Understanding your customer habits and being able to predict their next move is commercial gold dust as it empowers business owners to position more meaningful content towards chosen segments.
Similarly, it offers consumers improved value through personalised brand moments and relevant content as they move through the buying journey.
With that said, how do marketers track users from multiple digital channels? And how can they effectively measure customers if each channel uses different algorithms and definitions?
Customers are people, not numbers.
The real disconnect across social media is that there is no customer journey mapped out for marketers to identify critical moments. Sure, Facebook insights for business pages offers basic high level analytics to understand your audience but is that enough to understand your buyer’s journey?
Whilst Facebook does offer insight into page reach, visits, referrals and user engagement to name a few, it doesn’t offer in-depth intelligence, flowcharts or a time-line of aggregated interactions from individual users.
Facebook’s algorithm has really impacted business page owners’ ability to reach customers organically, meaning sponsored posts are now necessary to reach more than 10% of your following. One study suggests that for pages in excess of 500,000 Likes, organic reach can be as low as a 2%.
– Miserable eh?
Judging by the aforementioned metrics, a reasonable advertising budget is fundamental to the success of a Facebook page’s user engagement, customer reach and overall Facebook strategy. However, the ROI that brands and page owners receive from sponsored Facebook advertisements can be limited in terms of data that can be recycled and acted upon again.
But what if there is a smarter solution? a solution not just to reach followers but to understand them?
The intersection between marketing channels and a company’s website provides the most insight as it bridges the gap, identifying key user paths and pinpoints what is working and where improvement is needed – this raises the question about social media advertising being the smartest investment if the long-term goal is to maintain, retain and understand customers.
Tools such as Hubspot, Marketo, Eloqua and Adobe Audience Manager power marketers using integrated cross-channel reporting to better understand:
- How users transition between channels
- The influences surrounding customers
- How to capture prospects’ motivations, needs and goals before, during, and after they interact with a product or service.
Brands should start looking at the bigger picture and access raw user journey data to support their marketing efforts. It is for this reason that investing in understanding customers and not just reaching them is the shrewdest business move – think about the bigger picture and long term success rather than short term gains.
Both organisations and customers can benefit from improved customer experience and closer connection, therefore, start collecting your customer’s data, joining the dots and start ending their frustrations tomorrow!
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