Alright advocacy marketing program campaign managers, listen up! Today we’re going to share some insights into how you can utilize your advocacy marketing program data to support and enhance your other marketing initiatives. The tips below work regardless of which platform you’re using to support your advocacy marketing program, though we’ll be using specific examples from the SocialToaster platform to help illustrate these points.
Big data and data-driven marketing aren’t groundbreaking concepts. However, many brands consider data mining to be the realm of large brands with sophisticated marketing channels and matching budgets. That’s why we’re focusing on providing insights that are achievable by all brands regardless of their size. It’s important for all brands to be utilizing data in their marketing decisions. 75% of brands that do say they have achieved a competitive advantage in customer engagement/loyalty and are 55% more likely to have increased revenues.
So what data from your advocacy marketing program should you be looking at?
4 Ways to Data Mine Your Advocacy Marketing Program
1) Demographics and Location
Start with getting to know who your advocates are. Our SocialToaster dashboard makes it easy to size up the age and gender of your audience; however, other advocacy marketing platforms should also be able to provide you with this information. And if they don’t (or can’t), get a new platform!
It’s not uncommon for brands to be surprised by how their demographics actually break down, since most brands have a set idea of who their core audience is. When the data shows a new age or gender trend, it’s actually presenting a new marketing opportunity. Still, other brands use the demographic data to support and reinforce their current marketing efforts if the audience in their advocacy program matches the audience they’re trying to reach in other marketing channels.
Likewise, many brands find user location reports to be a useful data source when planning their media buys.
If your advocates are naturally concentrated in specific cities or states, it might represent a new opportunity in your paid marketing targeting. Most digital marketing platforms support geo-targeting, so ditch the “All U.S.” targeting and focus on where the advocacy data says your advocates are!
2) Heavy-Sharer Advocate Commonalities
As with any marketing initiative, advocate performance is going to be stratified. Some advocates might share only a few pieces of content each month, whereas others are going to share every piece you send them – and clamor for more! Zero in on these heavy-sharers. Take the time to analyze and refine who they are and what commonalities/interests they share.
A simple way to do this for budgets of all sizes, is to use the Facebook Audience Insights tool. Export your heavy-sharer user information (including their email address) from your SocialToaster program or advocacy marketing platform, then upload the CSV to Facebook. By using the Insights tool, you can get a better idea of what common interests and behaviors are shared by these specific advocates.
Once analyzed, you can use this data to:
- Promote your advocate marketing program to potential new heavy-sharer recruits
- Create a new audience targeting set for your Facebook and other social media ads
- Create new content pieces that align with the advocates’ shared interests
3) Determine The Type Of Content That’s Being Consumed
An estimated 65% of sales experts say they can’t find content to send prospective consumers. That’s a staggering number when you look at the amount of time your sales team spends in cultivating leads and driving new business. Likewise, many content creators struggle with determining the type and topic of content they should be creating.
Enter data mining.
In addition to looking at who your advocates are and what they do, you should also use the available data to determine what content type and topic are most popular with your advocates! Start by exploring your advocate email share rates, open rates, and engagement rates. In addition, you’ll also want to look at your open-to-share rate (how often an email was opened and then subsequently shared).
If, based on these metrics, your advocates are sharing a specific content topics and ignoring others, bingo! Your brand has a clear picture on what content they should be creating. Remember, your advocates represent just a fraction of your target demographic, so by creating content that your advocates find useful, you’re also creating content that your broader target demographic will want to see too.
4) Purchasing Comparisons
This requires a bit more work, but the insights gained are priceless, especially if you’re a B2B or Ecommerce brand. Within your advocacy marketing platform, you can easily export a list of all your advocates. Once exported, you can compare those names to your sales data to determine who in your advocacy program is also purchasing from you, how often they are purchasing, and what their total purchasing behavior value is.
This data is instrumental in helping to determine the complete ROI of your advocate marketing program and can be used to:
- Influence new audiences
- Identify which pieces of content are leading to sales
- Show a correlation between user engagement and revenue
Beyond driving immediate sales, you can also analyze this data to identify opportunities to upsell and cross-sell to your advocates, earning even more money from them!
Bottom line, if you’re only using your advocates to amplify your social content and not taking a hard look at the advocates themselves, you’re missing out on a big chunk of your advocacy program’s value. Take the time to look at the data and get to know who your audience is, where they are located, and the type of content they love to share! Use that information to identify new opportunities for your marketing strategies and content creation plan.
4 Things to Do With The Data Once You’ve Collected Your Customer’s Data in 2021
So you’ve got the data, but now what? Having loads of data is no good to you if you don’t use it effectively. Here are four ways you can use your customer’s data to improve their experience when shopping with you in 2021. All new content is in bold below.
Spot Problems
You don’t need to be an expert to know that even a single negative experience online can cause a customer to bounce forever. Having access to large amounts of customer data can help you pinpoint the when, where, and why customers are leaving your site. With this information, you can flag and fix any bugs that may be causing customers to leave abruptly. Take it an extra mile by having your customer service team reach out to the customer to see if you can entice them back once the issues are fixed.
Create Exclusive Promos and Offers
Your customers are unique, and now that you’ve gotten to peek behind the curtain of their online behaviors, it’s time to reward them with something sweet! Real-time analysis of their behavior online can help you create exclusive promos and offers designed with them in mind. It’s a win-win situation. Your customers get discounts on products or services you already know they love, and you get high profits!
Improve Your Marketing
No matter the size of your business, your marketing dollars should be allocated carefully and thoughtfully. With your customer data, you can make your marketing dollars go further and act more effectively. With big data, you can better understand your customers’ behaviors across multi-channels and create a more profitable customer journey.
Get Helpful Feedback on Products
Ever wonder why some products knock it out of the park, and others seem to fall flat? Analyzing and applying customer data, you can identify important aspects that allow you to make every product a winner. Customer data can help you identify price points your customers are willing to pay, keywords they’re looking for in their product search, and why they’re bouncing out of specific products or services that you offer.
Discover Insights With SocialToaster
For our SocialToaster clients, your account manager is ready to answer any questions you have on how to better understand your advocacy data. If you’re not on the SocialToaster platform but want to be, reach out today! Send us an email or call us at 855.62.TOAST. We’ll be glad to walk you through a demo of our platform.
