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Questions and Insights is the distillation of everything I believe in and am most passionate about as a consumer marketer: the simple idea that we must approach every marketing challenge by ‘starting with the consumer.” While that may sound obvious, it’s surprising how many campaigns go off the rails when a brand manager or agency team starts the strategic discussion with “here’s what we’re going to say, here’s how we’re going to say it and here’s when we’re going to say it.” (Full disclosure: I’ve been known to be as guilty as the next person. It’s tempting when timelines are tight and pressures are mounting.)
But, we need to resist that temptation, especially at a time when any individual with a social media presence can propel ideas, propositions or agendas to a global audience and fuel influence. Deep consumer understanding has never been more critical than it is now for brands that want to succeed in building relationships, cultivate long-term engagement, and create advocates among customers and prospects.
We need a clear line of sight into the lives and worlds of our audiences.
Is our core proposition in tune with our target audience’s values and agendas? Are we meeting them on their terms, not ours? Is our message relevant to their needs, concerns, desires and aspirations? Are we communicating in a way that is resonant and that prompts further engagement? Are we creating community in the social media channels that they favor and prioritize?
When you start with questions that get at the heart of consumers’ lives, concerns, aspirations and modes of communication and engagement, you find out how well your audience will actually listen to what you communicate — and how deeply you are driving influence. Brands cannot drive influence if they are not heard.
In a world in which consumers can become your most passionate advocates or your fiercest nay-sayers, driving influence is wholly dependent on our ability to listen, ask the right questions, make informed conclusions, connect-the-dots, and to transform that knowledge into strategic, vetted insights that show us the pathways to meeting consumers on their own terms.
Questions and Insights 