Today, time is a precious resource. A glance is all you get from consumers. Yet marketers need to reach those consumers with attention-grabbing digital experiences in the moments that matter.
However, because of content-led marketing strategies that have led to content proliferation, the competition for consumer attention has massively escalated.
For time-poor consumers, that noisy content barrage detracts from content's original intent: to engage with positive, inspirational experiences—whether that's in an e-commerce scenario or a brand awareness campaign.
More than half (55%) of Web pages viewed get less than 15 seconds of attention, according to Web attention and monetization firm Chartbeat.
For brands, that means there are only tiny windows of opportunity to grab attention: They have mere moments, and they have to make each moment matter by delivering "instant digital gratification"—the best possible customer experience, instantly.
Here are 15 recently published statistics that explore marketing through the lens of instant digital gratification.
1. Some 55% of Internet users only use two or three trusted sites for their content discovery and purchasing. Carat CCS
2. A total of 41% of people say they feel overwhelmed by the wealth of choice on the Web, which makes it hard for them to make purchase decisions. Carat CCS
3. Meanwhile, 26% of people say there is so much information online that it is hard for them to find what they are looking for when shopping online. Carat CCS
4. 55% of Web pages viewed get less than 15 seconds of attention. Chartbeat
As the amount of content is growing, consumer expectation on how quickly that content is delivered is growing in tandem.
5. 47% of consumers expect a website to load in two seconds or less. KISSmetrics
6. 40% abandon a website if it takes more than three seconds to load. KISSmetrics
But pages are getting heavier—more video, more images, and more content are weighing down the consumer experience.
7. The average Web page has grown 20% in just six months—from 1,491 KB to 1,795 KB. Web Performance Today
8. Images account for 56% of the average page's total size—an average of 1,000 KB per page. Web Performance Today
And yet, experience is everything.
9. 80% agree that "our customer experience is our brand." SDL/eConsultancy
10. 22% of digital marketers see user experience as the most exciting trend of the year. Perficient
11. 78% of companies agree that they would be trying to differentiate through customer experience in the year ahead. eConsultancy
Consumers are living for the moment because time is an increasingly precious resource. The same applies to marketers trying to tap into those consumer moments as they happen. And the resulting content marketing crunch is a significant impediment to delivering the essential instant digital gratification that today's consumers demand.
12. There are nearly 2,000 marketing tech vendors to choose from. ChiefMarTec
13. 69% of marketers say they feel challenged by a lack of enough time. MarketingProfs and Content Marketing Institute
14. 30% of B2B marketers say they feel a lack of time to be their greatest challenge. MarketingProfs and Content Marketing Institute
15. 21% of B2B say they spend 15 hours or more per week just managing marketing services vendors. MarketingProfs and Content Marketing Institute
In today's fast-paced society, everyone is searching for instant digital gratification, and moments are all you have to sate their need.
But to react to moments, marketers need to connect in that moment. And, until now, building something that can act as that immediate, rich, cross-platform trigger has been a vexing task. But it can be done.
(The Zmags e-book Mastering Marketing in the Moment examines the four critical elements that marketers need to master marketing in the moment, and provides insights on the tactics and best-practices today's most successful brands implement to cater to the momentary glimpses that consumers can spare.)
