via Dan Shewan @ WordStream

On this week’s episode of Digital Dialogue we covered the basics of psychology in marketing, including psychographic information which is the information collected from consumers, such as your habits, hobbies, spending habits and values. While demographics explain “who” your buyer is, psychographics explain why they buy the things they do!

Alex Birkett of ConversionXL.com says that psychographic information is important because, “Essentially, if you know how people choose and compare products in your category, you know how to structure and prioritize content.

If you know their deepest held beliefs, you can align your marketing messaging more closely. If you know what they don’t care about, you can dismiss it and cut it from your site. If you know what they read, you know where to reach them.”

By structuring and prioritizing content specifically for your audience off of their habits or values it allows for more acute targeting. Building a customer profile creates an opportunity to look into the way someone thinks and appealing to their ethos you can ethically guide someone towards purchasing a product or service. Here are some tips that we think are key to gaining a psychographic advantage.

Tap into the Audience’s Ethos

Craft content that will resonate with your target audiences emotions or ethos. Emphasize the desired emotional outcome from using the product or service in question. A great way to do this is by sharing testimonials, really anything that sparks and emotional response because emotion drives us. Brand driven storytelling is extremely efficient because it allows someone to feel good about spending their money on a product that is for example giving a percentage of the proceeds to a clean water initiative.

Convey Authenticity

You are bound to gain more followers or have a higher engagement rate if people feel like your content is authentic. Real and authentic content allows you to build a relationship with the audience. Put your founders at the forefront if they are willing because if they are engaged and authentic it is a positive.

Be Aware and Utilize Psychological Biases

Cognitive and psychological biases are defined as repetitive paths that your mind takes when doing things like evaluating, judging, remembering, or making a decision. As a marketer it is so important to be aware of these biases and how they can affect your audience.

• The Bandwagon Effect – when a product/service’s popularity increases the more others support it. This is also known as herd behavior. We see this all the time, especially on social media. A great and honest way to make use of this mentality is sharing testimonials.

• Zero Risk Bias – people are more inclined to favor things where there is little to no risk involved. You can tap into this bias by using language like “risk free” or “money back guarantee”.

• In-Group Favoritism – This is when you favor a product/service because you identify with a group that also affiliates with it. This is a huge marketing influence. It’s human nature to want to associate with a group because everyone wants to feel like they belong. Apple has definitely used this mentality to their advantage. For the most part Apple users are solely using Apple products and that’s it! Being aware of various communities online is a great way to exercise In-group favoritism too.

If you missed the latest episode of Digital Dialogue, check it out below!