The flowers that are placed in sunlight and receive adequate water will thrive and blossom into something very beautiful. Those that are not given this kind of attention will wither on the vine. The same is true of marketing efforts. When one gives them serious consideration and the time that they need to be successful, then it is highly likely that their efforts will pay off. If you're not getting the results that you want from your consumer research, it may be time to consider making some changes. Here are three warning signs that indicate you may need to improve your approach:
A Sagging Conversion Rate
If your conversion rate is declining, it's a sign that something isn't working right. It could be that your target market has changed and you're not reaching them with your current research methods. Or, it could be that you're not properly understanding what they want or need. In either case, you'll need to make some changes to your approach in order to get your conversion rate back on track.
Figuring out exactly what is causing the lower than desired conversion rate often comes down to doing a little A/B testing. The blog at ideacafe.com explains this perfectly:
For this reason, most professional marketers implement a step-by-step strategy that can be broken down and analyzed individually using methods such as A/B testing. That way, they can chop and change small parts of the campaign until they find the sweet spot without the need to completely revamp their strategy from the ground up.
There may be just one small element of the marketing approach that isn't quite hitting the right chord with people, but that small piece of invalid marketing may be all that is needed to bring the whole operation down. Make sure you address issues like this routinely so that you aren't left wondering what has caused your marketing efforts to not land just right.
Your Audience is Too Broad
When your target market is too broad, it's difficult to properly research their needs and wants. As a result, your marketing efforts are likely to be less effective. To fix this problem, you'll need to narrow your focus and target a specific group of consumers. This will make it easier to conduct more targeted research and produce more effective results.
Marketing is often about making an emotional appeal to a specific audience, and the broadest marketing messages aren't able to hit people with the emotional feelings that they need to experience for a marketing effort to really do its job just right.
There are a few great ways to narrow down who your target audience is so that you may begin to appeal to them more directly. Here are a few ideas for how to make that happen:
Review your product or service: What is it that you specifically offer to the world via your product or service in the first place? Do you know what others think about that product or how they might use it? Which groups of people are most likely to gravitate towards using the product that you have to offer them? These are the types of questions that you need to answer if you want to get a better understanding of the types of audiences to target.
Research the Competition: Sometimes there are ways to take advantage of homework that your competitors have already done. You do not necessarily have to reinvent the wheel every time. You can look at the types of customers that your competition is appealing to and perhaps try to make a play for that same group of customers. On the other hand, you may want to go for a completely different demographic if you feel that the demographic that your competition is going for is already tapped out. Either way, knowing what they are doing will prove helpful.
Figure out Who Your "Superfans" are: There are certain customers who will engage with your products and services even more than others. They are major fans of all that you have to offer right from the start, and you need to try to get in the heads and mindsets of those customers right away. They have truly been converted to your brand, and this means that they are enjoying all that you have to offer them. You need to make sure you encourage them to speak with others about your product and how great it is. Getting them to convert others is a great way to leverage the power of your superfans to create even more fans for your products down the road.
These are some strategies that can help you narrow down the target audience that you really and truly ought to be targeting with your marketing efforts.
A Lack of Reliable Data to Review
If you're not collecting enough data, or if the data you are collecting is unreliable, it will be difficult to make informed decisions about your marketing efforts. To fix this problem, you'll need to find a way to collect more insightful data. This could involve using a different research method, or it could mean increasing your sample size. When it comes to converting customers, data reigns supreme. There's nothing better than thoughtfully analyzing the wants and needs of your customer and creatively applying that to your marketing efforts, But in today’s world, there is so much data that it can be overwhelming.
Depending on your marketing objectives, Talk Shoppe employs both qualitative and quantitative methods to help you connect with your customers in a deliberate manner. We can help you cut through the data dump, and get to the human insights of consumer research.
It is easy to get caught up in the day-to-day operations necessary to keep your business running the way that you need it to. However, you cannot overlook the fact that your marketing efforts may need to be tweaked in order to reach the people that you need to reach. It is not an easy process, and it is not easy to admit these things to yourself, but the sooner you do, the better. A few simple changes can produce massive results and get your business back on track to reach the customers it needs to reach.
If you have research questions you need help answering, let’s talk.
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