How Context Impacts the Marketing Message
“Ordinary contexts, from where we are to what we see around us to who else is with us, influence and transform how we behave and what character traits we exhibit.” —Sam Sommers, Situations Matter: Understanding How Context Transforms Your World
If I asked you to define the word “bass,” you’d probably first ask me to use it in a sentence. Without context, you wouldn’t know just by reading that homograph if I was writing about a species of fish or the low vocal part of a choir.
The term “context” refers to the situation or circumstances in which an event occurs. For marketers, context has infinite strategic value. Consumers’ decision-making doesn’t happen in a vacuum. It can easily be influenced by the context in which information is provided, sometimes overshadowing the information itself.
On a daily basis, a typical adult in the United States can be exposed to upwards of 5,000 marketing messages. It would be impossible for a normal person to give full attention to all 5,000 of them. The top reason that consumers ignore marketing communications is because the messaging ignores context by not corresponding to where buyers are and what buyers are doing.
Before marketers can change purchasing behavior, they have to understand existing consumer behaviors and the surrounding context that might be influencing them.
The 5 W’s of Context Marketing
1. Who who is with the consumer when the behavior occurs?
The presence of others is a significant predictor of how a person will behave. In fact, so-called “herd mentality” has a greater impact on behavior than personality type. Mob behavior during annual Black Friday sales illustrate this perfectly.
A consumer’s social situation can significantly affect what he or she will purchase, how much of it, and when. Some companies have built their entire business model around leveraging the social impact of purchasing. Brownie Wise exemplified this in the 1940s with her Tupperware “party plan” method of direct selling wherein groups of friends would browse and purchase products at a social gathering. It was later mimicked by various brands including contemporary companies like LuLaRoe and Scentsy. How many of us have purchased a Pampered Chef or Mary Kay product just because we were invited to the party by a good friend?
2. What else is happening when the behavior occurs?
Contrary to popular belief, some research has shown that audiences actually enjoy television programming more when there are commercial interruptions. Other research has shown that viewers rank television commercials as either good or bad in relation to their enjoyment levels of the show during which the commercials are presented. Depending on how much they like or dislike the show they’re more likely to rate the commercials shown during that show more positively or negatively.
Thales S. Teixeira, associate professor at Harvard Business School, explains that the context of a viewing audience’s location and attention greatly impacts the marketing approach you should take with your advertising. Audience members in a movie theater tend to give full attention to ads shown before the film, so Teixeira recommends persuasive and informative tactics. At-home viewers have more distractions available, so their attention could be directed elsewhere. Teixeira recommends more entertaining and engaging methods of advertising to recapture that attention.
3. When is the behavior taking place?
According to a Princeton University study, the pressure of time can be a stronger influence on behavior than personal values. The time of day, time of year, and how much time consumers feel they have to shop will inevitably affect what they buy. The need to purchase a birthday present, a Christmas or Chanukah gift, or a Valentine’s Day card all create their own time-sensitive pressures.
Marketers innovating around these time-sensitive situations have seen great rewards. For instance, by offering gift cards for purchase in convenience stores, widely-known brands such as Starbucks, Regal Cinema, and Outback Steakhouse have facilitated the gift-buying process for consumers and increased revenue for themselves.
4. Where is the consumer when the behavior occurs?
Consumers’ physical environments, including a store’s layout and design plus ambient factors like lighting, aromas, music, and temperature influence their purchase decisions. An environment’s effect on all five senses — sight, smell, hearing, taste, and touch — can determine how long a consumer stays in a particular store, his or her impulse buying behavior, and if he or she will even enter the store to begin with.
Have you ever wondered why grocery stores place pantry staples like milk and bread on opposite ends of the store? It’s because the longer a shopper walks around the store, the more money he or she will likely spend. Grocery stores space out their most frequently purchased items to increase the average customer’s time in the market.
5. Why is the behavior taking place?
A consumer’s basic functional and emotional needs offer perhaps the greatest insights into his or her purchasing behavior. Beyond basic sustenance, most humans are driven by the need for safety, love, accomplishment, and self-fulfillment. Harvard University professor Gerald Zaltman posits that 95% of all purchasing decisions are driven by these subconscious needs.
Marketing that connects with people’s emotions is far more likely to be successful than any other type. These Why emotional responses also directly intertwine with the four previous W’s of this list. What feelings are evoked in consumers based on Who they are with, What they are doing, Where they are, and When it is happening.
This brief introduction to context is just the tip of the iceberg, but can awaken marketers to a plethora of contextually based strategies and frameworks to drive business growth and revenue.
