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7 simple steps to building

your audience of viewers

Part 1 of a 4-part series for media &

entertainment marketers

April 2015

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ed.40%

Home with video

streaming service1

33%

Increase in digital

brand advertising

70%

Media & entertainment

marketers who increased

digital budget2

27%

The amount of viewers

ages 18 to 24 who

watched less traditional

TV3

The challenge: Creating a direct relationship with your viewer

So much has changed in the media & entertainment world in just a few short years. Viewers

aren’t just watching television shows when they are scheduled—they’re watching them on their

PC, tablet or mobile phone whenever they want. Their attention is drawn to YouTube while they

are watching a movie on their TV at the same time. Over-the-top services have taken off, and

they aren’t showing any signs of slowing. That said, linear television still draws millions of

viewers—and marketers are increasingly focused on how to attract viewers to tune in.

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To increase your viewership, you need to learn how to not only identify your potential

audience, but to connect with them. But when you don’t have much data about them,

how do you get started?

7 simple steps to building your audience

Identify

1

Infer

2

Recognize &

enhance

3

Profile

4

Model who

you know

5

Model who

you don’t

know

6

Build

7

The process:

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So you don’t have much data on your

audience. Start with what you do

have. You might have an email

newsletter for a specific show, some

research or maybe you have

subscribers to an app or Internet

product. Gather any first-party data on

your current audience that you may

have.

Step 1:

Identify

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Usually, you know the age and

gender of your audience—or you at

least have a good idea. That’s a place

to start. Now leverage third-party data

to get the full picture. Where do they

live? What are they buying? What are

their interests?

Step 2:

Infer

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Looking at the data, ask yourself:

What do I know about this audience?

Once you know who they are, there’s

a lot you can learn using reverse

appends and data enhancement. For

example, you might find that your

audience is predominantly high

income, frequently goes to the

movies and has a strong interest in

science fiction. This step helps you

to fill in the gaps.

Step 3:

Recognize

& enhance

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Now that you’ve filled in the gaps,

create the full picture. Build the

story of who they are and what they

are like. If you learned that the

majority of your audience is made

up of males ages 18–24, who live

mostly in urban areas and are tech

savvy, have no children in the

household and have an interest in

science fiction, then that may tell

you how to best target them.

Step 4:

Profile

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If you are running a DMP on your

site(s), you’re capturing behavioral

data. Great! You already know the

demographic details. Now add what

videos they watched and what pages

they visited. Use all that you’ve

learned in steps 1–4 and use a

lookalike model to find potential

viewers that have similar behavior.

Step 5:

Model

who you

know

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Of course, you’re not going to have

data on everyone—and even if you

do, they may be anonymous to you.

Match the behavior of this anonymous

group and make some inferences

based on their online behaviors. You

will find that this can be a strong

indicator of their demographic profile.

Step 6:

Model

who you

don’t

know

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At this point, you’ve done some great

sleuthing to find out the unknown.

Using your lookalike models, match

them up against a compiled database

like TotalSource Plus to identify new

potential viewers that resemble your

current audience. Then, match them

to Epsilon’s 320 million unique online

profiles and push a digital campaign

to them. Use the same strategy

through the social channel.

Step 7:

Build

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Now what?

Your world isn’t standing still anytime soon. The way an

audience starts viewing a new show can follow a very

disruptive path. They may hear about it on Twitter, see a

digital ad or find it in their Netflix recommendations, making

it a convoluted journey.

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Once a connection is made, this can lead to improved TV

ratings, more ad dollars and a higher CPM. This all begins

with using data to identify potential viewers.

Media & entertainment marketers always need to evolve. The first

step in your advancement is building your audience. But before

you can do that, you must first understand them and know the best

way to connect with them.

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Making sense of all this data can be quite challenging. We’re here

to help. In the continuation of this series, we’ll show you how to

reach the right audience once you’ve built it. Then we’ll help you

learn ways to boost their engagement. Finally, we’ll assist you in

measuring all of your hard work to optimize and monetize.

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To get the full series, sign up below. Or give us a call to discuss how

you can use data to grow your audience exponentially.

Subscribe

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About Epsilon

Epsilon is the global leader in creating connections between people and brands. An all-encompassing global marketing

company, we harness the power of rich data, groundbreaking technologies, engaging creative and transformative ideas

to get the results our clients require. Recognized by Ad Age as the No. 1 World CRM / Direct Marketing Network and

No. 1 U.S. Agency from All Disciplines, Epsilon employs over 7,000 associates in 70 offices worldwide. Epsilon is an

Alliance Data company.

For more information, visit epsilon.com, follow us on Twitter @EpsilonMktg or call 1 800 309 0505.