Empathy refers to the ability of seeing situation from another person’s perspective. It means an individual should put themselves in another person’s shoes to get a better idea of their feelings.
How Does Empathy Apply on Business Strategies?
For brands, empathetic market is about looking at their brand and products through the user’s viewing glass. You put the consumer at the center of the marketing strategy.
However, your empathy should be genuine. It should not be limited to the marketing table just to hoodwink the consumers. Be sincere in building a trustful relationship with the consumers. Focus on organic relationship building throughout the process.
Why is Empathy Important in Marketing?
2020 has changed the way we see the world. The pandemic has altered our interactions, our business dealings and changed the dynamics of relationships. Keeping the circumstances in mind, emotions and connectivity are more important than ever. Daily interactions, going to the office, hi-fiving on a business deal has become a thing of the past. Human emotions have suffered the most. We no longer have our partners by our side when we close a deal, to pat us on our shoulders. We do not have friends helping us try out a new top and give their verdict. Instead, anger, depression and fear has spread its wings over the world.
Marketing campaigns can help alleviate the negative energy from the environment. They can evoke positive emotions and connect with their audience, while increasing their sales.
How to Induce Empathy in Your Business Strategy
There is a few points you can consider while establishing your marketing plan.
- Understand your target audience’s pain points.
- Adapt to the needs of the target market.
- Tell them a story.
- Engage them through visuals.
- Add Interactivity
- Utilize content generated by the users.
Understanding the Pain Points
Currently, the pain points are reeling from the Covid-19 pandemic. Keeping that in mind, it is easy to determine that people are missing out on action, outdoor activities, travelling and just hanging out on the beach. You marketers can utilize these pain points. They can design a campaign that lets people know on the important role they are playing in fighting the pandemic. Apprise them of the situation, and how their sacrifices are helping the world.
Furthermore, establish the pain points people have with your brand. For that you can share comprehensive guides, tutorials and establish communication channels to be more approachable.
Adapting to the Needs of the Audience
The pandemic has pushed many business and people out of work and into poverty. Considering this, Ebay helped its associates by cutting down on delivery and services cost.
If you cannot offer that, you can opt for other options which will let the audience know you care. You can offer discounts, or introduce extra services for the same cost.
Tell a story
Story is a great way of empathetic marketing. It tells people about your journey. Hearing stories from a real person always leaves a positive impact in the hearts of the people. Several brands have opted for this strategy, such as the 2020 Google’s Super Bowl commercial. You can create Instagram or Facebook posts where your employees tell people their side of the story, about how it is like to work for your industry.
Such a step makes people think you really care for your employees, and are committed towards a better world, especially during the pandemic.
Engage and Educate Through Visuals
Your content must attract the audience. It should be of some value to them, if you want to enhance their experience. Through educational visuals you strike to birds with one stone. People become aware of your brand, and probably features of your product they might not know about. Further, attractive visuals can help in referrals and lead generation.
Start by auditing your current content to find ideas and pieces apropos to your audience. You can either update the existing information or create new visuals to evoke the right emotions.
Add Interactivity
People are craving interaction. Interactive marketing, therefore, has taken off significantly in the past couple of years. Social media has catapulted interactive marketing and paved way for brands to easily connect with their users. In the current pandemic, interactive marketing can help you garner a significant audience. Since, people are no longer going out, shopping from big malls, they have to rely on websites and social media for reviews, and help. You can offer help through chat boxes, or comment sections in your social media channels.
Utilizing Content Generated by Users
User generated content has become a favorite tool for social media marketing. Why shouldn’t it be? It is powerful. It is strong and its helps brands build connections with its customers. User generated content (UGC) bridges the gap between big corporates and their consumers. You can start a competition, or buy off content a user might have created for their channel. Resultantly, the content gets amplified through social media platforms, newsletters, emails and websites.
The best part about UGC is that you do not have to create such content. However, you would need to crawl through dozens, or even hundreds of channels before you find what your love. Users whose content is chosen, will share your page and brand with their networks. Thus, you will not only get referrals, but increase organic traffic to your website.
Summary
Empathy is important, especially in the current environment. Pandemic coupled with woke culture has ushered a new wave of emotions. It is your time to tackle the situation skillfully and design such strategies that will empathize with your customers, and show your human side.
Keep their emotions at the center, and work your way out towards your goals. Empathic marketing can help generate organic traffic, increase referrals, generate leads and increase your profits by manifolds.
Make sure to be sincere with the empathy. True empathy marketing will work only when you understand that your customers know that you want to help them, and not the other way around.
