Why Deep Insights in Customer Interest and Opinion Matter in the Buyer’s Journey
Article | By Rody Zimete
Performance measurement in marketing has been instrumental in helping marketers understand how their marketing efforts are doing. From reaching the target market to conversions. It is important, however, to get insight into the impact of what keeps the customers engaged and how they perceive it. Exploiting each moment that a customer goes through explains why these insights will lead to more sales and ultimately brand fans.
Customers are interested in what matters to them
Research has shown that a favorable emotional response to a story, product, or offer has a greater influence on purchasing intent than any feature. Marketers able to tell a story with value-adding reactions are seen as partakers. Their ideas are embraced and spread by this community. Insights into what these internal narratives are and knowing the nature of the stories that appeal is key to understanding customers.
A customer’s perception and opinion of a brand’s marketing message can make or break current or future conversions. Growth-oriented marketers can use them to aid in decision making. The story that the brand tells has to match the emotional response the target market anticipates. If this is not met, value-destroying opinions will prevail and result in lost sales.
In the Customer Journey
The impact can be best understood if we analyze the buyer’s journey. Whilst it is important to know how many have seen a campaign and who took action, an exploration of the gap in-between will expose important drivers that influence a customer’s decision. Given their position and influence, understanding interest and opinions will improve the competitive advantage. Insights into them will give answers to whether or not the story appeals and do the associated emotions engage with the culture (which is people like us do things like these)?
How knowing customer interests and opinions will help you
Having got the data relating to these conversion-drivers, it will assist in getting human psychological traits that make up the audience. These, being based on consistent characteristics, give a better incentive on how to position the message. Psychographic segmentation, for example, will assist in coming up with the right story which will fit an audience with the same worldview. This maximizes the chance to tell a story that will get the right emotional response.
Making your brand more relatable
Many brands struggle to be empathic in their communication. Learning about the human traits which make up your target customers will help them to be more appealing on a personal level. That is why humanizing a brand makes it more relatable and agreeable.
The human psychology algorithm does not change. Insights into these characteristics will set up a campaign to follow a psychology-driven brand strategy and have a sustainable approach in understanding how potential and current customers interact with a product, brand or offering.
Success in marketing means succeeding in how humans perceive and make decisions. Being aware of what the humans we are serving prefer and value their opinions will give the brand a better edge and seen as problem-solvers!