Customer Empathy Guides Marketing
Marketing is and always has been about providing a solution to the client.
- Identifying the Wants
- Identifying the Desires
- Identifying the Needs
- Providing a solution to the client's pain point
The client has a need, sometimes called a pain point, and the product or service provides the solution. Pre-internet, marketing provided the lead to a sales person who may be the person who empathized with tne pain point and offered the solution.
SEO brings the client to the web site, mistakes may have been made, the web site needs to operate as the sales person for digital marketing. Often digitial marketing has only concerned itself with getting people to the page, instead of helping the customer with his needs.
Brand Marketing, the signature of quality
In commodity markets, there are many generic products, but there are also those who take pride in their work and sign what they produce. A brand represents the signature of quality a company provides. Consumers want a product that is of good quality and prefers to deal with brands that they can trust to supply the quality they want. Digitial marketing has focused on the numbers which are easiest to messure, impressions and clicks, and loses focus on traditional marketing that messures sales.
- Organic brand marketing returns to customers over engines
... Brand Marketing and E-E-A-T ...
The goal of brand marketing is having customers trust the brand for quality, service, and trustworthiness. The goal of E-E-A-T is simular but promotes sites that demonstrate Expertise, experience, Authority, and Trust.
- Experience is shown by how long the business has been helping customers? By how long much experience do the people in the company have? By hands-on knowledge of the product or service.
- Expertise is shown by information content about the product. By informational content that shows the business is aware of the need product or service? How the product provides the customer with a solution? How a product or service is best for quality? How it is the best value?
- Authority is shown be having points of contact, or having the site listed, on sites where people can ask questions or peer-review the product or service; Having customer reviews on products on the site; Having a details review or comparison of the product on ones own site.
- Trustworthiness is shown by having the Name, Phone number, and Address listed clearly on the site. Contact information and information on the key employees listed on the site. Privacy policy if the site collects information about its visitors. Return and customer service information if the product collects money through the site.
E-E-A-T has not yet evolved into a ranking factor ... it is currently a qualifier that the page is relevant for the search query to be able to appear at the top of search and not as supplemental information when no E-E-A-T page is available.
Sales Funnel Becomes Search Intent
The sales funnel, Awareness, Interest, Desire, and Action within the scope of SEO becomes search intent.
- Awareness becomes the client intent of information query or research query
- Interest and desire become the information search intent
- Action becomes the transaction client intent
Modern search engines are focused on matching the search intent to help the client accomplish their goal. Modern marketing is aligned with the same goal. Organic search is based on search entities or digital entities, a product of natural language processing that providing a topical understanding of keywords or query terms.
Evergreen Content and Updates
Client behavior has changed, not that many years ago visitors were happy to land on a page where search intent was not yet determined. Today they are more likely to click the back button if the page does not match their intent.
If they want information but the page is selling a product instead; It is not a match. If they are looking for an answer to a question, and the answer is buried; It is not a match.
Google may have started the trend but now it is the new normal; Even if Google stopped using search intent, the clients would continue using keywords to match their intent.
... Search intent shifts over time ...
Keyword phrases or search query intent, are determined by AI noting client interactions with the search results. Over the course of months, clients may prefer one type of content over another for the search query ... pages need to be checked and updated as a normal course of events.
... Algorithm Updates ...
From time to time search engines make changes to improve the quality of results they provide to their clients. Some of these changes may require a re-evaluation of the content on a site.
✔ Vanity SEO is Dead, Long Live SEO
✔ March 2024 SEO is Dead, or the death of mass-produced content
✔ Content the Client's Perspective
Claims of SEO is Dead, arise as search engines adapt their algorithms to perceived client goals ... Content must also adapt. Off-page SEO designed to bring more views to a page does not solve people returning to the search engine and looking at a different result. Faster pages do not address content issues ... it only makes it faster for the client to switch to the competitor's site.
Search Engines, AI, Machines use Natural Language Processing use entities
Marketing with entities requires and understanding of how search engines work:
- SEO Algorithms
- How a site appears in search or the anatomy of what content on the page effects the sites appearance in search
- Search intent or what the search query is going to be looking for to provide the listing
- Entities; Which, are topical keywords or conceptual keywords ... entities relate to groups of keywords
And how visitor interact with the content.