The lessons learned from online consumer behavior in 2023 are of great value for crafting much more specific and meaningful marketing strategies in the future. Understanding how behavior patterns, preferences, and needs of consumers have evolved is crucial for any brand aiming to stand out in the digital world.
So, if you're a marketing director looking to build stronger digital strategies for 2024, here are the key points you need to know to achieve that.
Key Insights into Online Consumer Behavior in 2023
Undoubtedly, the analysis of online consumer behavior has become an essential tool for assessing and implementing better marketing and advertising strategies. This is because the solid data it provides about new trends in audiences offers the opportunity to reach new consumer segments and establish a strong presence among them.
In this regard, the analysis of online consumer behavior has provided several fundamental insights during 2023, regarding how consumers respond to digital marketing strategies and how they engage in online commercial dynamics today:
Digital Slowdown
Firstly, we are witnessing a decrease in the "digital fervor" experienced during the pandemic. Currently, while consumers value connectivity, the need for in-person interactions persists as social beings. This is especially true for the younger generations, who define their well-being based on online and offline experiences.
Resistance to E-commerce
On the other hand, although e-commerce continues to grow, it is clear that it has not yet reached its full potential. While some product categories find fertile ground online, others still show resistance to purchases through this channel.
This aspect highlights the need to thoroughly study the reasons behind such resistance to adapt specific strategies that foster both consumer trust and comfort in different types of online purchases.
Commercial Strategy
In line with the above and due to the complexity of consumer behavior, there is a dichotomy between boosting Direct-to-Consumer (DTC) sales or expanding penetration through marketplaces. While there is no definitive formula covering the variety of possible circumstances, it is clear that brand decisions must consider online consumer behavior data and aim to seek greater autonomy, strengthen the brand, and improve business profitability.
In addition to the above, 2023 has left us with other insights revolving around the challenges of advertising effectiveness. Some of them include:
Democratization of the Digital Environment
Currently, for brands, standing out among the large amount of existing content in the digital environment has become a constant challenge. This involves increased difficulty in terms of visibility, differentiation, and recall from their target audiences.
This is mainly due to the democratization of the digital world as a communication, advertising, and sales channel. Now, all kinds of companies (large and small), as well as individuals, compete for consumer attention.
The AI Boom
On the other hand, if anything has defined 2023, it is the impact of Artificial Intelligence (AI) on the advertising world by transforming how content is generated and media strategies are planned. However, despite its potential for greater efficiency in processes, it has also reinforced a lack of credibility, raising concerns about the authenticity and reliability of information.
Fraudulent Practices
Lastly, one of the most prominent challenges to advertising effectiveness has been the proliferation of fraudulent practices and manipulation of numbers, particularly in the area of programmatic advertising. This is observed, for example, with the generation of fake traffic using bots and the production of a high percentage of false impressions, undermining the actual effectiveness of advertisers.
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Achieve Your Marketing Goals in 2024: Strategies to Achieve Them
With all the challenges and lessons mentioned so far, it is evident that a comprehensive approach is required to analyze online consumer behavior and design plans more customized to today's internet users, covering different aspects of interactions with this medium.
Therefore, we want to discuss two strategies that you can use to improve your return on investment (ROI) in 2024 and achieve your marketing goals.
1. Optimize Presence in the Buyer’s Journey
Firstly, to have a greater impact on audiences, brands need to optimize their presence throughout the different touchpoints of the buyer's journey. For this, the analysis of online consumer behavior is crucial when:
- Identifying the points of that journey
- Defining the tactics with the greatest impact on each of them
This way, it becomes easier to determine the "what," "how," and "when" to maximize the success of marketing strategies.
2. Using Internal and External Data on Online Consumer Behavior
In the second place, it is essential to learn how to utilize available internal data and build from there to understand what additional information should be acquired for a better understanding of buyers. The acquisition of such information should focus on data that truly reflects the profiles of the previously defined buyer personas, ensuring much more relevant results.
In this regard, a fundamental analysis tool is behavioral data, as it offers the opportunity to observe the real behaviors of target audiences through multiple points of contact. Some characteristics that make behavioral data a valuable research method include:
- Utilizing passive measurement, based on the observation of user actions in the digital environment.
- Providing insights from real people.
- Collecting real-time and large-scale quality data.
- Examining data from the same user across different devices (desktop, laptop, smartphone, tablet).
This way, using both internal and external data allows understanding when and where the desired audience is, to boost the effectiveness of strategies.
Heading Towards 2024: Expectations Regarding Online Consumer Behavior
Undoubtedly, 2024 will be a year where success in marketing strategies will be defined by a deeper understanding of online consumers. Only through this can differentiated strategies based on habits and areas of interest be generated.
In summary, this year, the focus of marketing leaders should be on obtaining what we at Netquest call a "Symphony of quality data." This provides a clear and detailed image of the consumer to:
- Understand their browsing and purchasing patterns, as well as their interactions with different platforms.
- Identify the most important points of the buyer's journey.
- Define the touchpoints where brand presence should be increased.
- Determine the most significant actors in the digital lives of buyer personas/target audiences.
What Does Our Symphony of Quality Data Entail?
Providing a 360° view of the consumer has been our goal since Netquest began. Therefore, thanks to our panelists, with whom we maintain a relationship of high loyalty and transparency, granting us their explicit consent to monitor their online and offline activity, we can delve into the heart of their behavior, offering the following solutions:
- Digital Behavior: To understand meticulous details about the online activity of consumers (website visits, search terms used, frequency of app usage, etc.).
- Audio-matching: To identify what audiovisual content your audience consumes on television, radio, and the Internet, allowing you to understand the impact of your multimedia campaigns.
- Geolocation: To discover the offline habits of your target audience, understanding their daily routines and other patterns.
- Profiling: To select the target you want to analyze very precisely (+1,000 sociodemographic profiling variables and specific behavior variables).
- Opinion: To know what your audiences think about your brand, products, or services.
In addition, we recently launched an additional service to complement the study of online consumer behavior, whose main purpose is to allow brands to know the satisfaction level of their e-commerce channel vs. that of their main competitors: the Digital Shopper Monitor.
At Netquest, we want to help you boost your marketing strategies by making this Symphony of data a reality. Contact us and see how we can help you achieve a more comprehensive analysis of online consumer behavior, allowing you to make 2024 a year full of triumphs.
