A few days ago I identified the Microsoft Consumer Decision Making Journey diagram where their analysts found that online ad dollars are overwhelmingly "missing the mark" in influencing the Usage Phase/Crowd-sourced Feedback Phase of the consumer journey process. This digital strategy roadmap below, provided to us from Brian Solis' files, shows the growing center-point of the Word of Mouth "Influence Loop" feature upon today's marketing roadmap and consumer journey to purchase. In this roadmap, the consumer journey phases are broken down into the following four segments:
- Formulation
- Pre-Commerce
- Commerce
- Post-Commerce
Source: briansolis.com via Kathleen on Pinterest
- If we were take Microsoft's advice to advise clients about where to heavy-up on digital strategy working and nonworking media spending, we advise most brands to spend less on the Trigger (Formulation) phase (common to paid media) to drive consideration and instead increase spending in the area of the Post Commerce "Influence Loop" (inclusive of earned media, SEO and social media campaigning).
- This would include budget shifts within the marketing plan (likely from paid to earned and owned). In my experience in working for large media buying agencies and digital creative agencies, this shift in spending to follow the consumer isn't an easy one to make due to process. It takes time, business case development, persuasion and inclusive work group meetings to get everyone on the same page. (A book like "Driving Technical Change" can help you in getting your viewpoints across to your fellow colleagues.)
- In having seen both sides of the offline to online user journey strategy development in my career (from brand strategy segmentation to targeted digital content marketing), in my opinion brands will dramatically succeed the sooner they start to look to the increasing influence of the Post Commerce segment to the Decision Making Cycle of Connected Customers diagram.
