Consumer insights are important when crafting a law firm marketing plan, and they have certainly changed a lot in the last few years. A new consumer content study by Adobe lists five significant changes that you need to dial in to your marketing planning for 2019, including:
Consumers spend almost 9 hours on average every day engaging with digital media.
Does that number sound high to you? Then consider this: Millennials (23-34) spend 10.9 hours and Gen Z (18-22) spends 11.4 hours on their digital devices daily. According to the Adobe study, you can attribute much of this phenomenon to FOMO — Fear Of Missing Out — as well as the advances in technology that allow us to do almost anything on our phones today.
This means a couple of things for marketing your law firm — (1) there is no doubt that you should use digital marketing to reach your target market; and (2), you need to be as different as possible with your content to stand out.
Consumers are impatient.
The Adobe study found that more than half of consumers surveyed said they will abandon content that is too slow to load. And “too slow” usually means content that doesn’t appear immediately — within a few seconds. They will also abandon content that is poorly written and websites that are poorly designed.
And here’s a surprise: the demographic groups that are the least patient when it comes to content not displaying quickly or well enough are Baby Boomers (50-64) and Traditionalists (65+)!
Reviews matter.
The #1 place a consumer visits when researching a purchase (goods or services) is a brand’s website, but a close 2nd is online reviews, followed by social media and video channels.
Voice search emerging in importance.
While sounding the death knell for the keyword is premature, emerging technologies like voice search are on the rise. Crafting content that makes it easier for consumers to find you when using digital assistants like Google Home, Siri, etc., will only continue to grow in importance.
Trust in social media is high.
It’s not surprising that the generations that grew up with social media — Millennials and Gen Zers — trust it the most. However, social media is also trusted by 70% of Gen Xers (35-49) and 52% of Baby Boomers. According to the Adobe study, Facebook and YouTube are the most trusted social networks and both have earned a place in your law firm marketing plan.
