Insight or How To Make Sure You Don’t Forget Your Customers

This post is part of the Visibility series.

So far I’ve talked about defining purpose and destination in creating a digital vision. In my last post I discussed the importance of clarity in terms of creating roadmaps, processes and specifications. These are all very internal facing considerations for digital marketing by which we essentially ask ourselves where do we want to be, and what do we need to do to get there?

The last pillar of the vision framework ensures that the customer or audience stays front and centre. I like to call it insight.

Audience-centricism

Is centricism even a word? I doubt it. But audience-centricism sums up a way of thinking frequently mentioned but less often actually put into practice when planning digital marketing.

We’re at a stage now where UX is an established part of the web design process. Brands, both big and small, have grasped the concept of user testing, iterating design and laying websites out with the user in mind.

However when it comes to achieving visibility this approach is less common. A new website is launched, and it looks great, but who it’s aimed at, what their requirements are and how content is tailored to their needs as a result is an afterthought.

Having a detailed understanding of customer profiles, needs, and content requirements is crucial to creating the right kind of digital content in order to gain the links, likes, shares, and coverage needed to gain online visibility.

To understand you customers you need insight, and insight comes from data. And, as I mentioned when discussing destinations, unfettered access to data is crucial to modern day marketing.

There are two key methods I use to add customer insight to any project – personas, and customer journeys.

Personas

Back when I began working in digital, I read that the beginning of any good project started with the development of personas. I’ve continued to read that throughout my career. I’ve been involved in a wide range of digital project since then.

How many times have I seen a set of personas? Once. How useful were they? Immensely – probably one of the most useful project tools I’ve ever used. And so it surprises me that they are used so infrequently, and I’m not sure why this is.

With the growing role of visibility in achieving digital success, I can only see the need for personas increasing and yet they remain a hazy concept in the mind of many.

Personas help you to understand users’ context – who your audience are, their motivations, relationships with technology, the culture they’re part of and the ways in which they want to interact with your brand.

Developing a set of audience personas at the outset of your visibility project will provide you with a frame of reference. They will be a resource you can refer to throughout to ensure the purpose and audience needs are met by each piece of content you create. They will inform your measurement framework, and ensure your evaluation measures the right outcomes.

They don’t necessarily need to be costly; I’d suggest their level of complexity should be directly proportional to the scale of content project they are part of. But their development will ensure your content has the best chance of resonating with its target audience – a key ingredient to success for any visibility activity.

Customer journeys

While a persona will give you a good idea of who your audience are, gaining insight into their typical journeys, whether its to purchase something or to sign post them to a particular piece of content, will help you to ensure you’re producing the right content for them.

The typical model of awareness > consideration > purchase > advocacy is a common example, but in the marketing environment we’re operating in right now we have the opportunity – in fact you might say we have the responsibility – to become more granular in the way we analyse customer journeys at a persona level.

This is where user research and data analysis can add some really rich information to the visibility strategy. Using internal data, website surveys and face to face interviews with customers and/or non-customers, recruited against your personas, will enable you to gain a deep understanding of how people buy your products or interact with your brand.

In understanding this you’ll be able to identify the pain points in a customer’s journey, the steps they need help with, and the content you need to produce to move them to purchase or a better understanding of your organisation.

If you do this, in a way that resonates with your customers on an emotional level, or in a way that truly satisfies their needs and requirements, they will be more likely to recommend you to others. Whether that’s through word of mouth, or a link, or a social share, you’ll be encouraging audiences to participate in your visibility.