The question most often heard in company hallways is: how do consumers behave? It comes up in marketing and sales departments, in area management, among team leaders and in every sphere where our core business is aimed at an end consumer.
As market analysts, we always believed we could fit our audience into specific segments and niches, but as time goes by and more and more technologies are developed, companies realize that the process of listening to our customers spans multiple disciplines and a great many sources of information, and, most importantly, that our consumers are unique and one of a kind.
In the race against the clock that companies and organizations live every day, not only as businesses providing a service but also as consumers, living an experience that is far better tailored to a true essence, a real need and the expectations one has as a buyer becomes the only real and indisputable objective for reaching the finish line.
Consumer behavior stems from multiple different factors that come into play in the decision to purchase a particular service or product, and analyzing it provides
viable tools for predicting purchases. However, from the standpoint of consumer psychology and sociology, tacit contact with the buyer takes place through subtle digital actions that are perhaps somewhat easier for mathematics and statistics to understand, and in the context of analysis and prediction, data mining and Big Data play a fundamental role in that analysis.
Data mining can analyze enormous amounts of information. It comprises a set of techniques and technology tools capable of making use of the sea of data, analyzing it and turning it into decisive conclusions for decision-making, and, where consumer behavior is concerned, predicting the buyer’s consumption behavior, how they use what they buy and why they chose it. In the past, companies focused their efforts on mass outreach in an attempt to hook consumers through their ability to stand out. Today, with permanent internet connectivity, consumers look for a valuable message with particular relevance; in short, personalized content and products explicitly designed for whoever receives them, whether a prospect, a customer, a user or a viewer.
In addition to this new volume of data that marketing departments within companies handle for each user, and users’ new expectations regarding the experience and the anticipation of turning buyers’ real wishes into reality, strategy developers face a dilemma: this data comes in infinite volumes, not merely static ones, it grows by the millisecond, and it is stored in a great many information systems and multiple formats. Consumer information is hard to access, find and analyze, and that is where having a tool capable not only of searching but of finding information is essential to achieving management’s objectives.
Enterprise search is the technology that offers us an experience similar to internet search engines, helping us search for and locate exact consumer data in any format or location. With enterprise search, data from information sources such as email, digital files, information systems (ERP, CRM, HCM), websites, intranets and file management systems (document management systems) come to life, giving analysis tools the real information needed to find the behavioral answers of customers, audiences or buyers.
By combining enterprise search with data mining analysis and Big Data in order to get to know the consumer, this will no longer be a task carried out subjectively; instead, it goes further, making it possible to deliver a product that matches each consumer’s needs, an engaging message and an experience that meets their expectations.
In conclusion, when we talk about delivering an accurate product to consumers and customers and delivering a powerful message to an audience, the nature of the company or the product does not matter; what truly matters is understanding who that audience is in order to define specific strategies for each of them. And knowing whom to talk to, what type of consumer or customer, is a challenge that companies must tackle through enterprise search and analytics. Real differentiation and category leadership are achieved by giving data the true relevance it deserves, because that is where the real answers lie.
Author: Creangel Ltda