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Non-Interruptive Marketing Strategies For Connecting With Your Target Consumer

Forbes Communications Council
POST WRITTEN BY
Nishat Mehta

The traditional interruptive advertising model we’re used to seeing is getting more difficult to execute as consumers gain more control over how they see ads. It is also less valuable to the advertiser because it exposes a potential consumer to a product without any context.

The traditional ad places the brand at the forefront of the consumer’s mind with the hope that they will purchase that product at the next opportunity. While most consumers have never particularly liked being interrupted with advertisements, this model has historically been successful at advertising specific products to the broad consumer audience because few alternatives have existed.

However, with shorter consumer attention spans and the invention of new technologies and platforms, interruptive advertising has become less valuable and less effective. Consumers today are given the option to skip ads or avoid them altogether, making it more difficult for brands to tell their stories. Ad-blocking software and premium ad-free services are reportedly used by one in four internet users, limiting exposure to interruptive ads. Furthermore, consumers have numerous other demands on their attention and may turn to a second or third screen when presented with an interruptive ad on their primary screen.

Making matters worse, marketers have a much smaller window of time to influence a potential consumer. That’s because services like Amazon -- and Amazon Alexa -- make it possible to purchase an item as soon as you recognize the need, and the increased prevalence of subscription models practically eliminates the need for a consumer to actively make a decision to repurchase at all. As a result, consumers may often purchase the first brand that enters their minds or the brand they most recently used, instead of taking time to consider other possibilities. This is especially relevant in the consumer packaged goods (CPG) industry, where highly commoditized products are constantly being replenished.

(Full disclosure: My company, IRI Media Center of Excellence, provides data licensing and media measurement services for Amazon.)

Finally, markets face a new set of issues because consumers today are shopping much differently. Their focus on price and quality has expanded to prioritize the entire brand’s story, including characteristics like a company’s purpose, its community and corporate social responsibility efforts, the simplicity of receiving the product and the services delivered with the product.

Take, for example, the convenience of shaving subscription services. For decades, the shaving industry was dominated by a few players that marketed product improvements such as the addition of another blade or a comfort strip. Dollar Shave Club turned the industry on its head when it offered a quality product at a reasonable price that could be delivered with hardly any effort on the customer’s part. Consumers responded positively to the simplicity and ease of using Dollar Shave Club’s service, and numerous copycats have emerged including the original competitors in this space.

In this new advertising landscape, we must discover new methods for addressing the need to become more non-interruptive. Here are three to consider.

1. Summoned Advertising

Unlike interruptive advertisements, “summoned advertisements” appear based on consumer requests, rather than out of the blue. This type of advertising works by waiting for a consumer to ask a question and then helping solve their problem. As a result, it is often received much more favorably than interruptive ads.

The most obvious example of this is in search, but websites like Pinterest are also dabbling in the art of summoned advertising. Consumers are able to browse Pinterest boards consisting of aggregated posts from other users on a certain topic of interest. Ads related to the topic are integrated into the boards and offer a solution to meet the consumer’s requested need. An ad for a liquor brand delivered to a consumer who just raised their hand to ask a question about the perfect cocktail for a dinner party, for example, is a perfect way to improve the consumer experience and reinvent advertising to be more consumer-friendly.

(Full disclosure: My company partners with Pinterest.) 

2. Influencer Marketing

Companies increasingly rely on their consumers to act as brand advocates among their peers. Consumers are much more receptive to influencer marketing because the product recommendation is coming from someone they know and trust. In fact, 83% of consumers say they trust the recommendations of people they know -- a higher level of trust than in any other earned or owned advertising format.

Recently, influencer marketing has evolved to take advantage of people’s vast social networks, enabling simpler and broader communication between peers rather than only from celebrities and sponsors. Marketers can leverage individuals with large social media followings to market their products. By connecting with these personalities on social platforms, consumers have indicated that they trust their opinion and preferences. 

3. Experience-Driven Marketing

Brands are also leveraging content or information so that a simple product purchase turns into an entire experience. This creativity is often met with enthusiasm by consumers, and it better positions the company to build brand loyalty.

Take, for example, Heinz’s augmented reality app. When a consumer scans a particular Heinz product, the app recommends popular recipes that might be of interest to the user. Using this type of approach, what begins as a simple search can evolve into an engaging experience that deepens the consumer’s connection with a brand.

(Full disclosure: My company has previously worked on projects for Heinz.)

Ultimately, advertisers must be innovative if they want their brands to stay relevant in a world where consumers are given the opportunity to avoid interruptive ads. Marketers have been able to overcome these challenges by honing their campaigns to respond to consumers interested in them, leveraging trusted individuals as spokespeople and building digital content to enable a more complete product offering. If companies want to ensure their brand story remains compelling in the ever-changing consumer landscape, they must continue to think outside the box.

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