How Technology enhances the exchange between Marketers and Consumers

Technology is continuously evolving which enhances the exchange between marketers and customers. Now customers are more personally connected and interacted with the brand to develop better relationships.  Now a question arises- 

How technology enhances the exchange between marketers and customers.

The development of the internet provides customers an opportunity to get any information about any brand or product. Technology made it possible to open a plethora of numerous data for the customers to access.  Also, they have got access to real-time reviews and feedback about brands and products. This enables them to compare prices, qualities, services, and aftersale services about companies and choose the best. Now customers have become more conscious and alert about the words of marketers. Rather than believing all the stuff, they had added on the website or word of mouth they generally like to see the actual proofs of their services. These proofs are shown in the form of reviews, testimonials, ratings, and feedback. Marketers believe that these things fuel-up the conversion rate by 30-40% easily. 

Technology changes the producer oriented market to a customer-oriented market.

Now customers are the king of the market and marketers have to convince them for coming and converting on their business website. Along with customers, technology especially the internet has paved a way for marketers to provide customized and hyper-personalized messages to their customers. It enables them to increase their brand visibility to the relevant people which in turn increases sales.   How technology changes the whole scenario of marketing. Unlike traditional marketing, there is no face to face interaction or communication but you can get much more information on the website. Marketers have also got the opportunity to target the existing customers in the form of e-mail marketing and also to target a particular range of customers by retargeting.  Technology has made the exchange of communication and services flexible and easy. The innovation of smartphones which is an extremely important part of technology has made things easy. People from any part of the world can communicate and interact with any business easily.

Social media is now used by almost 80% of the world population. This has brought the whole world to one platform where any business can target their potential customers. Moreover, you have to get a chance of targeting globally and make your business international. Also know- some cheap social media marketing techniques to enhance your business visibility. This is how technology enhances exchange between marketers and consumers.

How technology changes the relationship between marketers and customers?

Digital marketing has changed the way marketers and consumers interact. Some of the innovation of technology that changes customer behavior are

Customers remain connected to marketers

Technology has brought the whole world under one roof. Marketers and consumers remain connected and interact with each other. Starting from searching for the product to after-sales services and reviews they remain connected. When customers make a decision to purchase a product, firstly they search on the internet about the product, then check reviews and compare the price with other brands then make a purchase. Even after that markets and consumers remain connected as after delivery they add a review about the product. Also, they keep contacting and suggesting to you the changes that you can make in the product or contact you for any fault or inconvenience.

Consumer expectations have enhanced

Earlier, people had limited time for shopping but due to the evolution of technology and the internet, a new form of marketing comes up i.e. digital marketing. Digital marketing provides customers an opportunity to shop anytime they want. But this has made consumers realize their rights and importance. Now consumers want fast and instant replies to their queries. For example- if someone enquired about the price of some particular service at 11:00 AM then it’s the duty of the marketer to provide them with an answer immediately. If they didn’t get the answer they may switch to some other brand.  Satisfying a consumer has become very important nowadays to make them your permanent clients else you will have to lose them. 

Increased use of voice search

After the development and innovation of technology, many new opportunities came into the field of digital marketing too. One such thing is voice search. Many voice search tools like Alexa, Siri, Google voice search, etc came into existence which changes the relationship between marketers and consumers.

As in 2020, 50% of the searches are done by voice search. Voice search option changes the way consumers search for a brand or product.  The report shows that only 4-6% of marketers properly optimize their answers for voice search. But voice searchers are much more than that. So if you do so then your customers can easily find you and interact with you otherwise you will have to lose them. This is how technology enhances the relationship between marketers and consumers.  

Personalization

Technology has changed the way marketers target and communicates with their customers. Now personalization is one of the most important techniques to target audiences and convince them. Personalization basically enhances user experience and makes a meaningful interaction that further fuel-up the conversion process. By creating a one-to-one marketing technique, you can easily know their actual preferences and needs. Some best examples of personalization are youtube, amazon, and other shopping sites. Look at the image below it provides you recommendations related to the product you have added to cart or purchased.   

How technology is changing the marketing scenario?

Purpose-driven marketing

Nowadays marketing is being more and more purpose-driven.  Technology has an important role in its rise.  Technology is imparting authenticity to purpose-driven marketing. Consumers want to have faith in the brand.  Marketers are shifting their focus.  Now they do not only just advertise their product for sale, but they also go further deep and explain the purpose and working of the product they are offering the customers. Companies now contribute to the economic growth of some countries with investment by way of setting up their projects.  The companies that do not truly commit to the purpose they advocate get exposed and result in the loss of customers.

Technology has empowered customers.

Technology has made customers more enlightened about purchasing.  Before buying a product the customer with the help of the internet and other media platforms has the luxury of knowing about the product and services they intend to purchase.  Armed with the detailed knowledge of the product people engage with retail stores or call B2B salespeople.  Technology has enabled marketer customer-centricity.  Technology has changed the focus of marketers.  Now they take people not only as customer segments but more as individuals.  Technology has made it possible for marketers to create an individual user experience across devices.

Inter-dependence of marketing with technology.

To get the best understanding of the new technology with its positive effects on the marketing of product and brand the marketer needs the company’s assistance from its technology, information, and legal units.  Of course, companies can, with some efforts get a lot of data on the market trends and the brand. Even then the marketer can not make use of it even if he acquires the latest technology.  It can not be effective without marketing intelligence.  Marketing intelligence integrates data insights and helps in increasing ROI.

Global Reach

With the onset of low flying satellites, broadband service gets cheaper and affordable for developing countries.  This will make it possible to carve out a marketing strategy to reach one’s audience in a vast number of customers.  Product and services can be advertised to international audiences with the speed at a low economic cost.  One will need to formulate a separate but equal marketing strategy to reach individual audiences across the world.  We can say that technology has helped the digital marketing business to expand fast and far away in the world. Digital marketing is cost-effective which results in higher ROI.  This obviously results in an increase in business and hence profit.

Budget increase results in more revenue.

There are certain aspersions in the minds of the businessmen in increasing the budget on technology.   It is a wrong notion.  In the long run investment on technology bears more fruits in the shape of increased business.  The total cost actually tends to decrease as the competition among service and platform providers increases.  With the increase in marketing budget, the budget on marketing technology also increases but at a lower percentage as compared to the total marketing budget.  Investment in technology is justified by the anticipated increase in revenue that will accrue to the business.  There are different types of technologies to suit different businesses.  The integration of technologies with marketing depends on the type of company where it is being applied.  So, the requirement of investment in each technology is dependent on the type of industry.

 Conclusion

Now you must have understood how technology enhances exchange between marketers and consumers. Technology has enhanced things like machine learning, artificial intelligence, customization, personalization, and voice search.  The way marketers and consumers interact is also changed now as digital marketing emerged as a result of technology. Digital marketers made it easy and convenient for businesses to reach target audiences that too at a cheaper rate. Rather than targeting the general public, you can now target the potential customers who are actually in need of your product or service.