 100 customer demographic fields for free when you sign up for an InstantData account.