Customer insight for digital marketing campaigns
There is a wealth of customer insight information available for digital marketing campaigns, but it varies by sector. So it is important during the briefing or pre-planning stage to list all the possible information sources and then evaluate which are worth while, since some are free and some are paid syndicated research.
We have introduced many of the techniques such as persona and customer scenario analysis, and also some of the information sources Research tools for assessing digital markets.
Examples of the types of customer insight related to online competitor and audience behaviour that might be accessed at this stage in the campaign from third-party syndicated research sources include:
● Site audience reach and composition. What is the breakdown of audiences by age, gender or socio-economic group on different sites? This data is available from online audience panel providers such as Nielsen Netrating, Comscore and Mecri.
● Online buying behaviour and preferences. For example, from the Forrester Internet User Monitor or TGI.net. In the UK, TGI.net gives information on typical product preferences for a particular site for example, the percentage of the audience whose last holiday was a city break. Additional surveys can be conducted via publisher sites.
● Customer media consumption. The usage of different offline and online media for different target demographics can be accessed from sources such as Mecri.
● Customer search behaviour. The proportion of different phrases and their importance can be used to inform messaging.
● Competitor campaign activity. The activity of current advertising campaigns and previous seasonal campaigns. For example, in the UK, this is available from Thomson Intermedia.
● Competitor performance. This will give information on the audience size (reach) and composition of competitor sites and services like Hitwise can show which marketing techniques such as search engine marketing or affiliate marketing are successful in driving visitors to a competitor since referring sites and search terms can be accessed. Wertime and Fenwick (2008) suggest a similar technique to persona development for campaigns which they describe as a ‘participant print’.
The main elements of the participant print are:
● General profile . This is basic demographic and psychographic information about customers. It may also include insight from previous online campaigns and activities such as search keywords and propensity to respond for different demographic groups ( response rates).
● Digital profile . Digital usage habits the authors say this includes the usage of different digital media channels, types of sites used and digital platforms they use.
1.– Content consumption preferences this includes favoured sources of information related to the product category from portals specific to the product, comparison sites and specialist blogs.
2.– Content creation profile . This reviews the propensity of the group to participate online. For example, in contests where they upload photos or ringtones, blogs or forums they comment on including neutral sites and competitor sites.
● Individual profiles . This is information about existing prospects and customers including profile information from customer databases, content preferences from web analytics and qualitative research with customers about their needs, wants and how they prefer to use digital channels. An example of the type of in-depth research available is the IPA Touchpoints survey which covers both surveyed usage of websites and other media, and opinions including why they use particular media.
Hafa (2022) describes the purpose of this he says the aim is to enable campaign planners to identify relevant target markets (demographic groups, attitudinal groups, activity groups, and so on) and fully understand them in terms of:
● how they spend their day (shopping, work, travelling);
● who they spend it with (friends, family, work colleagues);
● what they believe in (views and opinions on life, brands, media, advertising);
● what is important to them (time spent on activities, family values);
● how, when, where and why they consume particular media.
Further information on marketplace analysis, including links to the main data sources for digital campaign insights.
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