Putting People First: Human-Centric Marketing Changes the Game

In the digital age of AI and automation, our world is more connected than ever before. Yet, genuine human connection is rare and therefore particularly valuable. 

As marketers, we always look for ways to understand our audience better in order to be able to offer relevant solutions and services. Searching for real, empathetic communication beyond pure consumerism? Human-centric marketing is the answer that could elevate your brand strategy to a whole new level. Placing humans rather than customers at the centre of your marketing campaign is the key to understanding their perspective, language, values, beliefs, goals, needs and challenges and tailoring your marketing accordingly.

Sounds like a solution worth exploring further? Check out our selection of insights on the subject and make human-centric marketing your winning strategy:

• Connecting with consumers as people, not just as buyers. According to Philip Kotler, the father of modern marketing, human-centric marketing is defined by brands that approach engaging their current and prospective customers via advertising and marketing tactics as whole human beings with hearts, minds, and spirits (9. Kotler, Keller, Brady, Goodman, Hansen, 2016). The consumer becomes a more complex entity, a whole human being with opinions and ideas that you need to listen to and take into account. With this new marketing methodology, the focus is on human values rather than corporate values, as well as getting consumers involved rather than just telling them what to do. Most importantly, it’s about treating consumers like real people rather than nameless numbers and showing that you want to connect on a human level. 
• Consumer co-creation supports your campaigns. Human-centric is also the philosophy that says successful marketing is distinguished by the increased consumer co-creation (consumer participation and collaboration) in product innovation and development (9. Kotler, Keller, Brady, Goodman, Hansen, 2016). Such an initiative increases consumer engagement with the brand and helps you develop a deep understanding of your audience. Through human-centric marketing, marketers can attract up to 63% more clicks and up to 1,400 more conversions when matching brand and marketing messages to consumer’s personality/human-based characteristics. In the end, it’s a win-win strategy: A brand becomes elevated through this approach because positive customer experience translates to positive perception of the brand. (Source)
• Applying human-centred design is beneficial. A human-centric brand is such that acts more like a human – putting human empathy, authenticity and vulnerability at the heart of its business processes to connect with consumers on an emotional level. What does it mean for your strategy? Test, improve, repeat – human-centric advertising is dynamic, responsive, and constantly evolving as more information flows into your campaign dashboard. Use marketing data analytics to deliver human-centric marketing. For example, consumer behaviour research has confirmed a few interesting new video watching behaviours including that most people keep their phones and even computers on mute while videos play and, therefore, expect and prefer videos to have captions. To apply this research in the real world, 6 different advertiser videos with and without captions were tested on 2600 real humans. The results showed consumers were 50% more likely to comprehend the main message of the video ad with captions and 52% more likely to remember who advertised in the video. So, a small change like adding captions to video ads can go a long way for advertisers towards adapting towards modern video watching behaviours.  
• Customer experience is a key competitive differentiator. According to stats shared by Emplifi, 77% of brands believe in it. 66% of consumers say they will share personal data about themselves if they think it will elevate their customer experience. Customer experience drives over two-thirds of customer loyalty, which represents more than brand and price combined, making it a revenue-driving force. 

In a recent survey of 1,920 business professionals to share their number one priority for the next 5 years, Customer experience (or CX) came in first – beating product and pricing for the third time in a row.

Source

• More humanity in your content strategy. A human-centred approach to content is the future of content delivery. According to this analysis, in human-centric marketing, content should be tailored to the unique needs and preferences of your audience. By leveraging the insights they have gathered, businesses can create targeted content that speaks directly to their customers, providing value and fostering engagement. How to do that? Develop content themes based on your audience’s pain points and interests, use dynamic content to personalize offers for each customer segment, as well as storytelling techniques to create an emotional connection with your audience. Human-centred content is approachable and original. It’s seldom self-serving, rather, it’s giving, supportive and educational. Need more inspiration on the subject of human-centred content strategies? Check out our recent article on applying the timeless wisdom of Aristotle’s Persuasion Triangle to advertising.

Novelty Media, via SmartAdd, has created an innovative mobile media channel – one that builds trust, enhances customer experience and drives customer loyalty. We partner with our global advertisers to deliver video and static content in a high-attention, clutter-free and respectful environment where consumers are in control and treated as humans. By utilizing specific moments of peak undivided attention on the mobile screen, your campaign gets noticed every time, your brand image is enhanced and you achieve increased user satisfaction and a higher loyalty rate. Our audience consists of 100% verified mobile subscribers endorsed by Mobile Operators – that means your ads reach only humans. Want to get new business opportunities and boost revenue growth by actively engaging with your customers and brand fans? Contact us and we’ll be happy to offer you our solution.