Harnessing the voice of your Customer

This article was originally published in ‘Twenty Years, Another Branded Content Story: A Collection Of Thought Provoking Essays From Leading Branded Content And Influencer Marketing Experts’ by Andrew Canter, Greg Turzynski, et al.

Word count: 692

Time to read: 3 min 28 secs

I am about to reveal an uncomfortable truth. Over the very many years I’ve worked in content marketing, I have frequently heralded the increasing maturity of the discipline. As innovation and creativity has exploded in the space, smart technology has superpowered our ability to reach and engage audiences at a staggering scale. The number of industry award categories dedicated to success in the field is testament to the fact that it has earned its rightful place in the upper echelons of marketing prowess. And for good reason; focusing on providing value through education, entertainment or inspiration is both worthy and worth it (thanks L’Oreal). So, we can now rest assured that, unlike many forms of advertising, content earns us real engagement and loyalty from our previously ambivalent target audiences.

Right?

Sorry, wrong. Because here’s the truth; they still don’t really trust you. You’re a brand, and they know it.

With consumer cynicism at an undeniable all-time high, building and retaining trust is harder than it has ever been. Brand love is at best fickle, at worst a mythical creature. Now, this is not to say you are wasting your time and budget on content marketing, far from it. But even the most creative and innovative branded content strategies in the world could be missing a fundamental component that could bring you closer to your audience, building trust whilst dramatically increasing ROI.

Harnessing the voice of your advocate customer.

I’m not necessarily referring to traditional ‘influencers’ here, but rather the people that spontaneously and voluntarily enthuse about your brand or products across social media.

Here’s the thing; ever since people have bought anything, word-of-mouth has been both a blessing and a curse for the companies selling to them. Businesses have frequently lived or died on the strength of both scathing reviews and glowing recommendations. Conversations about your products and services are happening all the time, completely out of your control. Today, they are happening at a staggering speed and scale across an ever-changing social media landscape. As overwhelming as this can seem, it also represents a huge content opportunity, especially for direct-to-consumer brands.

Discovering and amplifying user-generated content (UGC) from your unprompted fans can be a very powerful tool in making many elements of your digital content programme work harder. Integrating republished posts and video content on your owned and paid media channels can greatly deepen engagement. Utilising relevant content on product pages and in abandoned shopping cart emails has been proven to dramatically increase sales conversion. And by interacting with your advocates, it is also possible to build authentic communities around your brand. which opens up many more opportunities, from research and development to co-creation.

Given the sheer scale and unpredictable nature of UGC, it is near impossible for brands of any size to manage this in-house. But over recent years, smart technology has emerged to help. Platforms such as Miappi, Stackla and Bazaar Voice allow marketers to source, curate and publish content to their owned and paid channels, as well as manage permission from their advocates. Case studies from Miappi for example, who work with the likes of Unilever and Millennium Hotels globally, cite engagement uplift of 24% when organic customer content is utilised in paid advertising campaigns. In the eCommerce space there is mounting evidence from a variety of sources, that the presence of UGC on product pages increases sales conversion by between 43% to a whopping 106%. Not surprising when you consider the IAB’s finding that it is trusted on average 50% more than regular advertising.

As part of your overall branded content mix, it is well worth considering how integrating the voice of your customer could make your own content creation efforts work that much harder. It provides a transparency and authenticity that can only help you build trust, and ultimately deliver ROI.

And there is of course a marvellous side benefit to this way of listening to your customers and understanding what they care about. Because by harnessing the positive sentiment of a proactive community you can create content that you have more certainty of hitting the mark. And maybe, get more of them caring about you.