If 2024 was the “please-just-keep-the-lights-on” year for many small businesses, 2025 is the year of high-definition focus. There was a theme that kept popping out of Flowing Forward: The Small Business Marketing Guide, presented by VistaPrint in partnership with Wix, like a bold highlighter stroke: You absolutely must know your audience.
What does “knowing” mean in practice? It’s not just demographics, it’s motivations, peeves, haunts and hopes. It’s recognizing that Gen Z may discover you on TikTok during a doom-scroll while their grandparents wander into your store because they saw the hand-painted sign you hung yesterday. Same product, wildly different journey.
Partnering with Wix for the second installment of our Small Business Marketing Guide, we have once again leveraged real-world insights from 1,000 small business owners (SBOs) and 1,000 consumers to help small businesses like you identify and prioritise your marketing efforts. We sliced and diced answers on shopping frequency, trust triggers, discovery channels and even the exact merch people hope you’ll slap a logo on (spoiler: stickers split the room). In the pages ahead, we’ll:
- Explain why audience insight beats blanket marketing every time.
- Hand you a five-step, zero-fancy-software process to define your own types of target audience.
- Drop data-driven playbooks, each tied to a generation, for turning insight into revenue.
By the end, you’ll know which promotional products make Millennials smile, which discovery tactics make Boomers show up and how to keep Gen X coming back without burning your budget.
- Choice overload is generational; 22% of Gen Z say too many similar businesses “often” induce choice paralysis, while only 6% of Boomers feel the same.
- Small-business love is rising, especially among those under 45. Nearly half of Gen Z and Millennials increased SMB spending last year, versus 17% of Boomers.
- Trust starts with product quality, but graduates to branding for the young. A third of respondents rank quality as their #1 trust factor, yet over a third (36%) of Gen Z call branding “very important.”
- Shopping channel preferences flip by age. Gen Z is the only group that prefers online (55%) to brick-and-mortar. Boomers are 83% in-store creatures.
- Marketing mix must mirror audience tech comfort. Social posts drive 49% of Gen Z visits, while 38% of Boomers respond to direct-mail flyers.
CTA: Want to gain further 2025 marketing insights? Check out the full Small Business Marketing Guide in partnership with Wix. Small Business Marketing Guide 2025.
Small business owner showing kitchenware product to customer.
Why knowing your audience is essential
Imagine hosting a backyard barbecue without knowing who’s coming. You’d serve tofu dogs to meat-eaters, country music to EDM fans and peanut sauce to your allergic nephew. Marketing is the same: If you don’t know who’s invited, you’re guaranteed to disappoint someone and waste money doing it.
What our guide proves in chart after chart is that customer expectations diverge at nearly every step: where they shop, how they vet businesses and why they stay loyal. Treating them as one blob forces you into bland middle-of-the-road messaging (“something for everyone!”) that excites exactly no one.
Here’s what a crisp audience profile buys you:
| Benefit | Real-world leverage |
| Right place, right time | You’ll invest in channels that match habits: 55% of Gen Z buy online, so put cash into SEO and conversion UX. |
| Language that lands | Millennials care about equity and inclusion almost 20% more than Boomers. If they’re your bread and butter, speak that language. |
| Trust accelerators | Personalized service outranks price for 36% of shoppers. Knowing which 36% lets you justify premium margins. |
| Retention fuel | 66% of all customers say personalized offers keep them coming back. |
| Budget efficiency | Why print 10,000 flyers if half your list lives on socials? With clarity comes lower CAC (customer-acquisition cost). |
Bottom line: You’re not just communicating what makes you great, you’re showing you get what they care about, which is the secret handshake of modern trust.
How to define your target audience
You do not need a $100K focus-group budget or a Madison Avenue strategist. Use this five-step, coffee-budget framework to identify and continually refine the types of target audiences who’ll actually pay you money.
1. Re-anchor in your brand essence
Sit down with an old-fashioned notebook and tackle three deceptively simple questions. First, condense the purpose of your business into a single, breath-long sentence; if you can’t summarize it that tightly, you probably aren’t crystal-clear on it yet.
Next, recall three adjectives your most loyal customers naturally use when they rave about you (and if you don’t know, call a few and ask). Finally, identify the “hill you’d die on,” the non-negotiable value that guides every decision, whether that’s sustainability, craftsmanship, humor or lightning-fast service. The answers form your brand’s north star.
2. Map your 10 best customers
Facts beat hunches, so pull your point-of-sale and e-commerce data, rank customers by total spend or lifetime value, and focus on the top 10 names that emerge. For each person, jot down their approximate age bracket, the channel that brought them to you, the product or service they keep coming back for, and, most telling of all, the reason they say they choose you over anyone else.
Once this mini-dossier is complete, the patterns will leap off the page. Maybe seven of your top 10 are parents in their forties, or half discovered you at a weekend craft market. Those common threads reveal exactly who loves you and why, turning raw data into a goldmine of strategic insight.
Shopper carrying a branded shopping bag.
3. Spot patterns and gaps
Put on detective goggles. Are you over-indexed on Millennials in tech jobs? Under-indexed on local retirees with disposable income? Decide intentionally whether each gap is worth courting. Saying “no” is as strategic as saying “yes.”
4. Cross-check with free digital data
Open Google Analytics, TikTok analytics or Etsy Insights. Does your online traffic age range mirror in-store sales? If you’re attracting clicks from folks in the 25-34 age bracket but converting people aged 45-54 at checkout, you’ve got a funnel mismatch. Look at bounce-rate differences by age, maybe your site photos vibe young while your product is priced older.
Also lurk in competitors’ comment sections. Complaints (“Shipping took ages!”) reveal opportunities.
5. Run micro-experiments and refine
Great marketers iterate. Pick one hypothesis: “Gen X parents crave eco-friendly totes.” Order 50 totes, post about them during school-pickup hours, and run a 14-day tracker. If they fly off the shelf, double down; if crickets, pivot. Measure one variable at a time, or you won’t know which lever worked.
Document insights in a living doc. Personas shouldn’t gather dust, they evolve with seasons, global events and yes, TikTok trends.
You know your target audience—what now?
Time to turn insight into action. Below you’ll find generation-specific data nuggets plus tactical playbooks.
What the generations value
Our survey’s deep dive into motivations revealed four distinct priorities that shift dramatically with age. For Gen Z and Millennials, the tug of war between purpose and price leans decisively toward purpose: About a quarter of each group, 23% of Gen Z and 25% of Millennials, told us they patronize small businesses because they feel an emotional connection with the brand.
Sustainability sits on the same rung for the youngest cohort (again, 23% for Gen Z and 20% for Millennials), confirming that eco-credentials are now a baseline expectation rather than a marketing frill.
Moving into middle age, the mood changes. Half of Gen X respondents shop small chiefly to keep money in the neighborhood, and their respect for personalized service (39%) edges out the need for emotional bonding.
Boomers amplify that local-economy reflex to 64%, while interest in “heartstring” storytelling plunges to just 4%.
It’s also worth noting that there is a stark generational divide when it comes to choice overload of similar products in today’s world: 22% of Gen Z say too many similar businesses “often” induce choice paralysis, while only 6% of Boomers feel the same.
In practice, these numbers spell out a clear playbook: A brand courting Zoomers needs an always-on narrative presence, think first-person captions and behind-the-scenes reels, whereas a company that leans on Boomer loyalty should foreground its community impact, complete with photo proof of the park bench or Little League jerseys their purchases funded. For Millennial-heavy businesses, the winning move is transparent proof of values, certified recycled packaging, fair-trade suppliers and team photos that reflect genuine inclusion.
Small business poster for Jah Jah Food and Sound.
The interest is real
Momentum toward small businesses is strongest at the youthful end of the spectrum: Nearly half of Gen Z shoppers (45%) said they have increased their spending with independent brands over the past year. Among Boomers, enthusiasm is steadier but far less dynamic: Only 17% reported shopping more, while a solid 78% said nothing had changed.
The implication is that younger consumers are actively hunting for new favorites, whereas their elders already have a stable of trusted merchants. To capture the younger surge, create “first-timer bundles” that bundle a limited-edition product with instant loyalty points; this converts curiosity into habit almost overnight. To keep long-standing Boomers engaged, launch a low-tech membership card that unlocks a modest perk every quarter. They appreciate routine, and a classic punch or stamp card delivers recognition in a format they instantly understand.
In-person vs. online
Channel preference tracks age with near-mathematical precision:
- Gen Z tips the scale in favor of digital, with 55% saying they buy from small businesses online and 45% preferring a physical checkout.
- The 25-34 crowd straddles the line at a perfect 50-50 split.
- Cross into the 35-44 bracket and the balance flips to 55% in-store.
- By the time shoppers reach 45-54, nearly seven in 10 (69%) purchases take place face-to-face.
- Among those 65 and older, the figure climbs to a commanding 83%.
A clever retailer, therefore, offers a choice of paths. Buy-online-pick-up-in-store satisfies Gen Z’s appetite for speed while still giving Boomers the handshake moment they value. Pop-up kiosks at farmers’ markets or holiday fairs provide a tactile touchpoint for Gen X and Boomers without forcing a full brick-and-mortar lease. Conversely, livestream drops via TikTok Shop or Instagram Live feed the instant-gratification reflex of digital natives without pressing the older cohort to change long-held habits.
Digital vs. traditional marketing
Discovery channels are just as polarized. Roughly 72% of Gen Z said social media is their favorite way to find a new small business; websites (59%)%) and online reviews (56%) round out their digital triad. Boomers navigate differently: 73% start with a company’s website, 71% rely on search engines, 59% check out online reviews first and 43% still appreciate the unhurried cadence of an email newsletter.
Traditional media reflects a similar split. Four in 10 (41%) Zoomers notice promotional materials such as stickers or loyalty cards, whereas Boomers look first to the mailbox—63% read direct mail, 41% respond to local radio or TV, and 39% pause over printed flyers.
The smartest campaigns merge these worlds. A Gen Z launch might begin with a TikTok teaser on Monday, pivot to an Instagram Reel on Wednesday and culminate Friday with a limited hoodie drop, sweetened for the first 50 orders with a holographic sticker. Meanwhile, a postcard that promises 10% off and a free mug can nudge Boomers back through the door, especially if the offer echoes in a 15-second morning radio spot and a friendly stamp card at checkout. When Millennials are the target, a weekend collaboration with a neighborhood nonprofit, promoted via a values-forward email and an Instagram carousel, delivers the authenticity they crave.
Business owner carrying branded merchandise.
The promotional products they want
Merch remains the universal handshake, but the item that seals the deal changes from decade to decade. The one constant is the humble T-shirt, desired by 62% of shoppers across every generation. After that, the field splinters:
- More than half of Gen Z and Millennials (58%) would love a hoodie.
- 45% of Zoomers scoop up stickers for laptops and water bottles.
- Gen X responds best to tote bags, with 43% voting for a sturdy, pocket-rich carryall.
- Boomers favor drinkware—54% will happily snag a quality mug or tumbler—and 37% still appreciate a smooth-gliding pen.
Brands can turn these quirks into low-friction marketing: Slide a fluorescent sticker into every Gen Z shipment and invite selfies, number your eco-cotton hoodies to trigger Millennial FOMO, slip totes into Gen X orders over $75 and keep a handsome ceramic mug by the register for Boomers who like a souvenir with their receipt.
The kids are serious about branding
Brand aesthetics have become a trust shortcut, and nowhere is the divide starker than between under-40s and their elders: Almost two in five (39%) of Gen Z and Millennials say high-quality, consistent branding is very important in their buying decision, while only 19% of shoppers aged 65 or older agree. That finding correlates with our broader trust ranking across age groups: One-third of all respondents still place product quality first, but nearly 10% now rank branding ahead of privacy policies or even a stated mission.
Younger customers interpret cohesive and consistent design as shorthand for competence, so your logo must stay crisp even at favicon size, your color palette should match on packaging and Instagram, and your story highlights need to cover origins, eco wins and behind-the-scenes life in a single tap.
Small business branded stickers.
Learn the generational dialects
Broad-brush marketing is over. In 2025, the winners segment sharply, tailor every touchpoint and tweak tactics as data rolls in. Each generation speaks its own dialect: Gen Z wants story-driven brands, visible social proof and merch they can show off. Millennials still love a hoodie but demand authentic purpose and polished visuals. Gen X prizes practical value; think sturdy totes and reliable service. Boomers favor tradition, local impact and a well-made mug delivered with genuine conversation.
“Know your audience” isn’t a one-time worksheet; it’s the lens for every product launch, packaging choice and social caption. Re-anchor in your brand essence, study your 10 best customers, validate hunches with data and then run small experiments to refine. The insights in our Small Business Marketing Guide 2025, created in partnership with Wix, are the palette you’ll use to paint messages each generation instantly recognizes as “for me.”
Platforms will change, but one truth stands: Understand your audience and you stop selling to strangers. You welcome friends who buy again and tell others. Here’s to making 2025 the year your marketing feels as personal as a handwritten note and as timely as a limited-drop hoodie.
CTA: Want to find out more in-depth marketing insights for 2025? Check out our comprehensive Small Business Marketing Guide in partnership with Wix. Small Business Marketing Guide 2025.
