The Advertising Media Relay Race.
Placing advertising to engage the customer journey has gotten more complex. That’s because today’s customer journey does not travel in a straight-line. Instead, that path figuratively and literally crosses multiple channels and media types, requiring your message to move from media to media like a baton in a relay race.
Do you choose TV or mall media and billboards? What about print, radio, digital or mobile? Most advertisers just want to stay in front of their audience.
Think like your customer
To effectively advertise to your customer, think like them. The way they make their purchase decisions has changed. For years advertising followed a simple mantra: Attention, Interest, Desire, Action. As online and mobile options caused buying patterns to evolve, we adopted the “path-to-purchase” with Awareness, Consideration, Conversion and Evaluation. Today, retail management studies are developing a new model:
Recognition of an Issue or Need – The consumer becomes aware that their current condition is not consistent with what they want.
Information Gathering – The consumer begins seeking out options that could satisfy their want.
Evaluation of Options or Alternatives – The consumer compares them and makes judgments about which is the best fit to satisfy their want.
Selection – The consumer selects and purchases the product/ service to satisfy their want.
Evaluation – The customer will determine and share their degree of satisfaction, which can influence repeat purchases, loyalty, online reviews and referrals.
The New Journey Has A New Media Strategy
Regardless of the model, consumers still pass through a number of stages on their journey to make a purchase. Likewise, one channel does not match all journeys. Instead, the strengths of different media support different stages of the journey.
Awareness or need is usually triggered by seeing someone else benefiting from a product or service, or being exposed to it through advertising. POTENTIAL MEDIA TYPE: TELEVISION, PRINT, RADIO, MALL/OUT-OF-HOME, MOBILE, SOCIAL, DIGITAL DISPLAY AND PREROLL.
Information gathering is suited to digital and mobile, while interest and consideration is constantly under the influence of advertising. As interest and consideration evolve to evaluating options and alternatives, advertising again influences the journey. POTENTIAL MEDIA TYPE: TELEVISION, PRINT, RADIO, MALL/OUT-OF-HOME, MOBILE, SOCIAL, DIGITAL DISPLAY AND PREROLL.
Selection is separate from actual purchase because a specific product may be available at a number of brick and mortar locations and a plethora of online retailers. Here, advertising’s influence is constant. A promotional advertisement in the mall (OOH) can determine which retailer you walk into to buy a product from. POTENTIAL MEDIA TYPE: MALL/OUT-OF-HOME, MOBILE, SOCIAL, DIGITAL DISPLAY.
The after purchase evaluation will have a significant impact on customer satisfaction, brand loyalty, repeat business and the power of referral or negative review. POTENTIAL MEDIA TYPE: DIGITAL REVIEWS, MOBILE-SOCIAL.
Best Practices
The best practice is to really understand your customer and find the media options on their path to a purchase decision. Making connections, building awareness and touching consumers in the purchase-frame-of-mind with multiple impressions along the way reinforces the value and benefits that differentiate you from the competition.
