Why Should Your Small Business Use Behavioral Marketing?
Take a moment to consider your target audience. Who are they? Most small business owners have a picture of who their customers are. They might even have a good idea about their age, gender, purchase interests, and lifestyle. Having an idea about your target persona is a good thing, however, this type of thinking tends to lump everyone into the same category. The fact of the matter is that everyone comes with unique interests, desires, and habits. Speaking to your audience at large is only going to get you so far. To gain a deeper level of customization, you should use behavioral targeting.
What is Behavioral Targeting?
Behavioral targeting refers to the practice of collecting user web-browsing behavior to create more effective online ads. This technique uses a wide range of technologies, CRM software, and web analytic programs, like Google Analytics, to categorize visitors into separate channels so that appropriate content is delivered to each. Creating profiles for different personas, or segmenting customers, means that you are appealing to their specific interests, mindset, behavior, actions, and level of engagement. This not only results in increased conversions, but improves customer service efficiency, which in turn enhances online relationships.
Why Create a Behavioral Marketing Campaign?
Think back 20 or so years ago. If you wanted to offer customers 20% off on their next purchase, you may have stood on a street corner handing out 20% off flyers to anyone who passed by. If they didn’t know who you were or simply weren’t interested in your products or services, that flyer was in the next garbage can. A successful behavior marketing campaign is like having the power to hand this discount to people who are going to use it – customers who are on the fence about making a purchase, and need an extra push to follow through.
Where to Start
Like anything that becomes successful, it starts with a clearly defined goal. Before you can begin segmenting prospective customers, you’ll first need to establish what it is you want. Do you want to drive more traffic to your website? Do you want an interested customer to follow through on a purchase? Do you want to target profitable customers? Without an end goal in mind, you won’t be able to analyze or put to practice the data you’ve collected.
Collecting Data
You can get started with behavioral targeting using Google Analytics for free. Make sure to use tracking codes for anyone who comes to your site. Tracking codes are snippets of JavaScript that collect and send user behavior to Analytics. All you need to do is copy and paste the code into your web pages for it to do so. By setting this up, you can gain useful information about site visitors, such as where they are coming from, if they watched a video, opened an email, or downloaded a brochure, and how much time they spent browsing.
CRM software is becoming increasingly sophisticated. Keeping on top of it will allow you to gain an advantage over your competition. At LinkNow Media, we recommend researching the many options available to find the tool that works with your business type. More and more small business owners are beginning to see the benefits of using behavioral advertisements. If you are interested in learning more about behavioral marketing, don’t be shy to get in touch with one of our SEO specialists.
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