Marketing by Zip Code
The idea that a business can reach consumers across the United States and Canada within a few minutes would have stunned early marketers. Before the rapid breakthrough’s in technology of the internet, television, radio, and freeways, marketing was confined to small geographic areas and was done primarily through word of mouth and local newspaper ads. Today, just the opposite problems exist, its too easy to reach people and so business find themselves competing for the attention of consumers. This has leads to more specific intention marketing. Rather than spend immense amounts of ad spend trying to reach everyone and hope someone notices you and then wants to take action and purchase, targeting specific people who are most likely to buy leads to increase ROI and greater overall profits.
There are many ways to target consumers. Age, gender, ethnicity, hobbies, and income are among a few, but if your product or service is applicable to any of these categories, then targeting by geographic area may be the most effective option. For your business, it may be easier or more cost effective to deliver or offer your product in particular areas, for example if your product is related to farming, you would want to target areas where farmers live and own property. While you could choose a county or city, you may still be paying marketing expenses for many people not in your target audience. Zip Codes group areas that are similar to each other, for example a business park may have its own Zip Code, or a group of apartments. Targeting by Zip Code more effectively allow you to reach the right geographic group that will give you the boost in new customers and sales your business needs.
When targeting by Zip Code, you can decide how specific you want your campaign to be by choosing to use a basic 5-digit Zip Code grouping, or a much more detailed 9-digit Zip Code. Both are created by the USPS, but the 9-digit Zip Code is specific to delivery areas and routes of the postal delivery workers. The 9-digit Zip Code will give you the most insight into areas that are very similar to each other, like neighborhoods with similar income residents, or an apartment complex. The 5-digit Zip Code breaks up areas of a city and possibly surrounding cities that tend to be similar, but doesn’t break the areas up to the same specific detail as the 9-digit Zip Code.