What if the secret to Marketing isn't about getting Attention?

There is one word that every person in Marketing loves: ‘attention.’

It’s like the ‘currency’ of our generation. Likes, shares, and follows are those little dopamine hits that make us feel seen and validated.

We brag about and talk about them in meetings, job interviews, and on stage.

But if you observe closely, There are two types of attention.

• One is getting attention.?
• The second is paying attention.

Most marketing has focused on getting attention—leads, traffic, and impressions. And don’t get me wrong—they might work for some, but maybe we’ve been so focused on getting attention that we've forgotten about paying attention.

We've been chasing numbers instead of connecting with people. We've been talking to our users instead of listening to them. Because the more we seek attention, the less we find it.?

So, why don’t we shift our focus from now on?

What if we made our customers feel truly seen, heard, and understood?

This isn't just about being nice. It's about being smart. When we pay attention to our users, we learn what they need, what they want, and what makes them tick.

And that knowledge is marketing gold.

Because when we pay attention to our users, they'll pay attention to us.

But how do you pay attention to your users?

We could start with empathy maps, you know? Like actually trying to put ourselves in our customers' shoes.

1. Understand What their goals are. What are their challenges? What are their motivations? (some of us have, but everyone)
2. Let’s save every conversation on our Customer Support in an Excel sheet and then give it to GPT to analyze the interactions and identify common pain points, questions, and issues. Use user insights to create more targeted and relevant marketing campaigns.
3. We should reply and talk to them whenever that one hashtag that represents our value is mentioned on any social channel.
4. Analyze all the comments that our competitors get on their apps, YouTube videos, and posts. (maybe their roadmap too)
5. Doing AMA Sessions on Instagram every Thursday to answer questions related to your service/product
6. Start posting your blogs on the LinkedIn newsletter. It shows the profiles of the subscribers, which will help us to get to know them much better.
7. While giving Demos, we ask open-ended questions to encourage detailed responses and also write them somewhere.
8. Track user behaviour on our website and app. Analyze which pages they visit, how long they stay, and what actions they take. Use MS Clarity for it.
9. Segment the users based on user behaviours, preferences, and clicks. With Email, we experiment with different versions to see what resonates best with our users.
10. Analyse all the feature Requests in the roadmap and maybe find a gap for another feature

Any other ideas?