The 3 Big Intent-Based Marketing Trends and Why They’re Happening

The verdict is clear: interruptions are out, intent is in. The future of digital marketing and advertising success will be defined by understanding a user’s intentions and serving content that aligns, rather than distracting or annoying.

The value of intent-based marketing as a practice is rapidly on the rise. There are very specific forces driving this emergence.

Let’s take a look at how and why intent-based marketing is transforming, and what you should be doing to keep pace or, better yet, get ahead.

Trend #1: The End of Third-party Cookies & Rise of First-party Intent Data

We all have to change how we’re gathering intent data.

Intent data is information collected about a web user’s observed content consumption. This data is very valuable because it provides significant insights into your potential buyer’s behavior.

Not only does intent data help you target any particular buyer you’re currently tracking with more targeted advertising in the moment, but — even more importantly — keeping this data will help you assemble accurate buyer personas and more effectively target your ideal customer profile in the future, as well. In the age of digital advertising, intent data is one of the most powerful tools marketers have.

It’s also a tool that is about to fundamentally change forever.

Historically, most intent data came from third-party cookie providers. But back in June 2021, Google announced it’s bringing the hammer down on all third-party cookies by 2023 and replacing them with new technology. This means marketers will no longer be able to rely on third parties to get the kind of valuable intent data they’d been using to power their intent-based marketing. That’s a really big deal, and we’re already seeing the impact in 2022.

The need for first-party intent data

What does that mean for intent marketing in 2022? Well, right about now just about every marketer in the business is scrambling to find an alternative to third-party cookies. Increasingly, it’s looking like that alternative is first-party intent data. And it’s turning into a gold rush.

For Forbes’ “15 Top Trends That Will Impact Marketing in 2022,” Donna Robinson of Collective Measures explained:

“With the deprecation of third-party cookies set for 2023, marketers will be testing alternative targeting solutions, such as people-based targeting, throughout 2022. Companies that can leverage and expand on your first-party data will need to be vetted before cookies are gone entirely.” 

Throughout 2022, expect companies to be finding new and increasingly innovative ways to entice their customers into giving them their data directly in order to circumvent Google’s cookie policy.

Starting this year, first-party intent data (and, of course, creating a system that lets you obtain it reliably), will be the competitive differentiator for intent-based marketing. It only makes sense, therefore, that all the other intent marketing trends we’ve been watching are all about finding better ways to collect and use intent data.

Trend #2: A Growing Focus on “Low-hanging Fruit”

Given this context, another of the top trends in the Forbes article should start to sound familiar. Paula Chiocchi of Outward Media, Inc. explained the practice of “intent monitoring”:

“It’s time marketers focus on their biggest business goal: finding buyers who are ready to buy. To that end, it’s helpful to know who’s searching for your solution—and who is potentially in-market. Intent monitoring is the answer, and it’s a top trend that we anticipate will grow in 2022. When combined with actionable insights, it offers a powerful way to impact business growth.”

Without third-party cookies — and especially before many marketers have developed foolproof alternatives to those cookies — they won’t have access to as much intent data or to intent data that stretches as far back into the early marketing funnel, as they’re used to.

Intent monitoring is an early means of negating the need for that kind of intent data. Marketers are changing what they’re focusing on in order to target – as Chiocchi calls them – “buyers who are ready to buy.” Buyers at the end of the funnel are “low-hanging fruit” because they tend to provide the most obvious signs of readiness, and because those signs can still be gleaned from even relatively rudimentary first-party intent data.

Trend #3: Incentivizing Voluntary Intent Data Sharing

First-party intent data is still generally collected via cookies, but the difference is users have to opt into those cookies. You’ve probably started to see this on all kinds of websites — especially commercial or e-commerce sites. As you enter the site, you will receive a notification that says “this site uses cookies” and asks you to accept. Often, the site will even make you accept before you can use it.

We’ll see more and more of these prompts, but we’ll see other, slightly more subtle and (hopefully) enticing requests, as well, including some that will eliminate the need for cookies entirely. Chief among these? Interactive content and gated content.

Interactive content

This happens to coincide with yet another of Forbes’ Top Trends of 2022: the rise of interactive content. Solomon Thimothy  explained this one:

“Buyers are becoming more and more independent in their journey. So, as marketers, we need to take this into consideration and make things easier for the users. Businesses might have to put more time and effort into keeping the prospect engaged and helping them find what they are looking for, so one trend that might manifest itself in 2022 is the rise of interactive content.”

Interactive content also happens to be one of the most effective ways to get prospects to willingly opt into providing intent data.

A quiz, personalized guide to finding a product, survey, or another form of content can ask for the customer’s information not only for marketing purposes but also to help the buyer find the information they’re looking for.  

Expect to see more and more marketers finding ways to provide their prospects with personalized, interactive content on social media and beyond.

Gated content

Gated content is specialized, often long-form content that provides considerable value in exchange for information. The user agrees to provide their name, company name, interest in the content, etc, and in exchange, they may receive a guide, research, or an especially instructive case study.

Gated content is a great way to entice users into providing intent information, which you can then use to gauge who’s interested in information related to your product and why. Just make sure your content is so useful and compelling that your audience will actually want it!

 

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This article is written by Linkedin and originally published here.

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