Activities, Interests, and Opinions (AIO)

What Are Activities, Interests, and Opinions (AIO)?

Activities, Interests, and Opinions (AIO) are a person's characteristics used by market researchers to construct the individual's psychographic profile in their research. An individual's AIO is typically unearthed by researchers through their responses to statements or questions in a survey. Advertising experts apply AIO principles to help focus a company's marketing and promotional efforts towards its target audience, helping researchers and the company to better understand their ideal customer.

Understanding Activities, Interests, and Opinions (AIO)

During a typical AIO survey, a researcher asks the respondent to indicate their degree of agreement or disagreement with a number of statements pertaining to his lifestyle, entertainment choices, fashion preferences, and more. AIO data is particularly valuable when used in conjunction with other data, such as demographics, rather than in isolation.

AIO Segments

Activities

Activities focus on someone's daily routine and hobbies. A person who rides their bicycle to work and plays sports on the weekends likely has different purchasing patterns than an employee who drives a car to work and watches a lot of movies. Club memberships, entertainment choices, vacations, and social events can give marketers clues about a consumer's activities.

Interests

A person's interests reveal concepts and ideals that drive their passions. A mother of three may list family, cooking, crafts, and toys as interests on a survey. Interests may also include hobbies, affiliations, and pastimes. A consumer may have varied interests, such as coin collecting, model shipbuilding, gardening, and fishing. By identifying the interests of a target consumer, companies can better identify how to appeal to them.

Opinions

Everyone has opinions, and consumers are no different. Marketers would like to know people's opinions about movies, public figures, politicians, actors, and television shows. Marketing agencies also need to know consumers' opinions about brands, products, and stores. AIO aims to create a psychographic profile of a consumer, with the goal of targeting advertising to various types of people.

Example of an AIO Profile

Demographics identify a buyer based on age, income, marital status, and other physical characteristics. Psychographics attempt to determine why a consumer buys a certain product. As an example, a person's psychographic profile may indicate that they enjoy an active lifestyle, purchase higher-quality items, find fulfillment in family time, and spend a lot of time on social media.

One traditional method of compiling a psychographic profile is through a survey. A marketing department uses a survey to get a sample size of a certain segment of the population. Larger sample sizes lead to more accurate and precise marketing tools. Companies can also employ web analytics to find AIO characteristics. The types of websites a person browses can lead to special offers and bargains on all kinds of products. Someone who surfs on a baby-name website might find banner advertisements for baby products on a subsequent web search.