How To Use Behavioural Targeting in
Online Market Research
One of the greatest benefits to social media-based online market research is the ability to utilize
behavioural targeting. Here is how you can use behavioural targeting:
Nowadays, the web is all about data, but the art of marketing lies in interpreting this data correctly.
Unfortunately, 99.5% of the data never gets used or analysed. Visualizing this data is important for
businesses to have a deeper insight into consumer behaviour and browsing patterns. When
integrated into business systems, these timely actionable insights and events are likely to act as
critical success factors.
Benefits of Behavioural Targeting Over Profiling
Questions
It is easier to make your marketing more effective if you have more specific information about user
behaviour at your disposal. Moreover, user expectations are increasing. Audiences get annoyed
when they see less personalised or more irrelevant content. With behavioural targeting, you can set
the bar high by sending the right content to the right audience at exactly the right time. According to
Mackinsy’s analysis, personalisation can deliver five to eight times the ROI on marketing spends and
lift sales 10% or more.
But, sometimes, the procedural flaws of data collection makes marketers fall short of achieving their
marketing goal. Hence, an intelligence-driven targeting is the need of the hour to enhance the quality
of user data. In a world where nearly 50% of the consumers feel they receive too many marketing
emails, personalised campaigns make a huge difference.
Thus, the advantages of using behavioural targeting are much more tangible than profiling
questions. In behavioural targeting, data management platforms track consumer metrics to build a
knowledge bank about where and why their users visit online. Some of them include:
●
Frequently visited page
●
Actions like subscriptions and purchase
●
The time they visited a page
●
The duration they spent on a page
●
Links and ads click
While profiling questions are still useful in a specific context, the benefits of this quality of data are
extensive.
What Is Behavioural Targeting?
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haviors-
Behavioural targeting is the science of using data to establish the profiles of users based on their
web-browsing behaviour to display highly relevant ads and personalised marketing messages. In
other words, behavioural marketing gathers data from website activity, purchase activity, and
activities from third-party applications to understand the target audience in a deeply strategic and
relevant manner.
Browsing behaviour comprises every action taken online by any given user. Reader’s movements
are tracked by every website you visit, every product you search, every link you click or every bit of
content you interact with at any point in time. This user data is the goldmine for a broader marketing
game, such that when used wisely, it has the potential to achieve great results.
How Does Behavioural Targeting Work?
Behavioural targeting works by using user data to establish the profile of a specific user or various
segments of online users to create a more personalised experience for them. In other words, you
take the information for your users to build a more realistic profile of them which helps you tailor your
messaging overall.
When personalised content is sent at the right time, the likelihood of the audience taking action
increases. It also creates an interesting and engaging experience for the visitor and thus, it’s
success rates are higher than generic opinions.
Once you know your audience, you can give them content they really want to open and read. But
how do you do this? Here’s how:
1. Collect Consumer Data in Creative Ways
This is the first step in the behavioural targeting process. An efficient online research platform
collects data in unique ways to provide valuable insights. This creative expertise ensures user
cooperation through engaging surveys and activities.
Working with a platform that specialises in this field is key to understand consumer expectation and
personality. Here, the main advantage of an interactive medium like the internet in enhancing user
experience is the real-time feedback from the consumers.
The following data points can be collected to establish the online profile of a consumer:
●
Location data
●
Data entries in forms and surveys
●
Session behaviour (page views, navigation clicks, content he/she reads)
●
Browsing history
●
Purchase history
●
Devices they use
2. Develop User Persona to Invite the Right Participants
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The type of respondents researchers sought are totally different than those people who take part in
focus groups or surveys for money. Online research needs respondents who are interested in
contributing and being heard, and who want to make a difference. The way to ensure that you get
the right respondents is to send specific and targeted invitations.
Therefore, it is important to understand the various personalities that make up your target audience.
Understanding user personas helps you figure out what they really need or care about so that you
can communicate with them in the most relevant way.
A user persona is a detailed description of someone who represents your target audience. This
persona embodies all the characteristics of your ideal potential customer. Create fictional buyers
which are representations of your customer types or buyer personas. With many such personas, you
can understand your customer segments in a much better way to customise your marketing efforts
accordingly.
User personas entail demographic details, interests, and behaviour traits. These personas help you
see your potential customers as real persons, such that you no longer have to guess who they are
and what they really want.
3. Ensure Proactive Engagement by Using the Right Dialogue and
Efficient Technology
Efficient technology is paramount from the perspective of a researcher as well as a respondent. If a
user finds a platform difficult, they simply stop using it. Hence, it is important to prefer a platform that
takes esthetics into consideration and has an intuitive user interface.
Although technology is crucial in determining which platform is great to use, it is yet more important
to achieve proactive engagement. To achieve this, engagement managers interact and engage with
the participants and motivate them to come forth with new ideas and opinions. This task requires a
clear set of goals in terms of how often to interact with the participants and what dialogues to use,
depending upon the type of data required.
In market research, a competitive edge lies in connecting with the customer at the right time to
enhance the quality of your research data with rich and significant answers.
However, analysing behavioural data can be an overwhelming task and experience. Multiple
campaigns and varied audiences makes it difficult to interpret patterns without considering numerous
variables. A good research needs the agility to make changes to keep you informed of the needs of
your target audience. This flexibility in turn allows you to cover a broad array of research topics whether that is a fast-turnaround survey or topline summary data for a detailed report.
If you wish to stay one step ahead of the market with key success factors like strong engagement,
well-recruited participants, and flexible research, you would need the backing of an automated and
smart market research platform like the one we offer at Bolt. With Bolt data management platform,
you can keep your mind focused on the questions you are looking to be answered to take your
research data quality to another level and seamlessly carry out great projects.