By Dimitri Kyprianou, Managing Director, Go Inspire CX
Who would live in a house like this?
Older readers may recall that was the catchphrase of the original version of TV’s Through The Keyhole, challenging celebrity contestants to recognise residents by assembling a series of clues.
This jigsaw-like approach to identifying individuals is exactly what today’s marketers need to achieve to make their campaigns a success. That means adopting techniques which take traditional postcode-level data analysis a step further, providing a richer picture for brands to consider.
While elements of postcode data segmentation are still viable to modern marketers it’s also true to say “birds of a feather no longer flock together”. In the past, a street-level view did the trick largely because consumers really did tend to cluster in the same neighbourhoods.
Fast forward to today and social trends have changed the face of our local areas. The UK population is more diverse than ever. In greater numbers people rent rather than own properties. And the pandemic has caused further shifts with swaths of people leaving city centres where they no longer needed to work.
All of this makes marketers’ eternal quest to deliver one-to-one communications more complex. It’s time to embrace a fresh approach to data analysis and targeting.
Many streets up and down the land feature a confusion of citizens: households of multiple occupancy; married and unmarried couples, with or without children; English and non-English speakers; renters, mortgage holders and outright owners.
Getting to grips with who’s under every roof, their preferences and habits, and how they behave, is therefore crucial. Paradoxically, understanding the exact make-up of a household is one of the best ways to identify the individual.
Let me give you an example. My partner and I co-habit; there’s the first aspect of our household that requires identification. We both determine differing aspects of household purchasing, but any major spending decisions should be directed towards her rather than me. You’d only know that if you had the right data and level of analysis.
Take this on a step to include every household in our street and you begin to understand the quandary facing brands. How many people are in each building? How long have they been there, and do they own it? What floor do they live on? Do they have a garden?
It’s no exaggeration to say these details are crucial if campaigns are to find and engage the right person. For example, the information can drive next-best actions. You wouldn’t sell lawnmowers to householders who only have a back yard or don’t own the property they’re in.
The benefits for brands are endless: from banks and public bodies understanding whether transactional or regulatory messages should be written in a non-English language, to local grocers knowing the optimal volume of world foods to stock.
Data is the key that unlocks household insight, just as postcode data has underpinned segmentation for many years.
Combining first-party data and comprehensive third-party data sources from outside your organisation is a smart strategy to aid focus on individuals living under the same roof.
Technology is another vital tool in this exercise. Brands tend to have disparate or siloed solutions, but tying it all together – where possible using cutting-edge AI and machine learning applications – creates a foundation for insight that can underpin successful campaigns and boost ROI.
Having an always-on, automated resource that constantly refines details within the data can revolutionise marketing programmes. If that sounds like a lot to handle, forward-thinking agencies now house the ability to conduct data analysis and execute channel strategy under one roof.
As a result of a stronger combination of data and technology, brands will benefit from an immediacy of information at the point of household decision-making. Marketing comms will be targeted and relevant, without reaching the wrong person or irritating someone with misplaced offers. Think a telco trying to upsell a new mobile handset to a student who’s struggled with signal for months. Or a grocer pushing in-store deals to a busy dad who only shops online.
Understanding household composition, from occupant life-stage to individual habits and preferences, is the new battleground for data integration and interpretation. Building that knowledge brick by brick will ensure home is where the heart is for brands’ modern marketing strategies.
ADVERTISINGWEEK.COM – Under One Roof: Know Me, Know My Household
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