How to reach an audience 

We’ve all heard it, when it comes to audience building, content is king. But what happens if the king can’t be found? 

Unfortunately, even brilliant content can’t reach an audience without a practical and strategic plan. 

Anyone who’s ever made a piece of content and published it has worried about it reaching its intended audience.  

What if no one sees, hears or reads it?  Imagine putting all that work in for …. “cue the crickets”. 

But if you can figure out who your audience is and where they are online before you start, – and you craft your message into a great story that will interest them – you’re already halfway there.

Firstly, who is your audience? 

If there’s anything I can teach you it’s this: you must know who your audience is. You simply can’t reach the right people if you’re not tailoring your content for them. 

Uncovering who your audience is will ensure you not only create terrific content but also the content that answers their pain points and establishes you as an authority in your industry. 

But finding them is not what we’re discussing here. So, if you’re trying to identify who your target audience actually is, check out the Define Your Ideal Audience course.

For the purpose of this post, I’m going to assume you know who you want to talk to – you’re just struggling to give them what they need. 

Get your audience interested and give them a reason to listen 

Reaching an audience is a huge part of what I do at Moonshine Agency. For more than a decade, I've been experimenting with all kinds of different ways to connect with people through film. From hosted screenings to 60-second videos for Facebook or Instagram, eDMs, magazines, newsletters and everything in between. We’re pretty sure there’s nothing we haven’t tried to reach and captivate an audience.

Here’s some advice to live by: people will only tune into information that they are interested in hearing when it is shared on the platforms that they’re comfortable with. 

What I’ve found is that no matter the topic or desired outcome, ensuring your audience actually absorbs your message and considers your perspective, always comes down to the delivery method. 

And sometimes you might have to consider a myriad of ways to share your content.

I'll share an example with you. 

How Conquering Cancer has reached a diverse audience 

 Conquering Cancer is a feature length documentary film that I produced and presented with Moonshine Agency. Conquering Cancer is an impact film advocating for all countries to join the fight to eliminate cervical cancer.  The film was suitable for cinemas, video on demand, hosted screenings, broadcast television and virtual screenings.  To reach the broadest possible audience it was subtitled into multiple languages and we even produced a version dubbed into French to reach non English speaking audiences.  It’s quite fun knowing I’ve been dubbed into French!

The use of subtitles and dubbing greatly increased the reach of this project.

Many of the screenings were hosted by groups interested in sharing the message contained within the film about the elimination of cervical cancer.  Their screenings included Q&A sessions and audiences were able to ask questions and learn more from local hosts and experts.  Again this helped to expand the reach of the film.

Many short films were also produced that went on YouTube and shorter versions were also created to share across social platforms including Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn.

The social platforms also enabled audiences to have conversations, ask questions and have an opportunity to explore the films in a more engaged and deeper way.

Thanks to social media platforms, streaming sites and the internet more broadly, we’re able to connect with an audience in more ways than ever before. And with the comprehensive analytics tools available, it’s also much easier to test what’s working and tweak your strategy accordingly.

Reaching your audience 

It always comes down to who they are and where they are.

I’ve spent many years creating online content that connects and resonates with audiences all around the world. The team and I have had to think through strategies and conduct research time and again to ensure that the content we make really does reach an audience.

My co-producer Mike Hill and I created an episode of our companion YouTube series Moonshine Moonshot where we discuss in-depth how to reach an audience.  You can find it here if you’d like to keep learning more about how to reach your audience.