Target the best customers
You already know that the most important thing when running a campaign is to target 'ideal customers' who are more likely to buy than others.
Marketing to everyone (AKA the 'Scattergun Approach') is expensive, and is a sure-fire way towards a negative ROI - and an empty wallet.
Before you begin your marketing campaign, you need to ensure that you pinpoint the location of your ideal customers so that you're not throwing money down the drain.
If you're involved in any B2C direct marketing then you'll know that the Number One priority is to get your message in front of the right people.
This is where this little tool comes in! It helps you discover which neighbourhoods are going to be the best for your campaign.
My Neighbourhood Explorer tool is designed to help you. It shows you a breakdown of the demographics for any English neighbourhood (lower super output area) so that you can decide which areas will provide you with the best return on your marketing spend.
By using it, you can decide which neighbourhoods to concentrate on, and which to avoid.
It makes good marketing sense!
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How do I use it?
First, select an English or Welsh county from the dropdown list. My system will then go and fetch the geodemographic data and populate the map with a breakdown of the neighbourhoods.
Neighbourhoods are chosen by taking the official geographical areas known as 'Lower Super Output Areas (LSOA)', as defined by the Office for National Statistics, of which there are more than 34,000.
Each neighbourhood has a maximum of 6,000 households and a maximum population of 15,000 people, which make them ideal for deciding on areas to run direct marketing campaigns.
Bear in mind that there is a huge amount of data that crunches in the background, so some larger areas may take up to 30 seconds to load (I'm finding ways of speeding this up).
Once the map is displayed, you can hover over each of the neighbourhoods to find out which ones suit your marketing campaign. I've returned enough data to provide you with a good feel for the neighbourhood including indices of deprivation, crime, education, housing, work, transport and social status.
The more prosperous/desirable areas are darker blue, and the less prosperous neighbourhoods are represented in lighter greens.
When you've identified the neighbourhood(s) that suit your campaign, you can go ahead and run them. It's as simple as that!

What can I use it for?
This tool is ideal if you're going to be running a B2C (business to consumer) direct marketing campaign.
Running marketing/advertising campaigns can be very expensive if you try to target everyone. The most effective way of getting a good ROI for your campaign is to choose the target market carefully.
If your next campaign is one of the following, then consider using this tool to discover where best to spend your campaign budget:
- Direct Mail
- Telesales / Telecanvassing
- Facebook Ads
- Leaflet Drops
- Proximity Marketing
- Geotargeted pay-per-click
- Door-to-door Canvassing
- Any other Direct Sales campaign
- Market Research
In fact, the possibilities for this tool are endless, and are limited to only your imagination!

What does the data mean?
As you can see, there is a lot of information to take in about each neighbourhood.
Let's break it down further so you can get a better idea what the data represents.
Marketing Potential
Each neighbourhood is given a Marketing Potential score that ranges from 200 (low potential) to 1600 (high potential).
This score is calculated using data from the desirability score, UK/county ranks and deprivation levels (see below).
Desirability
The desirability score is calculated using the ZoomLocal proprietary algorithm (one of my other businesses) which takes a whole bunch of data (indices of deprivation, crime, education, property prices, jobs, car ownership, access to good schools, social status etc) to work out how 'desirable' a neighbourhood is.
The resulting 'score' is a good indication of how desirable it is.
UK/County Rank
The UK and County ranks show how desirable each neighbourhood is, compared to the rest of the LSOA neighbourhoods in England and Wales.
Deprivation
The ZoomLocal proprietary algorithm also takes into account official indices of multiple deprivation. 'Deprivation' is defined as 'a lack of...', and include factors such as crime, education, living standards, children, health and access to amenities.
Using deprivation statistics is a useful metric that helps to determine whether a neighbourhood is also desirable.