Randy Dickinson, of ImpactThinking.com, interviewed me yesterday about how surveys can help businesses create products and services that keep customers buying, get proof to convert prospects, and target messages to customers so that they feel you know them personally.
This is “as recorded,” unedited, but I thought you’d enjoy it, because it has some really great content about how to use surveys to power your business.
There’s a hot new tool that offers HUGE opportunity to ramp up your marketing results, by linking social media with surveys.
Today, we’re going to fill you in on the new tool and show you EXACTLY how you can capitalize on it.
Pay close attention because this kind of geographic targeting promises to be the next big thing.
Here’s the scoop: a small (1%) group of Twitter users now has access to a new service, Local Trends. It’s a new twist on local search that lets you measure trending topics in a geographic area.
With this tool, you can do 2 very important things. First, you can target your own area (appears you can change it when you travel). So if you market locally, this gives you a huge opportunity, because you can
stay on top of hot topics in the local market and keep your brand in the conversation,
follow up on these topics in your surveys, to get more systematic information, and
use these topics in your marketing messages and offers.
The second function of Local Trends is where it really gets cool for those of us who market nationally or nternationally. Local Trends lets you click on a list of cities and countries to find out what the trending topics are there. Right now, the list is small, but you it will grow.
Once this list does grow, this gives you a HUGE opportunity to really increase your conversions.
We’ve told you for a while that segmenting your list and personalizing your offers could skyrocket your conversions but this can put it on steroids.
Here’s an example: Let’s say you’re getting a lot of prospects and customers in Vancouver, BC. With Local Trends, you could find out about issues, hot spots, trends, controversies—all sorts of things going on in Vancouver so that, when you send messages, offers, or invitations to your customers there, you can connect with them in a much more personal way.
How do you do that—how do you KNOW if a lot of prospects and customers come from Vancouver? Use surveys.
Use super-short surveys of your prospects and put a customer profile survey in place, as we’ve been teaching you, and include location information in the data you collect.
As your database grows, look for cities, regions, areas where you have “clusters” of customers.
Where those segments are big enough, create a list segment.
Use Local Trends to periodically see what’s going on in that area, so you can use those trends in your messages to that segment.
It’s just as simple as that. Location-based targeting, like Local Trends and Foursquare, is just the beginning, so stay tuned for updates and get ready to ride the next big wave.
Suppose you could show your customers data that showed that more than 90% of your customers were satisfied, on 7 different measures–real, scientific measures of satisfaction–something like this.
Pretty cool, huh? Well, you can get those data on an ongoing basis, easily and inexpensively.
And I can pretty much guarantee they’ll have a HUGE impact on your customers and prospects. In fact, I’d be willing to bet it could double, triple, or even quadruple your profits.
I saw this in action this week, at my daughter’s school. At their annual Open House, where prospective parents come to tour the school to deside whether they want their children to attend the school.
And featured at the event were survey results that showed that more than 90% of current parents are satisfied, on 7 different measures.
As you can imagine, that was VERY persuasive evidence for these parents. These data spoke volumes, far more effectively than anything we could say. One parent was so impressed he wanted to try to move his child into the school right away.
Well, guess what–if you’re running a business, you’re having “Open House” every day, as you compete for customers.
Don’t you want to have evidence like this to CONVERT those prospects–evidence many of your competeitors lack?
Imagine if you could have a chart like this sitting on your home page or sales page.
Imagine if beside that, you could list literally hundreds of testimonials from satisfied customers, telling these prospects how your products and services transformed their businesses or changed their lives.
Imagine if you could also put case studies on that page, “stories that stick” because they show exactly how your products or services worked.
You can have all that on your home page and sales page, if you put a a satisfaction survey in place for your products and services.
Wondering whether those Facebook ads have any effect? Facebook and Nielsen have teamed to give SOME users a way to measure the ROI.
With more than 300 million users, Facebook has provided an attractive advertising venue for quite a while. The ability to “slice and the dice” the demographics to secure targeted, affordable ads has proved particularly attractive for many users.
As with many other aspects of social media, the tantalizing question remined: “Is it paying off?”
Now Facebook and Nielsen (yes, that’s the polling organization that tracks TV viewing habits) have collaborated to answer that question.
Their new project, dubbed “Brand Lift,” will poll Facebook users to measure recall of the ads, brand awareness, and considerations regarding purchase.
Sounds great? Here’s the catch: The new product will reportedly be offered only to Nielsen customers.
New data tell us that in the last quarter, 43% of Internet users visited social networking sites–that’s nearly 1 in 2!
Nearly 50% of women and more than 37% of men went to social networking sites. And the age data are among the most interesting: While it might not surprise us that more than 70% of under-35 Internet users ventured into these sites, it’s more surprising that more than 43% of Internet users between the ages of 35 and 54 ventured into social networking sites and nearly 19%–close to 1 in 5–of users over the age of 55 did so.
When we consider that much of the growth in the labor force is expected to come in the over-55 age group, the increasing use of social networking sites by older Internet users becomes even more important for online marketers.
These data, which come from the Consumer Internet Barometer, underscore the growing importance of these sites and remind us all that marketers simply cannot afford to ignore them.
And, as an aside, the Consumer Internet Barometer is a great source of data on online trends!
There’s a hot new tool that offers HUGE opportunity to ramp up your marketing results, by linking social media with surveys.
Suppose you could show your customers data that showed that more than 90% of your customers were satisfied, on 7 different measures–real, scientific measures of satisfaction–something like this.
