Narrowcasting vs Broadcasting
Narrowcasting vs Broadcasting
Most people are familiar with the words broadcast and broadcasting because they are frequently used terms in television, internet and business. But what about narrowcasting? In a nutshell, narrowcast means aiming a broadcast at a narrowly defined audience or area. Narrowcasting is a specific transmission of information to a selected small group of people. An example of this is an advertisement that is broadcasted specifically for the female individuals in a specific shopping mall.
Broadcasting on the other hand is a process of transmitting a programme or any given information to a larger geographic area without focusing on specific audience groups. An example of the broadcast is a general TV show which can be seen by people across the entire country or even other countries that carry the same TV channel.
A broadcast is generally intended to please most of the people that it reaches, while a narrowcast aims to deliver a message towards a small number of people who are most likely to be interested in that content.
The decision between broadcasting or narrowcasting depends entirely on the type of content and its final objective. A government body is more likely to choose a broadcast in order to inform everyone about a particular law that comes into action within the next couple of months since the objective is to reach maximum amount of people and spread the information further.
A small business owner that sells handmade toys is more likely to take a different approach and only choose a narrow audience looking for custom products instead.
Why narrowcast?
Many of the tools developed for broadcasting can also be used to narrowcasting. Instead of sharing a generic message to everyone, these tools can used to target communication to people who already have a great interest in the topic.
Narrowcasting helps businesses to identify and reach customers who are most likely to be interested in buying and using their products or services. It is always better to have a small group of loyal and passionate customers rather than a large pool of people who are indifferent to your business offering. It all comes down to finding a way to focus on the message to find these passionate individuals, rather than focusing on maximizing your reach to as many people as possible.
