Ethnography: How It Can Help You Win the Hearts of Your Customers

Ethnography is the study of human races and cultures, according to Merriam-Webster.

It is "people watching" at a very basic level. In small-town America, previous generations used to go to Main Street after dinner, especially in the summer, to "people watch." Those watching (the audience) would sit on a bench and observe couples and families as they walked up and down the street; the audience would notice neighbors and friends gathering and talking. Everyone did a little window shopping and stopped in old-fashioned drugstores for soda or ice cream. It was fun, entertaining, social, and educational, and even some business was conducted. ?

The same phenomenon occurs today. Social media enables these behaviors in a more modern fashion. Some people are sitting back and watching on social media and not posting much—they are the "audience." Many people post videos, pictures and opinions. In many cases they are sharing very deeply personal experiences and challenges. Most people are both the audience and those sharing. It is fun, entertaining, social, educational, and certainly huge amounts of business is conducted (brands are recommended and influencers are born).

How is this relevant to marketers and brands from a consumer insights or research perspective? Being in the right place at the right time is critical to understand true consumer insights. Your brand, or company, can take advantage of social media to learn so much about your consumers, their needs, their lives, and how to reach them. You can monitor your target market's usage of social media for a time period, and you can use social media to conduct research to learn about your consumers.

Also, so much ethnography is conducted with mobile devices (virtual ethnography), so that you can be in the moment of emotion, in the moment of the shopping trip, or in the moment of the product usage, without actually being there in person. This not only allows the behavior to happen without the increased likelihood of the researcher’s presence biasing the results, it also makes it easier to conduct research across broad geographies (and various countries).

Consumers can use their phones to capture video and images...then they can tell researchers what's important in their lives, how they shop, how they use the product, and how it makes them feel. Also geofenced surveys can ping the shoppers’ apps while they are shopping at a particular store, after they test drive that particular new vehicle, or when they don't buy a product in that luxury retailer.

What is the path to purchase or customer journey? How are consumers initially exposed to your brand or product category? How do they research your brand or products? How can you convert less frequent customers to loyal customers?

Ethnography can also be conducted in person, where the researchers observe the shopping trip or product usage. Depending on the objectives of the research, the product category, and usage occasions, recommendations on methodology are made as to whether virtual ethnography or in-person ethnography is the most appropriate.

Your organization can utilize ethnography ("people watching,") to provide in-depth knowledge about your consumers. It allows your team to better understand your consumers, their needs and what is important in their lives. That in turn, will help you build stronger brands, better products, and optimize messaging to grow your business and improve profitability.