DIGITALBEVERLY

Big Data, Big Profits:
Why Digital Analytics is Integral to Market Research

Article from Jan 20, 2020

In Digital Beverly we believe, the extent of your online reach doesn’t matter so much as the kind of people you reach. A traffic of 1,000 visitors who have no plans of buying from you is useless compared to 20 leads with higher chances of conversion.

As such, business strategies have evolved from mass marketing to more accurately targeted techniques. This is especially crucial today when consumers are more empowered and connected than ever through smartphones and the internet. People use different channels to gather information about what they should buy, where they’ll buy it, and at what price.

Consumers are guided by their own intent when they’re researching, and this intent changes with every new information they take in. As a result, every consumer follows their own purchasing journey.

What does this mean for marketers?

It means that casting a large net in the digital pond isn’t enough.

Fishing in the Digital Pond

You have to be smarter and more strategic in reaching your target market.  Generic and cookie-cutter strategies won’t cut it because consumers get hyper-specific with their online searches, which represents their particular needs and wants. Leads and potential customers easily slip through the gaps in your marketing funnel if you fail to meet their expectations.

Luckily, online visitors generate plenty of data, which you can analyze to gain new insights about your target market. You can use these pieces of data to understand consumers better and develop smarter strategies that will attract your ideal customer: hook, line, and sinker.

Big Data, Big Insights

Every time an online user visits your website, likes your Facebook post, clicks on your ad, writes a product review, sends an email, adds an item to their cart, or clicks out of your website’s blog, they are creating digital marketing data. This covers web logs, mobile interaction data, social media data, transaction history, social media engagement, and recorded conversations with your customer representatives.

The good news is many of these platforms come with their respective analytics capabilities. For example, Facebook and Twitter has their own reporting tools showing the impression, engagement, and shares of your post or ad.

The challenge with digital marketing analytics, however, is interpreting customer data across channels simultaneously. Using different platforms for marketing analytics produces fragmented results, providing siloed views (i.e., for mobile, website, social media, or call center) of your customer experience. This prevents you from seeing the overall performance of your digital marketing campaign.

You need to see and understand your customer data across all channels at the same time since users interact with brands using multiple platforms, even for a single sale. A multichannel approach to digital analytics reveals consumer behavior trends that help you convert more leads into customers.

For example, big data analytics uncovers patterns on the digital path to purchase, or the consumer’s journey to finding you online.   

The following are some fundamental big data techniques to enhance your digital marketing campaign and improve your bottom line.

Digital Analytics

Digital Analytics Techniques

For us at Digital Beverly, keywords are the bread and butter of search engine optimization and pay-per-click campaigns, two common digital marketing strategies that increase your online visibility. These two are data-backed techniques; it’s not enough to have a list of basic keywords, you need data to tell you which ones to target and prioritize.

Keyword research also lets you see your market’s search behavior in different channels.

For example, voice searchers tend to use questions instead of phrases for their queries. Natural, conversational language and long-tail keywords are also more common for voice searches. On the other hand, people are likely to ask “how to” questions on YouTube.

Use these techniques to optimize for specific platforms, but make sure they tie into your overarching digital campaign.

Big data also lets you into the different kinds of people who come across your brand online. You have a target market, yes, but this can be divided even further into segments. Identifying who these market segments help you tailor your techniques for each of them and prioritizes the biggest lead generator.

The Pareto Principle is an age-old marketing principle, saying that 80 percent of your profit comes from only 20 percent of your market. This 20 percent is your VIP group. They bring in the lion’s share of your revenue, so they’re a valuable group to know.

Find out what kind of person finds the most need in your product or service. Describe them in detail. Their demographics, psychographics, and digital behavior are keys to identifying which techniques and messaging will bring out your desired response.

Market segmentation also helps you develop specific promos and content for each group.

For example, VIPs can get an extended happy hour sale, new leads can get a 20 percent discount coupon on their first purchase, and pizza-lovers can get a buy-one-get-one offer.

After segmenting your market, social listening tools let you track and respond to online conversations relating to your brand and industry.

Although the listening occurs mostly on social media channels, the details you gather here are applicable to your overall digital marketing campaign. Trend watching, competitor analysis, audience research, link building, social media engagement, and reputation management are just some of the ways you can use social listening.

The insights you glean from social listening help you curate relevant and timely content that attracts your ideal customer. This technique helps you stay on your market’s radar, which aids brand recall.

Ultimately, big data is the key to understanding your target market better — knowing what makes them tick and using this information to meet their wants, needs, and expectations.

But digital analytics isn’t just about mining data. It’s about knowing what to do with these insights to improve your marketing campaign.

Data-Backed Digital Marketing Services

Digital Beverly offers premium digital marketing services, including SEO, social media, web design, reputation management, and PPC. Our strategies are powered by actionable data, producing goal-oriented results.

Read our local SEO case study, “Starting from Zero,” to find out how we used keyword research, market analysis, and big data to improve an Italian restaurant’s online presence. When you’re ready, call or email us for inquiries about our services. 


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