PUBLICS & TARGET AUDIENCES

No organisation survives and succeeds without its publics. The target audiences are the backbone on which a firm rests its programmes, projects and products. It thus anticipates favourable response from them in terms of support and patronage.

            Any institution that fails to identify its publics, will definitely fail to achieve its aims and objective. The essence of audience identification is to enable the organisation fashion out a most reliable strategy in reaching out to all individuals and groups. This is necessary because the publics’ come in different forms and different environment with different behaviours, attitudes and characters. The public may be a target market, special audience or the general public. By the identification, it is easier for the organisation to recognise the information requirement of each key target.

            The public of public finance institutions like Federal Ministry of Finance, Central Bank and Tax Agencies, can be the entire citizenry. This is reasonable considering the essence of governance, which they represent. Therefore, we may say all individuals in the society who have a stake in governance are the public of the government. The electorates, farmers, artisans, teachers, labourers, businessmen and women and even the common people, and many other civil society organisations look up to the government for its obligatory social and financial commitments.

            The public of private financial institutions varies from one institution to the other. But it should be noted from the outset that every organisation relies solely on its internal and external publics. But most of the time, many organisations ignorantly fail to realise that internal publics need to be well oriented and seen too as target audience for their success.

            The major internal publics of financial enterprises include the employees, shareholders, board members (directors) and at times, their consultants and contractors. The external publics are the buyers, potential and existing business clients, users, opinion leaders, suppliers, regulatory bodies, customers, clients, stockholders, etc.

            It is necessary for organisations to prioritise their groups and study their needs through opinions and other researches. For instance, while the relevant public may need to be informed on the effect of the organisation’s new policies on share price, the marketing officers need re-orientation on new strategies. In fact, the timing and manner of launching or public presentation of new products and services are also very essential.

            Some special groups may require special attention. Example can be given of a group that holds strong feelings and beliefs, which may not help in presenting new products. For instance, there are adherents of a faith that forbidden from taking interest (usury) by which other products like interest-free services and taking share can be promoted.

            Identifying the public, assists greatly in conducting public opinion for effective programmes of action in convincing and influencing them towards accepting the service and what the organisation stands for.

            No matter how we look at it, any action or inaction taken, is deliberately geared towards a particular individual or group. The better way therefore to have the best of relationships is to specifically identify the weakness and strength of the target at achieving maximum benefits from the interaction.

All public relations’ activities are aimed at satisfying the various publics through objective and honest information via effective communication channels. The advantages of the relationship, which are indisputably beneficial, are to promote goodwill, maximising profit, avoiding crises and conflict and encouraging good relationship and understanding.