Customer profiles, buyer personas — how many of these do you formally create and informally contemplate for a marketing or product campaign? As marketers, we are always modeling to “keep it real” when we talk about a product to a target audience or develop a new product.
Increase understanding
Interviews and other research of your past customers and reviewing customer profile data help you develop personas on your current products. The interviews give you an opportunity to get a deeper understanding of your buyers’ motivations to help you model your next customer targets.
And a extra benefit: Interviews can give you new product ideas and product improvement perspectives. Don’t be afraid to ask the hard questions, you may find the answers you are looking for to fix or improve a product.
Here’s a whitepaper from IBM that provides a clean process to remind us of persona development best practices and a great primer if you are just starting to use personas.
Native advertising is a powerful marketing tool that can build a much more personal relationship with your customers and potential customers. Establishing the approach you take with your native advertising should be an extension of your core product voice.
Six points
Consistent messaging across all marketing tactics and customer touchpoints should rule. The native approach introduces more product “speaking” opportunities. Here’s SalesFusion’s quick, six-point list of ideas (and some creative viewpoints and sidetracks) to keep in mind as you build your native voice:
Decide Who you are.
Use your voice to differentiate.
Describe your brand voice in three words or less.
Inject personality.
Don’t forget grammar.
Craft your microcopy.
For the background and details for each list point, read more here.
Native beware
Now that you are all revved up to start or take your native advertising to the next level … don’t be scared off by the Federal Trade Commission’s policies. After you read them, they are common sense from the FTC’s consumer protection standpoint. Just know the facts.
The FTC’s recent rulings of improper use of native advertising in the Lord & Taylor case may give you pause. Learn the case facts and the pitfalls that can get you in trouble. Last December the FTC issued their formal enforcement policy statement and their website carries a native advertising guide that provides background on the statement. AdWeek published two very helpful articles covering the L&T case and the FTC’s native policy statement.
Change brings opportunity … but only if you stay on top of the wave.
Sarah Steever, president, and Clara Jacob, creative director, at Paulsen present a thoughtful blog on how innovation and invention in technology place ever-increasing demands on ag marketers to stay on top of marketing tech and our client’s world of tech.
Understanding your customer or marketing targets has never been more crucial and their world is changing at a pace that won’t slow.
Let’s rethink what we know and what we do. Multiple factors drive the tactical marketing tools we choose and budget is usually a driving factor for our choices. Beyond budget, let’s take a page from MarketingSherpa’s juxtaposition of consumer preferences vs. marketer’s tactics; two separate research projects that may have you rethinking your marketing plans.
MarketingSherpa commissioned their own survey to learn about consumers’ preferences to receive messages when they are away from computers. This online survey was fielded August 20-24, 2015 with a nationally representative sample of U.S. consumers.
Consumer Survey Results.
They asked consumers, “Which of the following methods, if any, do you prefer companies to communicate with you when you are not at a computer? Please select all that apply.”
Consumers’ Top 5 Preferences:Click here for the graph
1) Print ads (47%)
2) Email on smartphone (37%)
3) Radio ads (24%)
4) Text messages (20%)
5) Billboards (17%)
Marketer Survey Results.
The list is eye-opening. And what do we marketers like to serve? Are we marketers in step? MarketingSherpa also asked marketers’ the question, slightly rephrased for this respondent group, “Which of the following methods do you use to reach customers when they are not at a computer? Please select all that apply?”
Marketers’ Top 5 Tactics:Click here for the graph
1) Email on their customers’ smartphones (65%)
2) Print ads (38%)
3) In-person conversations (35%)
4) Mobile apps from their brands (22%)
5) Text messages (18%)
The Preference-to-Tactic Gap.
What are the factors that influence the reverse ranking of top two methods? The Sherpa article quotes marketers experiencing challenges with mobile service or access to messge delivery platforms with true mobile optimization. A key takeaway: The consumer list underscores the need for a full and integrated kit of marketing tactics.
Understanding what makes good email messages tick. Litmus’ latest (2016) email marketing summary report.
Here’s a great “catch-up” tutorial and reference for marketers on email technology, a “state of the industry” approach. If you haven’t read this, you need to get this report.
A couple topics are a bit to tech-nerdy but they are key concepts for marketers to understand to build better email messages and solve related problems. You will enjoy the graphics and it’s well written. This isn’t an endorsement of Litmus … you can ignore their sales pitch.
About the report from the Litmus website, report background: This year, Litmus tracked over 13 billion opens worldwide using email analytics to highlight trends across all industries and verticals. Also profiled are updates to delivery and spam that could impact your campaign results, as well as summaries of all the new email applications and how to optimize for them.
A short well edited list of the most current marketing techniques works as a best practices checklist and idea cheat sheet.
Revisiting Daniel Newman’s “The Top 10 Marketing Trends That Will Define 2016,” published on Forbes’ website, makes me bold enough to want to edit the title to “… 2016 And Beyond.” His list will make you think about your campaigns and either reassure you or give you chills.
His succinct list is a combination of best practices (we are/should be there already) and scare tactics (if we aren’t at least thinking about these techniques, we should). It’s a quick read, see if you agree.
Are you using the measurement that matches your goals and your market? What’s your Big E goal?
Ultimate Goal and Stepping Stones.
Metrics keep our ROI on track and it’s easy to debate which metrics matter. Isn’t it common marketing sense that the metrics you use to indicate success should align with your campaign goals? Or is the email message, one of the top communication tools marketers like to use, a stepping stone to the goal. Of course, the answer is “both.” We set the ultimate goal and use the right tools to advance towards the goal; it’s important to have sub-goals to make sure we stay on the track toward the ultimate goal.
Email ROI.
For years open rates were enough … even CTOR ratios. And beyond these measurements, how do know you are on the right track of building your customer base? Are you building the Big E … Engagement?
Engagement – beyond clicking on a link in the email message, did you capture the reader’s interest in your product or message enough to get them to interact with you beyond clicking on the link? Or even more key, did you have something for them beyond the email link? Taking your reader one more step beyond the click puts your campaign on the path to the Big E.
MarketingSherpa’s Marketing Chart of the Week (click for chart) on email research plots CTOR by industries. The narrative that goes with the chart has great summary email points. Scroll to the bottom so you don’t miss Michal Leszczynski’s three key mistakes to avoid when optimizing your email campaigns.
For those of us in ag marketing, our information consumption and needs have changed over the past several years. More, faster, better – is how we want our business information. What about our target markets: Producers?[vc_row][vc_column width=”1/1″][vc_row_inner][vc_column_inner width=”1/1″][vc_column_text disable_pattern=”true” align=”left” margin_bottom=”0″]
Penton Ag’s recent producer digital-use research project zeroed in on the HOW, WHEN and WHAT of our readers and users on this subject. We surveyed farmers from across the nation to update our knowledge base and keep us on target with their priorities. Our “Ag Producer Research, Info Needs & Platform Use” study is a large, involved project and I’ll chunk the data into easy takeaway bites.
[/vc_column_text][/vc_column_inner][/vc_row_inner][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”1/1″][mk_padding_divider size=”20″][vc_row_inner][vc_column_inner width=”1/1″]
[/vc_column_inner][/vc_row_inner][vc_row_inner][vc_column_inner width=”1/4″][mk_image src=”/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/trendMobile_graphs750x750slide16.jpg” image_width=”150″ image_height=”110″ crop=”true” lightbox=”false” frame_style=”simple” target=”_self” caption_location=”inside-image” align=”left” margin_bottom=”0″ link=”/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/trendMobile_graphs750x750slide16.jpg”][mk_fancy_title tag_name=”h5″ style=”false” color=”#393836″ size=”10″ font_weight=”inhert” letter_spacing=”0″ margin_top=”0″ margin_bottom=”18″ font_family=”none” align=”left”][click image to enlarge] The only way is up. More than half of today’s producers spend 2+ hours online for farm-related info. Study page 16.[/mk_fancy_title][mk_padding_divider size=”10″][mk_image src=”/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/trendMobile_graphs750x750page13.jpg” image_width=”150″ image_height=”110″ crop=”true” lightbox=”false” frame_style=”simple” target=”_self” caption_location=”inside-image” align=”left” margin_bottom=”10″ link=”/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/trendMobile_graphs750x750page13.jpg”][mk_fancy_title tag_name=”h5″ style=”false” color=”#393836″ size=”10″ font_weight=”inhert” letter_spacing=”0″ margin_top=”0″ margin_bottom=”18″ font_family=”none” align=”left”][click image to enlarge] Heavier digital use – 53% of producers report spending 2+ hours on the Internet for farm information each workday. Study page 13.[/mk_fancy_title][mk_image src=”/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/trendMobile_graphs750x750_page18.jpg” image_width=”150″ image_height=”110″ crop=”true” lightbox=”false” frame_style=”simple” link=”/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/trendMobile_graphs750x750_page18.jpg” target=”_self” caption_location=”inside-image” align=”left” margin_bottom=”10″][mk_fancy_title tag_name=”h5″ style=”false” color=”#393836″ size=”10″ font_weight=”inhert” letter_spacing=”0″ margin_top=”0″ margin_bottom=”18″ font_family=”none” align=”left”][click image to enlarge] Mobile access is 24/7,very portable, and provides on-demand access to information and people. It culminates in access-opportunities for marketers. Study page 18.[/mk_fancy_title][mk_image src=”/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/trendMobile_graphs750x750_page17.jpg” image_width=”150″ image_height=”110″ crop=”true” lightbox=”false” frame_style=”simple” link=”/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/trendMobile_graphs750x750_page17.jpg” target=”_self” caption_location=”inside-image” align=”left” margin_bottom=”10″][mk_fancy_title tag_name=”h5″ style=”false” color=”#393836″ size=”10″ font_weight=”inhert” letter_spacing=”0″ margin_top=”0″ margin_bottom=”18″ font_family=”none” align=”left”][click image to enlarge] Mobile access is key to producer and here are the most popular activities. Weather is a popular mobile access subject – also the No. 2 “keeps me up at night” reported topic. Study page 17.[/mk_fancy_title][mk_image src=”/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/trendMobile_graphs750x750page19.jpg” image_width=”150″ image_height=”110″ crop=”true” lightbox=”false” frame_style=”simple” link=”/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/trendMobile_graphs750x750page19.jpg” target=”_self” caption_location=”inside-image” align=”left” margin_bottom=”10″][mk_fancy_title tag_name=”h5″ style=”false” color=”#393836″ size=”10″ font_weight=”inhert” letter_spacing=”0″ margin_top=”0″ margin_bottom=”18″ font_family=”none” align=”left”][click image to enlarge] Almost a third of producers use apps for specific, defined and narrow purpose. Weather is always a hot topic with farmers and this bears out on several study questions, read on. Study page 19.[/mk_fancy_title][/vc_column_inner][vc_column_inner width=”3/4″][vc_column_text disable_pattern=”true” align=”left” margin_bottom=”0″]
Changing digital reliance
More than a half (53%) of producers report they spend 2+ hours each day on the Internet for farm-related purposes. (See graph at left, study page 16.)
Definite shift: More than 2x farmers spend 3+ hours connected each day than producers who reported spending less than 1 hour online per day.
Heavy man, heavy: 75% of producers report they are heavier users of digital ag information sources today, compared to two years ago. A significant portion (41%) of these heavy users are “heavy-heavy” users today. (See graph at left, study page 13.)
Key findings – Mobile use
More key producer digital and mobile indicators:
Farmers are massive mobile users.
The majority (55%) of farmers are checking their mobile devices multiple times throughout the day for farm-related information. See graph for the full breakdown. (See graph at left, study page 18.)
What are they doing on their mobile devices?
Most popular types of information accessed on mobile devices:
Weather – 84%
News – 64%
Market data – 63%
Search – 58%
Navigation – 50%
See graph for more activities on mobile devices (See graph at left, study page 17)
31% use farming-related apps. Apps that were named most frequently used are highly specific with a very defined, narrow purpose. (See graph at left, study page 19.)
Top apps reported:
Weather
Farm Futures
Tractorhouse
Weed ID
AccuWeather
Climate Corp
Key mobile takeaway
The study shows that marketers have greater on-going opportunities throughout each workday to connect with producers via mobile. Indications are that this trend will continue to grow this year and beyond. In the midst of this key mobile growth, producers aren’t ready to give up print … much … yet. Only 30% of producers tell us they use print information sources less today than they did two years ago. We aren’t at the tipping point yet for the shift from print to digital. That’s why we need to stay in touch with our readers and users.
Get more
Our next post from this research will dive into age-related and farm size-related mobile trends. Contactyour sales representative for the full study.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column_inner][/vc_row_inner][/vc_column][/vc_row]
