Why should customers bother answering your questions?

A great way to get to know your customers better is by getting them to answer questions about themselves. We call this self-identified data, also referred to as declared data. (Check out our article on different data types: A simple guide to data types for marketing). This can be described as a value exchange in marketing. 

Brands would love more in-depth data on their customers and prospects, but why should consumers care? What would make a consumer choose to spend their time with you? And how can this be done at scale?

Value Exchange in Marketing

The answer passes through establishing the correct value exchange.

Monetary Exchange

In traditional market research, the means of exchange are monetary. Consumers invest their time answering survey questions and, in return, are compensated. This is feasible for a small sample size of users to make predictions about a larger mass, but if you want to engage your entire customer base, you probably cannot pay each customer.

Non-Monetary Exchange

Consumers tend to engage with experiences that provide a value they perceive is worthwhile. It is also possible to build non-monetary forms of mutually beneficial value exchange between the brand and its customers. This is one of our main concentration areas at Poltio.

Consumers receive many propositions daily but react much better to simple ones. Formats that make the answer to the question “What’s in it for me?” enjoy higher response rates.

Here are a few strong non-monetary drivers:

Curiosity

Human beings are curious animals! Formats that trigger curiosity result in increased user attention.

Functional formats such as “Is your skin ready for the fall?” or “How healthy is your diet?” create curiosity amongst consumers of domain interest. Consumers would be willing to answer a few questions when the context is right to find out the result.

A similar situation can also be true for a simple poll that displays results after a user casts his/her vote. If you’re into sports and see a survey related to a game you follow, asking, “Was the referee’s decision correct?” – you may answer Yes or No. You would probably do this because you want to share your opinion, but the greater motivation would be to find out what others think.

Brands creating formats that trigger curiosity in their domain and, in return, provide valid information to satisfy that need have the opportunity to connect with customers in a new and lasting way.

Personalised recommendations

The Internet is full of options, and it’s challenging to make a choice. While shopping for a product/service or searching for content, most consumers would appreciate the opportunity to receive personalised recommendations.

While looking for a computer to buy, trying to select wine or searching for a new Netflix show, most consumers would be ready to answer a few questions in return for a personalised recommendation. This is similar to receiving help from a sales representative while visiting a physical store. Share information about ourselves, preferences and needs, so we can be presented with an accurate recommendation.

Product finders are a great way to engage customers, learn more about them and their needs and an opportunity to create value.

A Challenge

Giving your customers a way to showcase their knowledge on a topic they care about is a great way to boost engagement.

For a customer interested in cooking, the opportunity to test his/her knowledge on a “Do you know your sauces?” The quiz may be of interest.

You can also complement quizzes with rewards to incentivise action. A specific discount only available for customers who reach a particular performance metric would also increase the offer’s perceived value.

In addition to strengthening a brand’s domain expert positioning and the ability to educate in a fun way, quizzes also allow a brand to measure its customer base’s knowledge level in specific areas.

Improving User Experience

Personalisation improves the user experience, especially in products and services that are frequently used. Most brands rely mainly on behavioural data while personalising experiences. This is great but limited and, many times can be misleading.

A great use case here is Spotify. Users voluntarily share information with Spotify about their likes and dislikes about songs and artists. Spotify’s popular Discover Weekly feature recommends users’ songs based on their listening history and the history of similar users. Spotify today also allows users to rate songs. This a great example of user-driven personalisation.

Consumers would be willing to share constant input to improve service quality when structured correctly. Giving a brand the ability to enrich its already existing behavioural data with self-identified data.

Contributing to a cause

Sometimes a value exchange can be through the satisfaction of contribution. Consumers would be willing to answer questions to contribute to something they care about.

A survey asking the opinion of residents of a community about future projects does not necessarily need separate compensation. Contributing to your community has value as well.

An artist asking his/her fan base about the cover of a new album not necessarily needs to introduce a new reward for participation.

Brands also – if they exist – should not be shy to ask for input on topics that are of value to their customer base.

Data Quality

If the value exchange is non-monetary, there is also a side benefit regarding data quality. Users themselves choose to engage with these formats or not. But if they do…  There is no motivation to lie as they’re not being compensated for taking these experiences. While shopping for a computer on an e-commerce site, you may not engage with a “computer finder”, but if you do, the reason is that you want to receive an accurate recommendation and, therefore, you’d most probably give accurate answers to the questions.

Summary

Engaging your customers, providing value, and in return, getting to know them and their needs better can be a game changer for your business. The biggest challenge is to find the correct value exchange. Find the ideal exchange of value for your business, use the necessary tools, and you’ll have an ongoing engagement model where your customers willingly self-identify in return for a better experience. We call this self-identification of customer segments.

Poltio provides a platform for first-party self-identified data collection through engaging interactive content. To learn more about how it works, visit Poltio.

E-mail us at info@poltio.com or login try it for free  to join the data revolution!

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