Kotler's STP: why selling to everyone means selling to no one at all
When we ask business owners who they sell to, one answer comes up often: everyone. It sounds ambitious, but it is usually one of the clearest signs that the brand doesn't yet know where it stands.
Those who try to speak to everyone end up remembered by no one. The message becomes generic, price becomes the only argument and every competitor looks the same.
What STP teaches
Philip Kotler, considered the father of modern marketing, structured a simple logic to solve this problem. It became known as STP, which stands for three steps:
Segmentation: dividing the market into groups of people with similar needs and behaviors.
Targeting: choosing which of these groups the business will focus its efforts on.
Positioning: defining the place the brand wants to occupy in that audience's mind, compared to competitors.
The order matters. There is no strong positioning without first knowing who it was designed for.
Consumers want to be recognized
A 2021 McKinsey study found that 71% of consumers expect personalized interactions from companies, and 76% get frustrated when that doesn't happen. In other words, people want to feel that a brand was made for them.
Personalizing doesn't mean creating something different for every customer. It starts with a clear choice of who the brand wants to serve, and that is exactly what STP organizes.
The cost of not choosing
In Brazil, not knowing the target audience appears among the planning mistakes Sebrae identifies as causes of business closures. When a business doesn't define who it is talking to, it also can't define what to promise, how much to charge or where to be.
Choosing an audience is not losing customers. It is gaining relevance with those who truly matter.
How LakeLab works
STP is one of the foundations of the LAKE Method©. In the listening and investigation stages, we map the business's audience profiles, their needs and how they decide. Then we analyze the competition to find the space the brand can occupy.
The result is a positioning that speaks to those who matter, and a brand that stops trying to please everyone to become the right choice for someone.
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