With football season starting, I was reminded of Super Bowl XLVII, when the power went out at the Superdome. Remember any ads from that year? I don’t, but I do remember Oreo’s tweet during the power outage, which exploded over social media. Relevance like this can skyrocket a brand to the top of everyone’s minds.
But the lights don’t always go out at the Superdome. As marketers, we constantly search for ways to create more relevant digital marketing. We follow news and social media, conduct surveys, ask focus groups, and review industry reports. Last year U.S. businesses spent $21 billion dollars on market research alone, according to IBISWorld. The bad news is, market research can get pretty expensive.
The good news? You can gain market insights without spending a dime. Here are three tips for creating more relevant digital marketing.
- News and social media – Focus on your industry or target market. You’re probably already doing this. How do current events or trending topics relate to your brand or target audience?
- Google Trends – See search volumes for specific terms or broad topics. You can see related articles, trends over time, and search volume by geography, state or city. Use the Google Correlate tool to see how different topics relate over time or geography.
- Topsy – Search tweets by topics, time or place and analyze sentiment (positive or negative). Gain insight on people’s attitudes about certain topics and view trends over time. Understanding if a topic is positively or negatively viewed will help you develop the best approach and message.
With these tools, you can refine your marketing strategy, campaigns, and message to be as relevant as possible. You can even identify new opportunities, from discovering new geographic markets to gaining insight on new products or services that correlate with your core business.
