Digitally Disconnected Consumer
The 21st century is known as ‘The Century of Speed.’ With speed comes a demand for technology that has the ability to sustain and provide the desired growth opportunities to businesses. Globally, governments and corporates have been migrating from traditional to digital channels for driving growth. It is believed that, on average, almost one-third of the marketing budget is spent on digital channels by any company. Despite this considerable investment, globally, one-fifth of the consumers are digitally disconnected for any given business. If we look much closer, there are approximately 51% of the total affluent consumers that do not follow brands on social media.
In the recent past, there have been numerous digital drives to persuade users to switch online and follow brands on social media platforms, but the change is yet to come into action. This switch will only occur with time as a large section of society still resorts to the traditional consumer experiences. Some statics even suggest that the number of consumers preferring to visit stores before purchasing luxury goods is as high as 70%. Therefore, even though digital channels provide cost and functionality advantages, they will never substitute for the traditional system for as long as consumers refuse to or perhaps cannot have access to the internet.
In these times of disruptive innovation, four approaches are available to marketers if they are targeting the digitally disconnected consumers:
Ignore and do nothing – This is the default option and results in no marketing activity to understand or engage with the disconnected group. However, there needs to be strong reasoning behind ignoring the group from future target marketing as it will have a consequential effect on sales and branding.
Become a part of the solution – Many organizations have resorted to imparting digital skills to consumers, which eventually helps them in the long run. Companies are becoming a part of a solution to digital illiteracy that is currently prevalent in the world. They also try to overcome the limitation of consumers seeking purchase advice from friends & family instead of social media influencers or official brand handles.
Target a specific segment – Every business has a particular set of target consumers. The fact that a lot more data is available to companies about the people on digital disconnect, as a marketer, one must focus on the individuals holding the spending power or a demand for the product/ service offering rather than the whole population segment of digitally backward consumers.
Make digital touchpoints accessible – The core tenet here is to make all the new touchpoints or digital developments accessible to maximum online consumers. This is done to ensure that no further exclusion of consumers occurs due to the unavailability of suitable user experience applications or websites, besides the already existing segment of inaccessible consumers. Additionally, one can even make brand/ product advertisements accessible to all. Display advertisements or digital out-of-home could support purchase decisions.
With rapid changes in marketing trends and the advent of hyper-personalized marketing tactics, there is no reason to expect a slowdown in the ‘digital’ trend. Even digitally disconnected consumers engage with email marketing, giving positive results in terms of ROI if used effectively.
Research suggested that most consumers interact with the content that focuses on the product’s manufacturing, brand story, and ways to explore/wear or use the luxury product. Thus, this information can be leveraged by marketers to create additional engaging content to influence the consumers. Using this tactic might prove beneficial in gauging the attention of practical and least digitally active consumers. The onus is now on the marketers of the future to ensure digital inclusion for digitally disengaged consumers or most target consumers.