LaCroix Sparkling Water: A Millennial Marketing Success
How one brand utilizes target marketing segmentation to assist in boosting revenue and brand loyalty.
If you know anything about running a business or brand, you’ve heard the term “target market.” It’s defined as a group of people with shared characteristics that a company identifies as potential consumers to aim its marketing efforts and resources. Identifying your target market can essentially influence your business decisions, like pricing, packaging, and sales process. Through data-based audience research, the brand LaCroix Sparkling Water has effectively learned and utilized these key factors to implement campaigns set to target the correct market.
The Target Market
LaCroix Sparkling Water (pronounced La-CROY; rhymes with “enjoy”) is an American-based carbonated water brand that was founded in 1980. The naming of the brand comes from La Crosse, Wisconsin, where the brand originated, and the St. Croix River, a tributary that forms a border between Wisconsin and Minnesota. Initially, LaCroix’s goal was to market its niche by advertising as an “all occasion” beverage, as opposed to most sparkling water’s “snobbish positioning.”
LaCroix defines its target market as a bridge between Generation X and Millennials, with characteristics being self-image perception and individuality; this market segment includes mainly active, young professionals, of any race or ethnicity, invested in sustainability and healthier alternatives to soda, with easy packaging to keep up with their energetic lifestyle.
Demographic Factors:
- Millennials
- College students
- Young professionals with jobs
- Middle to upper class
Geographic Factors:
- Metropolitan centers
- Urban areas
- North America
Psychographic Factors:
- Health-conscious
- Special occasion drinks
- Replacing old habits with new habits
- Repetitive shopper
Behavioral Factors:
- Healthy habits
- non-soda drinker
- Hosts events, dinner parties, picnics, etc.
Millennials have become extremely health-conscious about what goes into their bodies. With more choices than previous generations, millennials are more open to trying new and unique brands, purchasing products that better align with their values, dietary habits, philanthropy, etc. By studying the nutritional preferences of millennials, LaCroix meets the needs of its consumer by offering healthier alternatives than competition currently out on the market.
Marketing Efforts on Social Media
Within the last few years, LaCroix’s all-inclusive micro-influencer strategy has driven the brand to become a growing phenomenon and status symbol among foodies, fashion icons, and fitness gurus. More than half of 18–29 year-olds are active on social media, which is where the brand sparkles (Get it? Sparkles? Sparkling water?)
LaCroix partners with influencers of all shapes and sizes to acknowledge, interact and engage with all posts surrounding the brand, especially in resharing user-generated content (UGC) posted with the hashtags #LaCroixLove and #LiveLaCroix. The brand’s use of bright-colored packaging also makes the fizzy drink a stylish accessory for nearly every lifestyle photo.
LaCroix lacks in traditional advertising, as the brand does not spend money on commercials, magazine spreads, or radio advertisements. Because the brand knows its ideal audience, it has worked strategically in attracting its consumer through unconventional advertising, dedicating marketing efforts solely through social media platforms.
Because it’s not a product that is thrown in their face all the time, millennials see LaCroix as a discovery — something only they and their friends know about; a “hidden gem,” if you will. While it’s older than most millennials, it’s marketed in the most millennial way possible.
Unique Selling Point
LaCroix advertises itself as a naturally essenced, zero-calorie, zero sweeteners, zero sodium beverage with no artificial ingredients, as well as gluten-free, vegetarian and kosher; this unique selling point sets apart the brand from other sugary beverages containing unhealthy sweeteners and chemicals. LaCroix has also developed a sense of community throughout its social media platforms, as the brand strives for 100% consumer involvement and authenticity. The company even hired one of the nation’s leading health authorities, Joy Bauer, as the national dietitian representing LaCroix.
Knowing Your Target Audience: The Importance
Identifying your target audience serves as a crucial point in optimizing your brand's marketing efforts, as social media, audiences, and content marketing are all connected. Creating a description of your ideal buyers, finding unique goals and features that your consumer finds necessary, and getting found by the audience you worked so hard to target serves as personalized marketing in the digital age. Developing an audience analysis can assist in understanding the types of content interested in your specific target audience; social media has become a key tool in developing deeper, more meaningful relationships with your consumers.
With proactive community management, LaCroix has developed one of the most successful UGC strategies through reverse-influencer marketing by identifying its client and remaining consistent through audience engagement. The brand has singlehandedly cultivated a unique community through social media by sharing stories and getting personal, showcasing a refreshing taste to those that enjoy a healthy drink.
“Taste the tropics, without the guilt.” — LaCroix Sparkling Water
