Don’t Just Trust the Data – Anticipate What Your Customer Needs.

In any digitally-driven business, getting accurate data about how your marketing performs is an essential way to measure impact and make plans. As I’ve written about in the past, good metrics can set you up with a clear sense of the return on investment your marketing initiatives gain for your brand. Data is experiencing a turning point – the conversation paths, buying habits, and audience behavior that brands measured pre-COVID-19 need to be reevaluated.

For one thing, consumer behavior has changed enormously in recent weeks. The change sunk in quickly and volatile conditions have created a landscape of high fluctuation across consumer confidence, spending, and plans. All of this is to say, it is difficult – and perhaps a waste of time – to focus on long term projects. With unstable data, we will see unstable outcomes for some time. While search traffic is ticking up in many industries, conversions are low.

So, what are marketers to do? While conditions are bound to remain unpredictable until the pandemic is behind us, there is one indicator that remains stable: Know Your Audience. While your audience’s behavior has certainly changed over the past couple of months, they are still, in many ways, the same people. Understanding who your audience is and building empathy for them throughout lockdown is a critical way to stay engaged and to avoid cringe-worthy marketing. This more qualitative approach can still be rooted in some data. Keep a close eye on your analytics to understand the paths visitors are taking to explore your site. Pay extra attention to the paths of any visitors that are making purchases. How can your site’s design lower the barrier to conversion? What other pivots might you make to optimize the traffic you’re able to generate? How can your direct communication with existing customers build confidence about you as a brand?

Ask yourself and your team tough questions to best anticipate your customers’ needs and, ultimately, to learn more about them. Increase your online presence, including your SEO efforts, and act from a will to see change. If you’re a business looking to find ways to re-orient your digital strategy against the backdrop of the coronavirus, ASTRALCOM can help. Get in touch today.