What is Marketing Consultant and Why Does it Matter?

 01

3 ways marketers can connect with Gen Z consumers

Generation Z, or Gen Z, is quickly becoming one of the largest online consumer groups. If marketers aren’t paying attention, they could end up failing to secure their buy-in.

“I want to start by acknowledging that generational labels are based on theory, and they’re not a factor of life, no matter how often we use them in marketing,” said Purna Virji, senior consultant of content solutions at LinkedIn, at SMX Next. “Would everyone in the same age range behave the same? No, of course not, even though there are commonalities.”

She added, “Yet these commonalities are even more pronounced with Generation Z based on who they are and how they grew up.”

Pew Research Center defines Gen Z as those born between 1997 and 2012. And, given the environment they’ve grown up in and their life experiences, this group looks much different than previous generations, which makes their consumer behavior unique as well.

“They are the youngest, most ethnically diverse, and largest generation in American history, comprising about 27% of the U.S. population,” Virji said. “They’re also the first digitally-native generation, and their point of view has been shaped by the screen side view they’ve had of this tumultuous, rapidly changing world around all of us.”

Building connections with Gen Z is imperative for marketers. The number of digital buyers in this group is projected to surpass 41 million this year, with no signs of decreasing in years to come.

Here are some tactics Virji recommends marketers use to increase engagement with this influential group.

Appeal to Gen Z values

“Gen Z considers itself more accepting and open-minded than any generation before it — they have a clearly defined value set,” Virji said. “In fact, Gen Z is altruistic and eco-conscious. Why? Their digital-first upbringing has made them a lot more conscious about the world around them — and more frustrated.”

She added, “They want change and they want to be a part of something bigger and as a result, they are drawn to brands that believe in values like sustainability, authenticity, and giving back.”

Gen Z consumers gravitate toward brands that share their values, one of the most important being sustainability. For instance, 75% of Gen Z prefer sustainability over brand names of products, according to a consumer survey conducted by First Insight and the Baker Retailing Center at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. They seem to be willing to pay more for environmentally-friendly products than consumers in other generation groups.

“You want to make sure that you can share how you walk the walk,” Virji said. “Gen Z appreciates when the content is genuine and you can demonstrate how sustainability is an integral part of your organization’s core values and vision.”

Whether it’s a commitment to sustainability, diversity and inclusion, or educational opportunities, marketers who highlight the values Gen Z cares most about will have a better chance of connecting with them.

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Focus on Gen Z life and career goals

Having grown up in midst of recessions and a global pandemic, Gen Z consumers saw their parents struggle with financial insecurity and other life issues. These experiences have helped create a strong desire for job stability.

But, Gen Z wants more than basic employment security. They want to thrive in their careers.

“Gen Z is ambitious and looking to grow,” said Virji. “They want to learn new skills. They want to find career success and financial security.”

Virji recommends marketers create engaging learning resources for Gen Z consumers that can help support their career growth. Then, they can leverage that content on digital channels those groups frequent.

“The same [learning] content can be here on social,” she said. “It can be an email campaign, or it can be used for upper-funnel display or search ads.”

Market to Gen Z preferences

“You want to appeal to that content consumption preferences,” said Virji. “Digital platforms have blurred the boundaries between commerce and connection, between consumption and production.”

Adding features such as humor to your marketing can help you engage with Gen Z audiences as these consumers re-envision the digital marketplace. Brands from virtually any sector can connect with this market by adding some personality to their campaigns.

“A good example is Lemonade Insurance — they consistently use humor in all of their content,” said Virji. “They would share posts asking, ‘How many actuaries does it take to screw in a lightbulb?’ Or they would ask, ‘What if insurance terms were blockbuster movies?’ They do this to help make insurance accessible and relevant for a whole new audience set. And it is that power of personality that enables them to grab the mindshare of younger consumers in the crowded and confusing insurance space.”

Above all, marketers should seek to speak the digital language of Gen Z, using engaging memes, social trends, and interactive elements in their content to capture attention. This can help show them your brand cares about this group’s values, goals, and preferences — all of which foster engagement.

“Keep playing into their interests,” Virji said. “Look at what they’re into and find a way to align your brand with that.”

New on Search Engine Land About The Author Corey Patterson is an Editor for MarTech and Search Engine Land. With a background in SEO, content marketing, and journalism, he covers SEO and PPC industry news to help marketers improve their campaigns.

02

6 Ways Taylor Swift Excels at Content Marketing (and How You Can Too)

Did Taylor Swift steal your content marketing plan? Let's help you steal it back.

Like Madonna before her (especially 80s Madonna), Taylor Swift is viewed by many as a creator of fluffy pop sensibilities. But if that’s the only way you see her, you’re not getting the full picture. That perceived bubblegum image with mass appeal actually masks a sharply savvy businesswoman who understands the power of content in developing and growing a brand.

No matter what your niche or small business model, you can use the Swiftian model to raise your own content marketing profile, attract new audiences, inspire true fan devotion, and grow your brand. So shake it off swiftly and take a look at how you can borrow Tay-Tay’s approach for your own content marketing work.

1. Taylor Swift took (back) control over her brand

Late in 2020, Taylor addressed the sale of her master recordings by Scooter Braun and her prior record label, Big Machine Records, to a private equity holding company by publishing a written explanation on her social media accounts. This was the second time such a sale of her masters had taken place, and the purchaser told Taylor (after the fact) that they’d been forbidden from talking to Swift before the sale was closed.

In response, Taylor announced she had already started to re-record her back catalog, starting with her first six albums, in an attempt to regain control of her brand and creative mission. Her fresh take on 2008’s ‘Fearless’ arrived on April 9, 2021, and ‘Red’ (Taylor’s Version) was released on Nov. 12, 2021.

The fuller context of Taylor’s re-recording of her back catalog was complex and included her long-running feud with Kanye West. However, the content marketing lesson here is fairly simple: Keep control over your content and don’t let it get redirected to someone else’s hands.

In Swift’s case, the sales were legitimized by a contract she’d signed when she was 15. Once she gained a few years of experience and business acumen, she realized her content wasn’t in safe hands. That feeling was validated when her fan base bought the album releases in droves. Swift had taken control over the underlying music and regained the upper hand by beginning the process of re-recording it.

How to make it work for you

For content marketers, the strategy isn’t much different. Take control of your content. If something isn’t working or producing expected results, diagnose the content marketing problem and fix it. That doesn’t mean you can’t outsource its creation, formatting, or promotion. It just means you must stay aware of the content processes carried out on your brand’s behalf. Moreover, you can’t shy away from stepping in if those processes go off-track.

In addition, consider keeping most of your content on your own blog, rather than placing it on large social networks every time you publish. This way you own your own content going forward.

2. She mines her life for her content

Even folks who aren’t huge Taylor Swift fans and hence don’t devour every single word ever written about her probably are aware of one key fact: She writes songs about her exes. This is sometimes bandied about by critics and competitors as something odd or inappropriate. In fact, it’s a smart content creation strategy. (People have played videos on TikTok and Instagram Reels about Swift and her exes millions of times, which says a lot.)

How to make it work for you:

You don’t have to unload every irrelevant story from your life on your audience (Taylor certainly doesn’t). Just be willing to share the unvarnished truth about your experience with your audience.

Stories transform good content into great content, and the very best stories for content marketing are the ones that elevate, connect, and evoke an emotional response from the audience. Share your brand stories and personalize the members of your team by sharing past events that involved them. Nothing helps you establish a winning brand through content like your or your brand’s past.

3. She knows her brand and her audience

While Swift may, on occasion, push the envelope with a creative risk or two, she generally delivers the content her audience has come to love and expect. Without enforcing an insistently uniform sound or style, she creates music and other content that delivers the emotional, aesthetic, and kinesthetic experiences her audience members embrace.

She makes sure her creative output keeps pace with evolving tastes and trends without merely imitating or duplicating them. The result is pure Taylor Swift while still seeking an authentic connection with her fans and audience members.

How to make it work for you:

You can exercise that same brand power and audience awareness by integrating modern tools and strategies that help you collect, collate, and understand relevant data and metrics about your audience and how they interact with your brand along every point in the buyer’s journey.

From awareness at the top of the funnel (TOFU) to the purchasing decision at the bottom of the funnel (BOFU), each stage in that customer’s journey presents unique needs, pain points, and desires. Use data collection and analytical tools to get to know your audience and prospects more intimately, then use that deeper understanding to tailor (pun absolutely intended) your content accordingly.

Social listening is another tool that will help you get to know your audience and how they perceive your brand. Pay attention to the conversations surrounding your field or niche as well as your brand specifically on LinkedIn or Twitter. Those mentions will help you understand your audience and how they see your company more deeply, which in turn empowers you to create content that better aligns with that audience.

4. She talks to her audience where they are and how they like

Sure, she could simply tweet out interview links, new album announcements, and the occasional selfie, but Taylor goes far beyond such basic social media fundamentals. Taylor was quick to embrace TikTok, for example, because that’s where a lot of her young fans were already beginning to congregate online.

And what does she share on TikTok? A solid mix of funny videos of cats, music video clips and her own take on “The Assignment,” each with its own authentic T-Swift imprint. Her audience can relate to Taylor’s commentary on the pandemic and they respond positively to it because it comes across as real and genuine.

How to make it work for you:

By all means, put your best foot forward on your brand’s social media accounts, but keep it real and authentic. Audiences today are too savvy to fall for a false voice. Don’t try to pull the wool over their eyes and come off as something you’re not, either for yourself or your brand.

Similarly, meet your audience and prospects where they already are. If they’re not really that into Twitter, why spend your precious time and content marketing budget dollars on a Twitter-intensive strategy? Go where they are, the way Taylor meets her fans on TikTok.

5. She understands her platforms

Look at Taylor’s TikTok page and compare it to her Instagram or her Twitter accounts. Notice anything interesting? There might be some similarities there, but it’s not all the same. Taylor doesn’t just hire a team of poorly-paid PR interns to post the same content across all her channels without any tweaking or tailoring (we can’t stop, we’re sorry). Instead, she shares content that’s well suited to each platform in a format that aligns with its needs and limitations.

How to make it work for you:

Make sure you’re sharing content in formats that suit the platform and its technical limitations. If you’re sharing a TikTok, concentrate on clipping the larger video in a way that best communicates the major message (or depicts the funniest bits fully). If you’re composing a tweet, try to keep it succinct so you don’t have to create an extensive thread that requires audience members to read a dozen or more sequential tweets. Think about your user’s expectations and context when they encounter your content, and try to craft the best possible user experience.

6. She encourages fan loyalty

There are Taylor Swift fans, and then there are the Swifties or superfans. And while the former are devoted to her music and other content, Taylor knows how important the latter are to her brand. That’s why she creates unique experiences that reward their loyalty. From pre-release listening parties in her own home to special merchandise, Swifties get treats and bonuses just for being consistently loyal. In turn, of course, these rewards simply make the super-fans even more ardently devoted.

How to make it work for you:

Don’t ignore existing customers in your lust for acquiring new ones. According to some studies, it can cost as much as six or seven times more to attract a new customer than to retain an existing one. Don’t let it get to the point where longtime customers never, ever want to get back together with you. Improve your CLV (customer lifetime value) by rewarding customer loyalty with earned and free but unique perks.

Taylor Swift’s key takeaway: Always keep your audience top of mind

Like a lot of artists, Taylor Swift has a vivid, viable brand that she’s carefully built and managed over her career. Looking at the ways she’s used content of all types — from her own music to her videos and social media content — can help you more precisely target your own content for your audience.

Whether you’re targeting existing customers or prospects, you’ll want to align your content with their needs and pain points and their location along the customer’s journey (TOFU, MOFU, or BOFU). Create and promote your content mindfully, with your audience always top of mind throughout your process.

To read more of John's work, subscribe for free to his Substack and his Medium.

John Boitnott is a journalist and digital consultant who has worked at media companies for 25 years. He writes about startups, marketing and leadership at Entrepreneur, the Motley Fool, Readwrite.com, JotForm.com, and his blog.

This article appeared on ClearVoice.com. 

03

Pharma colors and marketing: Typically ‘awash in blue,’ newer brand updates adopt bold hues

Roses are red, violets are blue, and so are most pharma company brands. Pfizer, Roche, AbbVie and Amgen are among the many pharma companies with logos in hues of blue, while a smaller band including Johnson & Johnson, Eli Lilly and GlaxoSmithKline reside in the red and orange zone.

More recently though, a handful of pharma companies jumped on the “not-blue” bandwagon – like Sanofi’s rebrand with purple and GSK’s Haleon spinoff with green – so we decided to talk to color experts about pharma and healthcare brands. What do different colors mean in the industry and why does it matter?

First, it does matter. Study after study explore the psychology of color and the fact that consumers, which includes physicians and patients, often make buying and judgment decisions based on color.

One often-quoted color and marketing research study found that between 60-90% of consumers’ product decisions are based on color. Another popular study from the Loyola University Maryland, found that color increases brand recognition by 80%. A more recent survey last year of digital and creative agencies found 39% say people care about color more than any other visual element when it comes to companies’ websites.

For pharma, color can lend authority or seriousness to the important, but also personal, subject of health. That’s one reason why blue – reliable, staid and trustworthy – is so popular.

“When you’re talking about pharmaceuticals, you’re talking about a very broad demographic,” said Jill Morton, the CEO of Colorcom and a longtime color consultant who helped come up with the red, white and blue colors of Tylenol extra strength gel caps. “Blues are going to be the safest colors. Color begins in nature and our reactions to it there are a hard-wired response. When we see blue, we think of the sky and the ocean, so it’s a very pleasant healing kind of color.”

And it’s not just the pharma industry that has a thing for blue. Some 70% of global brands incorporate blue into their brands, Morton said.

Pantone, the color authority that issues an annual color of the year – “Very Peri” purple for 2022 – works with brands across pharma and health, Laurie Pressman, VP at the Pantone Color Institute, said in an email interview.

She agreed that blue and red are “safe colors” with clear psychological meanings and ones that can cross cultural boundaries more easily than other tones.

Red, for instance, stands as the color of the heart and radiates positivity and energy, she said. Meanwhile, blue is “long linked to the serenity of the sky and sea. Light, medium and deep blues are embraced by the human mind as constant, trustworthy and dependable, so it makes sense that we would see a lot of pharma and biotech using the blues.”

Still, it’s not as simple as choosing blue for trust or red for energy when it comes to picking a pharma color. Sometimes brands are looking to stand out in a category and will choose uncharted colors versus ones with established emotional connections.

Non-biological colors, that is, colors that are not associated with the body, can work in cases where a health brand may be looking for a made-up color that doesn’t have associations – such as the proliferation of purples in the earlier 2000s, including allergy med Allegra and reflux med Nexium, said Haley Hiers, a copywriter at bfw Advertising who’s done research on color.

But if brands are going for unconventional, why not something like the color brown for a gastrointestinal specialist? Traditionally that would be a no-no, Hiers said, pointing out that “some colors are associated with sickliness and that’s part of why we don’t see a lot of brown and yellow in gastro,” she said.

Still the “rules” of color can be broken, and that’s especially true in today’s media-noisy world where getting noticed can be difficult.

“There is something really postmodern about the era we’re in right now, and I think some people might actually get a kick out of brown (in gastro). So I can definitely see somebody going for shock value, although I’m not sure anyone in pharma is brave enough to do that,” Hiers said.

Before Klick Health dives into color for a new product or company overhaul, it starts with a brand personality dive to find out the story or emotions the pharma or health brand wants to inspire. Still, the subject of color usually comes up quickly, said Jay Schacher, Klick’s design director. Klick’s goal is to find the right color that serves as a quick visual identifier and connects people to the story behind the brand. They also check out what the competition is doing.

“Sometimes we have what we call an area of opportunity to explore. Maybe it’s a company or a drug that isn’t in that space – not part of the blue or the red, for instance – and wanting to differentiate and stand out instead,” he said.

That thinking would likely ring true for Sanofi, which recently chose purple as its new corporate color – standing out was one of the several factors it considered. As Chris Williams, Sanofi’s head of corporate communications and brand, explained to Endpoints News last month, he and his team charted the logo colors of major pharma brands today and ended up with a chart showing two dominant color clusters. With a majority of brands on the shades of blue side of the map, and a smaller number of red and orange logos on the other side, Sanofi’s bright purple is a symbolic mix of the two, staking out the white space between the others.

Another recent pharma brand color choice that stands out from the blue-and-red pack is GlaxoSmithKline’s Haleon consumer spinoff with a bright green block in the middle of its logo as the middle line of the letter “E.” It was purposeful in choosing green as “a disruptive and dynamic differentiation” in the consumer health category, a spokesperson said when the brand debuted last month.

GSK’s also chose green because it “symbolizes many things around the world, including harmony and health. Green is a generous, relaxing color that revitalizes body and mind. It balances our emotions and leaves us feeling safe and secure. It is a positive color that gives us hope, with promises of growth. Alongside the symbolism of green, the associations with sustainability are strong,” he said.

The disruptor notion fits with Pantone’s health industry experience as well. Much of its work for pharma and healthcare brands centers on tried-and-true needs like color consistency. Pressman said some health brands do approach Pantone for color marketing help.

“The brands that are looking to us for color messaging and marketing support are targeting a younger audience and/or one that is looking to establish a stronger emotional connection,” she said.

Another consideration for pharma companies is history. J&J’s signature logo is James Wood Johnson’s actual handwritten signature penned 130 years ago when the company was founded, although the red color wasn’t standardized until the 1950s. Still, holding onto heritage can be a reason to stick with a color.

That doesn’t mean it can’t be updated though. Pfizer took its 70-year-old logo – a blue oval pill shape – and spun out a modern brand last year with two new blue tones. Pfizer’s new brand now uses a darker and a lighter shade of blue intertwined as a DNA helix spiraling up beside its name.

Why stay blue? Pfizer explains on its website: “We evolved the historic Pfizer blue to a vibrant, two-tone palette signifying Pfizer’s commitment to both science and patients. In an industry awash in blue, we’re doubling down. A choice that champions Pfizer’s history as a leader for the pioneers who have followed.”

Leslie Harrington, executive director at the Color Association of the US and founder of HueData color intelligence consultancy, said it can be important to consider legacy colors.

“When you’re making these decisions there’s also the color legacy or brand legacy. How much change do you want to signal to people is happening in your company?” she said. “Sometimes a company has a really bad rap so they need a really big change. But sometimes it’s just trying to look a bit more modern.”

Shading can make a difference in meaning too. Darker shades are more anchored and usually seen as trustworthy or timeless, while lighter shades can move a brand to a more creative and younger perception, she said.

Today most companies expect research and data behind why a particular color recommendation is right. While that’s a departure from the past when personal preference or intuition may have played a bigger role, Harrington has heard stories from colleagues who present extensive research on a color only to hear, “Orange? Oh no, we’re not doing orange, I hate orange,” from a C-suite executive.

So in the end it may not be about the exact color, whether bold or neutral, that a pharma company chooses, but rather the story it enables.

Klick’s Schacher said, “Color is all about the storyteller. What you’re looking to do is create relationships through people and color and using it as a way to communicate and story-tell.”