95% of marketers are now using content marketing, and a new competitive advantage is to be gained from aligning content accurately to a buyer’s journey. “Targetted relevance” is another term we need to embrace, whereby marketers align content, and focus on what matters to the buyer, when it matters and why.

How does this affect the marketing budget? By not extending it across a scattergun approach to lead generation. One targeted (relevant and timely) touch is more likely to convert to a sale than a generic message sent to a generic bunch of contacts. And how does that manifest itself in the Marketing accounts? By reducing the cost per lead, and showing a continuing trend in the decrease in customer acquisition costs.

Targetted relevance: the cost per lead could be lowered by 58% by being focussed on the moments and marketing opportunities that matter the most to buyers.

A particular example of using targeted relevance is the placing of “recommendations” along the buyer’s journey. These are consistently accurate product recommendations to customers, in real time, across all channels. This then gives the opportunity to upsell and cross sell similar and related products. Good product recommendations have led to an increase in revenue of up to 300%, and conversions from enquiry to sale of up to 150% increase.

The creation of recommendation data is complex – but is made simple by software that acts upon historical buying patterns and applies predictive analytics via algorithms based on salient data sources. The challenge lies in processing data from multiple sources and then applying predictive analysis on an individual’s history, combining personal preferences with the shopping history of other similar products.

A good solution will also provide click through analysis so that the success of the campaign can be measured, along with the quality of the recommendations that are being made.

The bottom line – you have to understand your buyers, and the ability to personalise across touchpoints increases the customer’s journey satisfaction.

We at Gauri have deep experience of online marketing, and are able to advise on the best practices and best solutions for our customers. If you think we can help you drive financial benefits from increasing your customers’ journey satisfaction, give us a call.