Marketing online has become tougher than ever. Did you know that 175 websites are published every minute? The internet has become quite literally infinite.

It would be easy to say there is no point in trying to keep up. But there’s one thing that can help us continue to make an impact above all that noise, and that’s data.

The thing is, only a tiny percentage of online content is actually valuable and does its job of attracting traffic and engagement.

Choosing data-led marketing and making data-led decisions gives you the power to create valuable content. Content that truly resonates with your readers and users, encourages shares and engagement, and helps to nurture them through the buyer’s journeyBy uncovering key insights about user behaviour and interactions, you can stay ahead of shifts in the market and pinpoint trends.

Building an online standout presence has become tougher than ever, but it’s certainly not impossible.

We’ve discussed research-based marketing before, and how companies like Little Moon harnessed key research insights for the good of their marketing direction. So, let’s talk a bit more about data-led marketing, helping you understand the bigger picture, create a compelling strategy, and make informed decisions.

Behavioural data

Gathering data on the past behaviour of your users is the best way to understand what type of online content resonates the most.

Blogs, videos, newsletters? Which are your audiences interacting with most? And how do they react? Do they bounce after a few seconds? Do they share videos with their networks more than blogs? Do they click through on shorter CTAs or are they more likely to click on an offer CTA?

Where do people go? How do they prefer to consume data? Which devices do they use?

This type of data is essential to informing the journey your customers make online when interacting with your business. It enables you to place nurturing tactics in the right place at the right time, and take advantage of their existing interactions with your brand. With this data, you can help guide the user toward becoming a lead much more naturally. Interactions feel less intrusive because messaging is data-led, rather than placed aggressively where the user doesn’t expect or want to see it.

A/B testing

A/B testing is a hugely prolific measuring tool for success in content marketing because it gives companies insight into which language, titles, images or CTAs generate the most clicks or interactions.

Usually used in emails and social media, click rates and opens tell you quite accurately which topics, types and times of day are the most successful for your online marketing strategy.

With an A/B testing strategy, you can test two types of content against each other. You may wish to randomly segment your audiences, or try different demographics. But the premise is that you choose two routes and test them to see which generates the most success. This could be an email subject line, a blog opening paragraph or title, or even a CTA. By dissenting this data at length you are empowered to uncover more insight such as which times, devices or platforms are generally the most valuable to your brand.

Don’t build your strategy based on assumptions. Learn about your audiences in thorough depth through data collection and analysis. Make data-led, informed decisions, but be wary of leaning too solely on data. We have our own practical experience and knowledge to lean on too, so take into account the data as one tool in your arsenal that you can load up when you’re struggling to make a decision or things are stagnating.