Digital Marketing to a Specific Demographic

Whole Foods Mission Statement and Core Values

First, let’s begin by going over the company’s mission and care values. The company’s mission statement reads, “We’re a purpose-driven company that aims to set the standards of excellence for food retailers. Quality is a state of mind at Whole Foods Market.” Whole Foods also takes the liberty to dive in depth about the top six values they aim to achieve. The website reads, “we sell the highest quality natural and organic foods. We satisfy and delight our customers. We promote team member growth and happiness. We practice win-win partnerships with our suppliers. We create profits and prosperity. We care about our community and the environment.” Being the nation’s largest retailer of organic foods, it’s not uncommon to wonder who exactly this high quality and frankly, high price, organic food is marketed for. 

Whole Foods Company mission and core values.

Adapting a New Target Audeince

The obvious target audience are people who lead a very health conscious lifestyle while being aware of the environment. With this type of lifestyle, usually comes price, which is why Whole Foods markets towards those individuals and families that have an income well above the national average. Generally speaking, most live in an upscale suburban or metropolitan area with a degree and a high paying job. According to Google Trends, the top three states with interest in Whole Foods are, Hawaii, Colorado and California. With these being up there for the most expensive states to reside in, it only makes sense. These customers are wealthy, usually buying the high end and expensive products and do not need any discount deals or coupons. 

However, Whole Foods decided to take on a new group of customers: the millennials. Still keeping the focus on the wealthier of the bunch, they were marketing more towards the new college graduates, working for high-tech companies, more liberal or progressive views, willing to travel and pay off college debts, and even went as far to market towards those on the more conscious side about saving money. 

Millennials ??

More specifically, ranging from 18-39 in the millennial group. These millennials are concerned with eating all natural and organic foods while keeping things unique and interesting as they look for an all-around experience when they shop for, prepare and eat their food. Millennial consumers have a positive attitude associated with the Whole Food brand and, in turn, believe it is worth sacrificing a few extra dollars for the healthier foods and quality they desire. Overall, these customers take into consideration what their shopping experience will be like, as well as how gourmet the food they want to prepare will be. Keeping the millennials in mind, Whole Foods Market amped up their presence on social media and now have 3.1 million followers on Instagram and 4.2 million on both Twitter and FaceBook. On these platforms, the company posts information about the brand’s products, recipes, health tips, nutritional information and much more. 

Making Social Media Their Focus

Putting all the research into action, Whole Foods Market takes a unique approach in the digital marketing sector, focusing mainly on their engagement on social media for those millennial customers out there. First, they take pride in their customer conversation by building meaningful relationships with the consumer and other brands. Their efforts focus less on traditional marketing and more on giving texture to the brand in fun and engaging formats. At every store, there is a community manager assigned to manage customer engagement through their multiple platforms where the customers are. Although the company is large and international, this side of the marketing strategy is very local, giving the stores lots of freedom and initiative. 

With the millennial age group, Whole Foods believes you need to focus on where they start their process of finding and shopping at a Whole Foods. Taking into consideration how much we need immediate results, Whole Foods decided to launch a separate account for each category one could want to search, so they don’t have to bother reading information they are not looking for. The company is not afraid to experiment and see what works and what doesn’t, and are always open to generating new ideas. Ultimately, each social media platform has their own primary objective with some adaptability. However, the overall strategy the company takes sets a goal of linking and close integration with all of their platform efforts.