– In this article we discuss how marketers often exhaust channels in attempts to reach a wider audience, as overly dispersing your messages will dilute the impact on your target
– It is found that you must be precise with channel choice in order to drive results and attain a measurable ROI
Your Channel’s Net Has Holes
Times have vastly changed from the era of marketers advertising towards the broad public, trying to simply be “louder” than the competition. In the past, it was seen as strategic to cast a wide net in hopes of catching as many leads as possible. The logic was simple: a bigger “net” reaches more people, and thus generates a higher sales lift. As the marketing industry has matured however, trying to be louder than everyone else has become a losing battle. To stick with our analogy, your bigger marketing net now has more holes – and your target audience is getting away.
Fortunately, no longer are the days where the only option is to take a costly shot in the dark. Marketers can now use pinpoint precision in choosing who, when and where they target an audience. What’s still missing is the why; we lack the ability to dig into our data to unearth valuable consumer insight and measure the effectiveness of these marketing channels.
Quit Fishing and Research Your Marketing Channels
Marketing execs may find themselves overwhelmed with the wide array of marketing channels that they can use for their various campaigns (we see this constantly here at Qoints). An estimated 96% of brand discussion is NOT happening on owned tech industry profiles, therefore companies must determine where these conversations are actually taking place. However, broad marketing channel statistics don’t apply to every industry – marketers must use data to determine what caters to their own audience.
Every target market requires a different approach to channel usage, and it is critical that marketers recognize which channels are effective to reach each respective target demographic. Take, for example, two of the most popular targets for digital shopper marketing campaigns: moms and millennials. The most effective marketing channels for reaching these demographics are completely different (read on for details and see the chart below). From extensive research on recent standout campaigns, we observed contrasting approaches that modern marketers have taken to target these popular consumer types.
Broad marketing channel statistics don’t apply to every industry – marketers must use data to determine what caters to their own audience.
How Marketers Access “The Biggest Catch”
Moms
In order to access the new mothers of the world, marketers primarily used Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Pinterest, while including more traditional marketing channels like blogs. Millennial moms are social, mobile and very visually oriented, so imagery and videos are ideal content. Given the generally cautious nature of moms, these commonly used platforms appeal to their digital comfort levels. Moms are not as inclined to branch out to new channels, nor do they have the time, therefore sticking to traditional social media is the best way to reach them. However, with 83% of new moms coming from the millennial generation, the tech savvy transition of this demographic is not to be ignored.
Millennials
On the other end of the spectrum, to catch the eye of the media-savvy millennial group, platforms such as Snapchat, Youtube, Twitter and Instagram have become the standard. This reflects the quick adoption rate of the digitally-inclined youth, who are significantly more open to experimenting with newer social platforms. They love their mobile devices, with about 20% using only mobile to access the internet – these could be potential consumers who are unaccessible without mobile compatibility. Marketers must be in tune with not only the latest trends, but millennial’s channel preferences.
It has become apparent that marketers need to be more precise with their channel choices in order to access their increasingly specific targets. As seen through Qoints’ data analysis, one channel may be effective for targeting moms, but almost useless for accessing millennials. With ad blocking technologies improving exponentially, customers are increasingly capable of opting out of the content that they do not wish to see; companies need to know now more than ever how to best capture their targets. It is critical that brands allocate their valuable marketing dollars to channels that stand to yield the best ROI, and ensure that money is not being wasted on platforms that are irrelevant to their target customer.
[READ MORE: HOW TO FIND THE RIGHT CHANNEL MIX FOR YOUR PROMOTION]
Measurement is a Matter of Sink or Swim
In order to maximize ROI from a channel perspective, marketers should seek out tools that help inform the decision and implement the use of such tools as an essential part of the marketing stack. This will help drive focus on ROI for all campaigns. The next step is to measure your results objectively and obsessively – you simply cannot improve if you are not measuring. Proper measurement leads to improvement in just about every scenario. Throughout your digital marketing campaigns, effective measurement must be considered a matter of sink or swim.
Here at Qoints, competitive benchmarking is our area of expertise … and we are ready to help. Don’t hesitate to reach out to us, whether you’re looking to audit your current efforts or you want to know where to start.