Peloton: the brand that has redefined the workout through its internet enabled bikes, treadmills and rowers. I only heard about the brand during the pandemic but, and in part due to the pandemic, the brand has become the definition of elite, at home workouts.

How did this company go from only selling its first bike in 2013 to leading the market in less than 10 years? Identifying and effectively pursuing its target audience.

It wasn’t by offering the product at low prices, exaggerating the impact of the product or even using Ryan Reynolds to promote the products.

Last week we looked at how fundamental it is to identify the target audience and this week we’ll pause here to see that helped Peloton grow and avoiding wasteful marketing efforts.

The company

When Peloton started in 2011, its founders were working for a bookseller in New York. One was struggling to fit workouts into his busy work schedule or at home with his young family. The other had just got engaged and was training for triathlons and cycle races. He was wondering about how he would continue to fit training into married life.

The two founders settled on the idea of an at-home exercise bike which was internet enabled to allow training sessions to be streamed at the consumers’ convenience.

Now Peloton has 135 studios, over 6,000 employees, celebrity endorsements and a fan initiated multi-day event. If you are reading this having just set up your own business, you should be inspired and encouraged.

The target audience

In the last blog, we considered how target audiences are created by looking at demographics, psychographics and behaviours. The Peloton founders had an advantage of being their own target audience (ideal customer avatar or ICA, if you want the jargon). This meant they only had to look at themselves to define their target audience.

The demographics suggest the audience would be in their early middle age with young families and professional jobs. Their incomes would be higher than average due partly to their higher level of education.

In the category of psychographics, we can identify that the target audience values health, fitness and wellness. They value their recreational time as much if not more. Their lifestyle leads them to try to control the competing demands on their time so they can live efficiently and pack as much in as possible. As ambitious people, they demand the best tools to help them achieve their goals.

Behaviours would show the target audience spends more on their grocery shopping allowing them to eat healthily and they also pay a premium for gym membership. However, the gym sessions are sporadic and rushed. All their exercise is solo because it is difficult to commit to team sports.

Issues

Inevitably, not everything has been plain sailing for Peloton and its brand image but by having a well define target audience, it has been able to navigate these successfully.

In 2019 it got a whole Twitter thread mocking the price of Peloton. This could be damaging for them if their target audience was lower income as Peloton wouldn’t be connecting with them. However, as their target audience has a higher disposable income (or, at least, aspire to), Peloton didn’t feel the need to refute the claims, rather, they simply acknowledged in an interview with CNBC, that the “thread demonstrated that Peloton has officially become part of the cultural conversation”.

Peloton has also received damaging news coverage when injuries were sustained and a child died after being pulled under a Peloton treadmill. Rather than recalling the product as the US Consumer Product Safety Commission requested, Peloton advised that the treadmills were kept away from children and pets, preferably in a locked room. Only Peloton, targeting an audience which would have a spare room to lock the treadmills away in, could suggest this.

By knowing its target audience and understanding their concerns, Peloton has been able to reach the right people and address any issues that could damage its reputation or put its target audience off.

What we can learn

Hopefully it isn’t necessary to reiterate the importance of identifying your target audience. Rather, this should provide a simple way to identify it. At Aubrey, we are regularly working with our clients to identify who their products and services would be perfect for (for charities, we look at the ideal person to support that cause).

Often the best starting point is to do as the founders of Peloton did and look at themselves – they were, after all, the people who wanted their product. If you are sure that you are not your target audience, go and speak to a supporter or a customer and find out about them and what makes them tick. They’ll feel so important that your product is meant specifically for people like them.

I hope this case study has been helpful as you think about your situation. Knowing your target audience really does have a huge impact on how you go about marketing, whether that is digital marketing, print marketing or so on.

Next week, we’ll get back to the marketing basics course and look at messaging. See you there!