How to Identify Marketing Innovation Opportunities as a Result of Changing Consumer Behavior

As consumer behavior changes, it often changes buyer behavior and as a result creates opportunities for marketing innovation. These opportunities are often overlooked by incumbent companies and typically provide opportunities for new entrants.  Here are four ways to ensure you don’t miss marketing innovation opportunities as a result of changing consumer behavior.

1. Understand, Monitor and Map the Buying Journey - and remember the buying process is often not linear, despite the often used metaphor of the “funnel” in the buying process . Then compare the utility of each step of the existing process to the new one. Compare the processes the same way you would compare products.

Are there new technologies that people are using to take a step on the buying journey?When these new technologies are introduced, they can easily be ignored because so few people use them. It doesn’t matter how few people are using these new tools, if there is utility, e.g. it saves time, money or makes the search process easier, word will spread and they will quickly be adopted. Remember SEO was new once.

When looking at the buying process, ask yourself how your prospects become aware of your products and services, where are they going to get information or “content” so they can consider alternatives, where are they going to purchase? Do they first become aware from SEO, a social media source or perhaps an information intermediary. Where the new process offers utility, potential marketing innovation opportunities exist.

2. Don’t Ever Say People Won’t Ever . . .  because they might and probably will.   In the early days of e-commerce, people would say, people won’t every buy a diamond online, too expensive, to hard to evaluate the quality, etc. Some said no one would place a $100,000 buy or sell trade online without a broker, or buy a  couture dress online. All things which are now done today.A three year old today growing up with an iPad will probably do things in ten years online that we just can’t imagine today.  Remember, consumer behavior is changing and just because you don’t believe people will not do something today, does not mean they won’t do it tomorrow.

3. Don’t Base the Evaluation on Your Existing Competencies - when buying online first emerged, it was easy for companies to dismiss the new process, because it required a new compentency.  Both business to business and business to consumer businesses said something like, we don’t sell direct to customers today, so why would we be interested in e-commerce? One of the dangers is the new process may make your existing assets or compentencies obsolete. For example, brokerage firms had tons of brokers in each city, many cold calling on prospective customers. Making it possible for prospective customers to buy online without the aid of a broker was an entirely different business model, and in the end, the new process changed the industry.

4. Analysts Reports on Changing Consumer Behavior, specially those that look at how the changes will impact your industry. There are research agencies that research and publish reports on changing buying processes on a regular basis. These could be valuable in helping you identify emerging technologies that might have an impact on the buying process or changing consumer behavior.  Brian Solis is one of the best Digital Anthropologists and his Altimeter Group does this type of work. 

CMOs need to take into consideration that consumer behavior changes quickly in the social media age. So it is important for CMOs to have an understanding of how new technologies are changing the buying behavior of their prospective clients.  These changes provide an opportunity for marketing innovation.