Leeds Digital Lunch - Audience Connection & Engagement


Following a short Summer break (or is that Winter?), Leeds Digital Lunch was back this month with a bang, discussing Audience Connection and Engagement.

 

As from the dawn of the Leeds Digital Lunches, Simon Wilson from Bloom was hosting the event at The Adelphi with an impressive selection of local digital industry dignitaries. A regular LDL event panelist, the charismatic Lawrence Alexander (Logistik), Mark Kelly (Digital Consultant), Karen Lewis (MadeByPi) and another regular Jim Moran (Fuse8).

Q. What effect has modern connection and engagement had on the consumer?

Most of the panel agreed that it is forever changing with no given channel being the best route. It is more to do with understanding who your target audience is and connecting with them on their terms, showing respect, building long term relationships through social networks and listening to people. Marketeers therefore shouldn't take control, they should be lead by their audience and act accordingly.

The marketing emphasis should be more about connecting with the person rather than the everyday channel device. People nowadays expect / demand consumer information to be instantly available, if it isn't you will quickly lose people's attention. Therefore information needs to be accessible, personalising it to the consumer needs.

Companies should be ready for the consumer. They should be using web site surveys and monitoring social networks. For instance; if somebody now tweets about a poor consumer experience, they now expect that company to be listening and engage positively.

Social media specialist's employed within a company don't always communicate with all relevant internal departments and consequently don't always project a common message that is a benefit to the whole company.

Q. Using digital media as a marketing tool, has it been a help or a hindrance?

At present there is too much information online to hand and consumers haven't got the time to look too deeply. Visual and verbal tone of conversation can also be hard to replicate in digital communication, making it hard to add the personal human touch. Digital data needs to be selective rather than data for data's sake. Companies tend to forget how people get the data they need and what they then do with it. Giving the consumer more data can make them more powerful than the companies themselves.

The marketeers also need to remember that there will always be a percentage of the population who aren't technically minded and will never engage fully with all the latest technologies. Unless technologically minded, people will generally only take on the new technologies that they feel they personally need.

Q. Do we analyse our own website data and use it effectively?

People are aware that Facebook analyses their data and are using it effectively. Marketeers should now be crafting a 'story' from collected data, making sure that the consumer only receives relevant information that they do actually want to receive. The general public should also be less protective over certain data as it would actually benefit them for future marketing campaigns. One interesting survey on recruitment advertising for accountants found that the ads that got the best response were the ones with the salary advertised.

Q. Do people connect with brands or people?

The general consensus was this is by a project to project basis. Again, brands need to be personal to the consumer, 'keeping it human'. Weirdly, people sometimes prefer not to advertise the fact that they follow some brands, so online market information isn't always totally correct. Do some brands even want to engage fully with all of their audience? For instance, it wouldn't necessarily be a good marketing move for Burberry to show a picture of every customer who 'likes' their Facebook page.

Q. Was getting consumers to respond in the 1950s simpler then, than it is now?

Basically it is no different. If the marketing was relevant then, then it will be relevant now - we just have more channels in the present day. It is human nature to expect things to be more complex in the future, thinking back to a simpler past - although I'm sure that every generation feels the same!

You can follow other thoughts on the Leeds Digital Lunch by following #digitallunch on Twitter.

Did you go to the lunch, what did you think?

@OrchardRich





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