In April 2021 we released an article titled “How Mainstream Brands Can Identify and Serve Muslim Niche Markets”. In it, we advise mainstream brands not to approach the Muslim consumer market as one big market where they can do mass marketing.
The article goes on to highlight the approach brands need to take to identify and serve niche markets within the Muslim communities by:
- Defining an unmet or underserved need
- Researching their Muslim customer base
- Create a niche statement to adhere to
- Marketing their business to their Muslim target audience
At Muslim Ad Network we are passionate about helping businesses and organizations reach and serve the Muslim consumer. So, as a continuation of the above, we interviewed niche marketing experts from across the US, UK, and Canada to get their expert views on this subject.
We have categorized the responses for your convenience and easy reading.
1- Conduct Research to Best Serve Your Muslim Niche
Any part of a bigger market with a specific and limited audience whose needs are not met by a broad-market solution is by definition a niche. However, not every niche will be profitable for your business or relevant to your organization.
Make sure you research thoroughly before committing and investing in a niche.
Ask the Right Research Questions
In order to look for opportunities, advertisers need to first define their niche audience. Tools like Google Analytics can help you define your target market.
Ask yourself the following questions:
- How do your competitors deal with this audience?
- Which channels work best for them?
- When is the right time to engage with them?
These questions help you determine when to grasp an opportunity.
It is important to figure out the wants, needs, and expectations of your niche audience. This will help you create more curated strategies for a specific group rather than appealing to the masses. This leads to a greater chance of success.
For example, if your target market is Muslim minorities, look at what they don’t have yet. Do they have a local halal meat store in their area? If not, then that’s an opportunity for you to tap into right there.
Advertise to the relevant Muslim niche and spread awareness about your product and how you can provide this item to your customers. You can even offer free home delivery.
It is beneficial to focus on things that would otherwise be neglected in the broader market. Make sure to cater to the specific needs of your audience. They will definitely buy your product if it’s something they don’t get from other stores.
Convey the Right Message Founded on Research
For Muslim niches, you will want to enable your advertisement to deliver what would be a belief and culture-informed message. The typical Muslim, for example, follows guidelines that suggest for them to cover relatively more than non-Muslims. Convincing this niche audience regarding respect for their norms is one way to ensure better reception in the market.
To be able to convey the right message during your campaigns, research your niche market, preferably with individual surveys as well as Search Engine Optimization.
For the cherry on top, you can compare methods with competitors as well and hence use the most appropriate language and wording that Muslim niche audiences are likely to use when discussing pain points and solutions.
When exposed to your advertisements with the right images and culture-informed wording, individuals from the niche will be more receptive to your products.
Kyle Kroeger, Entrepreneur and Finance Expert at theimpactinvestor.com. Expert on the growing need to diversify means of operations, products, and advertising, to appeal to broader segments of the target market.
Research Your Competitors
In order to find a niche market, you must ask yourself a question, “What needs can I address for my customers?” To best answer this, you need to research your competitors. This means going onto Google and Amazon and finding where they are hitting the mark and where the gaps are that need to be filled.
Looking at message boards and reading reviews will also provide you with good data. It is especially important to pay attention to unfavorable reviews and opinions. This will provide you with signals of where your business can step up to the plate.
By thoroughly researching your competition, you can gain a unique understanding and have a better chance of finding your niche market.
Determine your Talents and Interests
Begin by examining what you have to give and what you excel at. The most effective niche marketing techniques capitalize on your brand’s distinct assets and viewpoints.
Consider the unique and remarkable aspects of your brand, team, and offers. Determine the areas in which you love working as well as the individuals with whom you enjoy working with.
Niche marketing allows you to dig down and focus on the group of individuals you want to connect with the most, so identify who you want to serve the most.
Conduct a competition study to determine whether there are rivals in this area and, if so, what those brands are already doing. Look to discover if any gaps in your target market have been overlooked, as well as if there is actual demand in the sector.
2- Build a Community Based on Friendship and Trust
The community has been an integral aspect of Muslim life and culture from the onset of Islam. Your business or organization will do well by earning trust and building friendships so much so that you become part of the Muslim community.
Building a community will give your targeted Muslim customers a place to feel seen and heard beyond the usual stereotypes. You are inviting Muslim audiences to become part of something bigger and empower them.
Such a shared brand experience and collective impact will make Muslim consumers in the niche you are targeting more likely to purchase your product or service.
Become One With the Muslim Niche Community
To attract people who are interested in niche content, you have to be one with those niche communities. In order to thrive in 2022, you can’t just advertise to your audience; you want to be part of it.
It’s no longer just about finding keywords and audiences, but really being part of the community itself.
Finding ways to really get into what people care about, what they’re talking about, what they’re interested in is going to be a big priority for advertisers in 2022.
Become More Aware of the Needs of Muslim Minorities
It’s important to consider the needs of different minority groups such as Muslims. Advertisers should keep an eye out for the local stores dealing in items that hold importance to their target audience and advertise it accordingly.
The brands should carefully study the market in which they would want to advertise their products before beginning their marketing campaign.
Better Business Bureau – “a private, non-profit organization whose self-described mission is to focus on advancing marketplace trust” – can also help advertisers gain access to different stores all across the USA. This measure can help advertisers look into different opportunities in their local market.
Once the niche is defined, it is then time for you to create content. The content strategy should be such that it helps build trust and fosters a friendly relationship with the niche audience.
The advertisements should be optimized for different devices such as mobile phones or laptops. This measure would enable easier access to ads which would help improve user engagement rate.
The key for running a successful ad campaign would be to make it enticing and create its importance among the population. This strategy would allow the mass audience to understand and be more aware of the needs of minorities such as Muslims.
Speak Up Against Issues Facing the Community
With the information age, people are becoming more aware of social issues. As part of society, people have the inner drive to contribute to a good cause. And this phenomenon is a good opportunity for advertising.
Customers are more willing to commit to a brand if they share the same values. Having a unifying value will allow you to connect with your customer on a deeper level to achieve a common goal. That is why it is wise to research your niche market and see what their common political views are.
Speak the Lingo of the Community
Do your research and learn about your niche market’s lingo. People nowadays crave being part of a community. They want to be able to connect with other like-minded people who share the same values.
Learning about how your niche market speaks, how they communicate with one another, and what they believe in and incorporating those elements into your content is the most authentic way to demonstrate that you care.
3- Work with Influencers and Micro-Influencers
Picking up where we left off from the last chapter, we want to reiterate the importance of speaking the lingo of the community.
Who is better suited to help you speak to the Muslim community and convey your message more fluently than influencers within the community?
This strategy did not start with the influencers we see online today. It is a powerful means of rallying up the masses to take action. It has been used for decades by politicians to gain votes from different groups and communities. It even goes back to the ancient times when leaders wanted to influence fragmented communities and tribes.
Influencers are trusted by people in their communities and their opinions matter. Influencer marketing is one of the fastest and most effective ways of spreading your brand message to targeted communities.
A study shows that working with influencers generates ROIs for businesses averaging a 650% return.
Partner with Micro-influencers from the Muslim Community
Online advertisers should not only target the usual big-time influencers with huge followings on social media that usually have huge payouts and contracts.
These big-time influencers are in some situations no longer in demand and are often disconnected from their followers. They have millions of followers and have signed huge contracts in the past but brands have noticed that at times partnerships with them do not translate into sales.
Their millions of followers are often too many and diverse that it is quite difficult to reach out to. What brands are looking for in 2022 are micro-influencers.
Micro-influencers on social media typically have 3,000-100,000 followers/subscribers and in specific niches like pets, cooking, beauty/makeup, finance/investing, they do not often have a huge following.
So why are brands shifting their campaigns to them?
The answer to that is that micro-influencer effectiveness as endorsers has been proven effective by many brands. As advertisers, we see them as most profitable and promising because they attract a more engaged audience and are cost-effective as brands try to tighten budgets due to the pandemic.
The influencer marketing industry has changed metrics from the number of subscribers to actual data-driven insights and engagements that are easily converted into sales.
Brands and commercial retailers are now more willing to work with micro-influencers because they are affordable and are seen by their engaged audience as more authentic than the bigger and well-established influencers in the industry.
Micro-Influencers and Metaverse are Growing in Stature
I believe that partnering with micro-influencers and the mainstreaming of metaverse in the market can serve advertisers opportunities to fulfill the needs of their niche audience.
In the past year, we saw micro-influencers creating a lot of awareness in several niches for advertisers. I think the trend will continue this year as well because they are gaining popularity. Finding the right micro-influencer can serve a lot of opportunities for advertisers in 2022.
On the other hand, the recent development of metaverse is changing a lot of things and is bringing a lot of trends for advertisers. If it is properly used, advertisers can create many opportunities for themselves to serve their niche audience.
With the help of metaverse, they can reach their audience efficiently.
Use Muslim Micro-influencers as Alternative to Strict Media Platforms
Digital platforms are becoming very strict about detailed targeting options that are related to the topics like race, ethnicity, political affiliation, religion, etc. Therefore, it is getting hard for marketers to target minorities or specific niches even for their beneficial purposes.
Influencer marketing could be the best solution for targeting specific niches which also removes the barrier of racist content from the marketing platform. This happens because influencers act as a filter between automated and personal-generated content.
Marketers can acquire influencers that are more famous in the Muslim community to market their product or service. There are a number of famous Muslim influencers creating great content on TikTok and Instagram for the Muslim community. Marketers can choose from micro-influencers to the top-rated influencers depending upon the marketing strategy and output they are desiring.
4- Engage Your Muslim Niche Audience on Social Media
In one of our previous articles:” How to Leverage Muslim Consumer Behavior Online with Social Media Marketing”, we explained how to successfully market your brand or business to Muslims on social media.
We highlighted how it requires an understanding of the behavior of Muslim social media users. We also established that Muslim audiences use social media mainly for:
- Interacting with friends and family
- Talk about social issues
- Get news from unbiased sources
Since the advancement of social commerce in the past year, you can add shopping to the above list.
Build a Rapport with the Muslim Niche Audience on Social Media
Social media provides a unique opportunity to connect with your niche audiences and build a community with them. Facebook groups and even Reddit allow your company to interact with niche groups on topics that are relevant to your business.
When you build a rapport with your niche audiences through communicating openly with them, you are able to build a stronger bond. This solidifies your customer base and helps you increase your customer retention rate.
Join the Interaction on Social Media Platforms
Look for what your niche audience is engaging with on social media.
Whether it be video content on services like TikTok and Instagram, articles and blog-style content, or even long-form video content, the ability to join the interaction and conversation with your consumer base is crucial to your success.
The ability to quickly jump onto trends and open discussions with your niche audience will help you find better results as you seek advertising and interactive opportunities.
Slimmer Media Models Will Increase Competition
We all know the popular social media networks.
Despite public criticism of its policies, Facebook reported an increase in daily and monthly active users.
Newer platforms, on the other hand, offer a much slimmer media paradigm, designed to make community interaction easier to manage and safer.
Not all are social media sites. Among the newcomers are podcasting services like Spotify, live chat platforms like Clubhouse, mailing systems like Substack, and sub-communities within major social media platforms like Twitter Spaces.
Everyone wants meaningful connections with their favorite creators or communities rather than relying on artificial participation.
Conclusion
We would like to thank all our experts for their time and contribution.
It is important for us that you as a reader benefit from this rare behind-the-scenes look by 14 different experts in the field of marketing and advertising.
Please feel free to contact Muslim Ad Network for any additional information on what was discussed or for any other questions you may have. Also, take a look at our advertising page to learn more about advertising to Muslims.
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