5 Metrics for Measuring the Success of Emotional Marketing

About 31% of advertisers report significant profit gains when using emotional marketing. However, emotional or emotive marketing might seem like a less tangible approach to marketing, as far as ways to measure its success. You’re not just looking at sales or website traffic — you’re delving deeper into sentiment analysis, social media engagement, brand health surveys, and conversion rates. You’re exploring the potency of trigger words through A/B testing, understanding psychographics, and navigating a vast sea of internet comments and user-generated content.

READ: Emotive Marketing Isn’t Just ‘Sad’ Stories — The Benefits of Full-Spectrum, Emotional Marketing

Learn the importance of real human emotion in a world of AI

Understanding the importance of real human emotion in a world increasingly dominated by AI is crucial in succeeding at emotional marketing. It’s not enough to understand statistics and algorithms; you must also grasp the essence of emotional authenticity. Authenticity is what sets you apart in a sea of AI-generated content.

A computer might analyze data and predict trends, but it can’t replicate the complexities of human emotion. As a marketer, you’re (at least for a while) the only real way to connect businesses to their audiences on a deeper and more meaningful level. You’re the one who understands their fears, hopes and dreams — or at least can actually empathize with them. You’re the one who can make a customer feel seen and heard.

Emotional authenticity in your marketing strategy is a powerful tool. When you’re genuine, your audience knows it. They can sense the difference between an AI-generated message and a message that’s sincerely human. That authenticity is what builds trust, fosters loyalty, and ultimately drives conversions.

But how do you actually measure the impact of emotional marketing?

READ: Chat GPT isn’t Always the Answer — 4 Reasons for Human-Generated Copy is Still Essential

Analyze social sentiment

Analyzing social sentiment isn’t just about the number of likes or shares you get. You also have to understand the emotions behind the engagement. Are your followers happy, excited or maybe even upset with your recent post or campaign?

This is where social sentiment analysis comes in. It helps you identify, track and measure the emotional responses to your brand across various social media platforms. It’s more than just data; it’s about feelings. It’s understanding how your audience feels about your product, your service, or even your latest ad. Smaller brands that don’t currently have a ton of social commentary can still make use of sentiment analysis by connecting more directly with their audience or monitoring the sentiment of larger brands in their niche or industry.

Deliver brand health surveys

Another tool in your emotional marketing box is the brand health survey. This survey serves as a comprehensive check-up of your brand’s well-being. It’s a great way to measure how well your emotional marketing tactics are working and how they’re affecting your brand perception.

Brand health surveys help you understand how your customers feel about your brand. They reveal your brand’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats from the customers’ perspective. By asking questions related to brand loyalty, awareness, and reputation, you can gauge the emotional connection consumers have with your brand.

READ: How Brands Can Grow Customer Loyalty and Build a Positive Reputation in 2023

Conduct A/B testing of your CTA language

You can also measure the effectiveness of your emotional marketing by running A/B tests on your call-to-action (CTA) language. It’s an effective way to find out which words and phrases resonate most with your audience and drive them to take action. It seems minor, but we’ve seen the language of something as small as a single button increase click-through by 100% or more.

Of course, we know that A/B testing isn’t a one-off experiment. Test everything that makes sense, and test it all of the time. It’s something you should be doing continually to optimize your CTAs and maximize your conversion rates.

Check the frequency of user-generated content

The frequency of UGC (User-Generated Content) is a powerful indicator of your audience’s engagement and emotional connection with your brand. It’s not just about pushing your message out, but also sparking a conversation that resonates with your customers.

The more UGC you see, the more engaged your customers are. They’re not just passively consuming your content; they’re actively participating in the dialogue around your brand. This UGC engagement is a clear sign that your emotional marketing tactics are hitting the mark.

The bottom line

By tapping into real human emotions, employing sentiment analysis, conducting brand health surveys and refining your CTA language, you’re set to amplify your brand’s emotional resonance. When you consider that the “emotional” areas of the brain can process sensory information 20% faster than the cognitive areas, it makes sense to include emotional metrics in your marketing KPIs.

This article is sponsored content.

Seth Garland is the Digital Marketing Manager for Versatility Creative Group.