Is your brand barking up the wrong tree? Why brand demographics don’t work.
Does your target audience include 30-55 y/o females (or males)? Yes? Then you may have a problem.
Let’s start by answering this question: Have you ever met a person that’s 30-55* years old? No. Me neither.
*Replace this with any age bracket, the theory’s the same.
If your branding, brand communication or marketing efforts are based on demographics alone — or your marketing team are using demographic data to compile customer profiles or user personas — your business could be barking up the wrong brand tree. Here’s why.
People buy based on emotion. Their decision to buy a product or service is based on how it makes them feel.
But weren’t you just taking about demographics? Yes. So what’s emotion got to do with it? The short answer is; absolutely everything. Because emotional triggers are what motivate a customer to act. Not age. Not occupation. Not demographics.
‘People buy based on emotion’ is a simple statement that needs a bit of unpacking. So here’s the long version.
Tell me a story. And do it with heart.
People love a story. In fact, humans are hardwired to connect with stories. Stories, and emotion. That’s not opinion. It’s behavioural science.
Stories move people; emotion incites action.
Although emotional impulses are what drives us, emotion and logic aren’t mutually exclusive. They’re intertwined. However, it’s emotion, overwhelmingly, that drives behaviour. It’s emotion that incites us to act. We then use logic, or rational thinking, to back up our actions. We look for evidence to support (or rationalise) our emotion-driven decision-making.
So, although we need some level of logic to back up our beliefs and satisfy our critical minds, we’re led by emotion.
Despite the science, a lot of branding and marketing consultants still rely heavily on demographics to generate customer personas, and then use these to build brands and create marketing content. And, while there is a place for demographic data^ in brand-building and marketing, the science tells us it shouldn’t be where we focus our brand-thinking, messaging or content. We’ve learnt the best place to focus our efforts is on the touchy-feely stuff. On emotion. Emotion backed by a bit of logic.
^This usually covers things like age, gender, marital status, cultural background, occupation, income etc. But it can also include a whole host of other data too.
Why bother with emotion?
By taking the time to get deeper into your audience mindset — to understand them and get to know them on both an elemental and emotional level — your brand and marketing will reap the rewards.
The time and investment is worth it because it works. Emotion incites action. And, after all, that’s your ultimate goal. To get your customer to act. To buy something (your product). To use something (your service). To do something (donate/volunteer/join).
The benefits of using emotional triggers:
Creates better alignment with your ideal customer
Leads to empathy and makes your audience feel understood
Builds a community; a shared feeling; a sense of belonging
Helps your customer feel something (emotion) that moves them to act
Forms a consistent message across — and purpose to — your marketing and communication (online, offline and beyond)
Emotion-centric content = higher engagement + better ROI
Emotion incites action; emotion sells
To position your brand for success, focus your brand communication and marketing on your audience’s emotional triggers.
“They may forget what you said, but they will never forget how you made them feel.”
How to build emotional insights.
The key to getting it right — and to gathering the insights you need — is to put yourself in your audience’s shoes. To immerse yourself in their problem or situation. To spend time thinking like your customer; being your customer, even.
Depending on the size of your organisation, and your budget, you could:
Run an emotional insights exercise internally with a small focus group; or
Bring in an external consultant to facilitate a workshop session.
Tips:
Keep stakeholder groups small and ensure everyone involved has a good understanding of your audience and your product/service.
If you have a large number of stakeholders, consider running more than one session/workshop.
If you have more than one product/customer segment, you may need to repeat the exercise for each one. (Note, sometimes the same insights are surfaced. Sometimes they’re different.)
Consider facilitating similar small group sessions directly with your customers.
Document your findings.
Use your findings! Weave what you’ve found — the emotional triggers — into your branding, messaging and marketing content.
The process can be enlightening and invaluable. It can help your organisation build your product or service around customer needs and feelings (see last bullet point above). Which can lead to a whole host of other benefits. For you. And for them.
Use these emotional-trigger questions as a guide
Ask yourself:
How do our customers feel before they engage with our product/service?
How does the current situation they’re in (or the problem they’re facing) make them feel?
Why do they feel like this?
How do we want our customers to feel (during and after) they engage with our product/service?
How will we help them to feel like this?
The answer to these questions — the emotional insights — are what connects your customers to each other. It’s what brings the group together as a segment. It’s what connects that segment to your brand.
The takeaway
Emotional insights gained from human-centred workshops are essential for: building laser-focused brands; creating targeted content and brand communication; and delivering better marketing ROI.
Understanding your audience well — knowing what really moves them — will help you build a brand that incites action. So use emotional insights as your linchpin to build better products and services, and a better brand experience.
In short, emotional insights help ensure your brand is barking up the right tree.
Ready to build a genuine connection with your audience?
Talk to our branding and design team and we’ll show you how.
