The Gap Between the Audience You Want and the One You Actually Have

A Reality Check on Audience Segmentation

I keep coming back to this idea of “segmenting your audience,” because it’s one of those concepts that shows up in pretty much every marketing class, in every book, in every workshop, as if it’s the most obvious thing in the world. And yet, when we look at how we actually do it in real life, most of the time it happens fast, almost automatically, and in a way that ends up being a bit superficial.

I think part of the reason is that there’s a very human tendency behind it, and it’s the same one we have in our personal lives: we all have an image of who we would like to be, as a person and as a company. And it’s not necessarily a bad thing to have that image. But if we start making decisions as if we already were that person, or that company, we risk overlooking the one thing that actually matters: the reality of who we are today. The starting point.

And this is where audience segmentation can go off the rails. Because if we ignore who we actually are and what we actually offer, in favor of what we want to be, or the company we aspire to become, or the product we hope to offer someday, we end up segmenting the audience we want, not the audience we have.

And even when we do look at the audience we have, instead of analyzing it to understand what’s working, what people actually value, and what that tells us about how to position what we do, we end up mostly recording the “gap.” The gap between the audience we have today and the audience we wish we had.

And that mindset creates a cascade of effects.

Because if the gap is what we’re staring at, then our messaging starts drifting toward the audience we want to attract, not the one that’s currently listening. We start writing, speaking, and building our narrative for “the other people,” the ones we don’t really have yet (and maybe you never will, which is also something worth admitting sometimes). The result is that the message becomes less clear, less direct, and less compelling for the audience that is actually there, because you’re not really talking to them.

And when the messaging is weak in that way, it’s not just a branding problem. It becomes a sales problem too. Because if the value we’re advertising is not the value that matters to the people who are actually paying attention, then our differentiating value becomes harder to understand, and the product or service becomes harder to buy. Not necessarily because it isn’t good, but because the story we’re telling is slightly misaligned with what your real audience cares about, and we end up losing opportunities that might have been ours.

Which is also why I strongly believe sales shouldn’t be treated as something that happens “after” marketing, as if marketing sets the message and sales simply repeats it. Sales is where reality talks back. It’s where we hear the objections, the doubts, the alternative options people are considering, the words they use to describe their problem, and the reasons they hesitate or move forward. That feedback should constantly shape and refine the message.

And this brings me to a tool that I don’t see used enough, even in companies that have all the systems: a proper reporting/analysis process on sales pitches. Lots of teams use Salesforce, Pipedrive, HubSpot, and so on. We track stages, pipeline, close rates. But how often do we slow down and actually analyze the qualitative side of it?

Why did we lose a contract? Why did we win one? What was the differentiating value that made the client say yes? What were the specific concerns that kept coming up during the process? If we lost, why did they pick the other option, and what did they believe that other option would do better for them? What story did the competitor tell that felt more convincing, more relevant, more aligned?

I honestly haven’t experienced many companies that do this consistently and in a structured way, even though it feels like one of the most obvious sources of insight we can have.

And again, it’s similar to something personal. When we send a CV and we don’t get the job, how many of us actually go back and ask for feedback? Not to argue, not to convince them, but to understand: was it the CV? Was it something we said in the interview? Was there a skill or a signal the other candidate had that we didn’t? Most people don’t ask, and I get why, asking these questions is hard.

Whether you’re a person or a company, asking for real feedback can force you to confront uncomfortable answers. It can challenge the story you’ve been telling yourself about your product, your service, your strengths, or your market. And neuroscience teaches us that, as humans, we naturally prefer to live inside our confirmation bias. We like information that reassures us we’re right.

But from a business perspective, and honestly from a career perspective too, having the guts to ask the uncomfortable questions is often what makes the difference. Not just asking the people who said yes, but also the people who said no. Not just collecting opinions, but collecting data, looking for patterns, and then being willing to adjust your positioning based on what reality is telling you.

Because in the end, it really does start and end with your audience. Your real audience. The people who are actually in the room.