Affinity for a brand is becoming more crucial. Consumers, especially millennials, are four times more inclined to buy from a firm that is purpose-driven, according to research.
Globally, 94 percent of customers believe it is critical that the businesses with which they interact have a strong purpose, and 83 percent believe that businesses should only make a profit if they also have a beneficial influence.
Consumers now want to support firms that, both inside and beyond their operating area, they believe are making progress on vital problems. Building brand affinity via your digital marketing activities is one approach to demonstrate values alignment to your audience.
Continue reading to understand what brand affinity is, how to develop it, and how contextual advertising may help you establish a favorable link between your audience and your business.
What is brand affinity and how does it work?
Customers believe that a company’s values are matched with their own. This is known as brand affinity. Because brand affinity builds an emotional connection between consumers and a brand, it’s a vital part of a marketing strategy.
An emotional connection is thus established, paving the way for long-term brand loyalty and favorable consumer interactions. Brand affinity is best built via marketing initiatives, which include digital advertising.
The importance of brand Affinity
Company affinity is an essential part of a brand’s media strategy since it aids in the development of brand supporters within the brand’s target audience. Consumers or customers that actively promote your brand are known as brand advocates.
They will most likely inform others about their experience with your brand via word of mouth or their own channels, such as social media or email. One of the advantages of investing in brand affinity is the creation of brand supporters. Here are a few more:
Customer connections and loyalty are strengthened through brand affinity.
Consumers nowadays have a plethora of choices when it comes to making a purchase. The majority of them will choose to buy from a company that has a more personal, approachable aspect to it.
And, if the brand aligns with the consumer’s values, they will feel good about spending their money with it. Customers are less inclined to switch brands, resulting in a better customer connection and higher customer lifetime value (CLV).
Brand affinity aids in the development of a brand’s personality
By aligning your brand with unique principles, you can give it a distinct personality that will keep people interested and engaged. Customers will be able to connect to a brand if it has a distinct personality.
A consumer may be able to identify with the attributes expressed, resulting in an emotional bond. Furthermore, having a distinct personality for your brand makes it more memorable.
Where do I begin?
To begin establishing brand affinity, you must first have a clear knowledge of who you are as a company. Take the following steps to define your brand’s key values and be prepared to convey them with your audience:
Learn as much as you can about your intended audience
Creating client profiles is the most effective approach to do this. These profiles give accurate information about your audience’s demographics and purchasing habits.
A client profile will comprise all you need to know about them, including their location, age, life stage, purchasing history, and hobbies.
Make contact with your intended audience
You can successfully communicate with your target audience after you know who they are. You can develop relevant message that engages your audience through channels like social media, email, content marketing, and programmatic ads.
You may express brand personality and share your brand’s underlying beliefs with your audience with this message. This marketing piques your consumers’ curiosity and allows them to connect with your business in new ways.
Create a good environment
It’s critical to provide your consumers a great experience since it will minimize churn, keep them engaged, and inspire them to purchase from you again. You can guarantee that your audience has a favorable experience by making every encounter pleasant and memorable, whether it’s in person or online.
You’ve laid a fantastic basis for building brand affinity, which will lead to strong consumer connections and loyalty, by following these steps.
Contextual advertising may help you build brand affinity
You might consider investing in a sponsored campaign plan that will enhance affinity via positive association: contextual advertising, to strengthen brand affinity even further. This form of targeting is helpful for providing purpose-driven message that builds a good relationship between a customer and your business.
Contextual advertising is a cookie-free approach of targeting that relies on content rather than user data to reach the right people at the right time. You may engage with customers who are open to purpose-driven marketing and seeking for businesses that correspond with certain values by targeting based on content.
A customer interested in decreasing their environmental footprint, for example, would look for information that offers advice on how to live a more sustainable lifestyle. A brand marketing an electric car may use contextual targeting to target the key word “sustainable lifestyle” and appear next to information on the subject.
This method works because it guarantees that your advertising are seen to people who share the brand values you’re promoting, laying the groundwork for consumer trust and a favorable brand connection. And brand loyalty isn’t the only advantage that contextual advertising provides.
Contextual targeting outperforms third-party segmentation in terms of CPA 77 percent of the time, according to StackAdapt.
Begin to cultivate brand loyalty
Building brand affinity is an important factor for any marketing plan, especially as customers become more socially aware. While conventional brand affinity methods are important, using contemporary approaches such as contextual advertising can improve your outcomes.
Thanks to Erin Hynes at Business 2 Community whose reporting provided the original basis for this story.