In today’s digital landscape, businesses are bombarded with advice and frameworks, each promising to be the key to marketing success. A quick Google search for “business framework” yields hundreds of millions of results, highlighting the sheer volume of available strategies. Yet, many of these frameworks operate in silos, addressing individual departments like marketing or engineering in isolation. Take AIDA, for example, a classic marketing model, which, while useful, often reflects a company-centric, rather than a truly customer-centric perspective. Similarly, Agile provides a framework for engineering, but lacks a holistic view of the customer journey. These traditional frameworks often fall short of capturing the complexities of modern digital marketing, particularly the ability to build relationships at scale through mobile and social platforms. They struggle to account for the rapid pace of digital change, the importance of data-driven decisions, and the shift from interruptive marketing to becoming a valuable part of the customer’s life.
This article addresses the pressing need for a more unified and customer-focused approach. It introduces a framework designed to simplify the complexities of marketing and content creation, ensuring all business activities contribute to higher profits by prioritizing customer needs and perspectives. The goal is not just to provide another framework, but to offer a lens through which you can re-evaluate your current strategies and develop a content marketing program that truly resonates with your customers. Frameworks are valuable because they teach you how to think, empowering you to create customized solutions rather than blindly following generic advice. By understanding the underlying principles, you can adapt them to your unique business challenges and craft a strategy that drives meaningful results.
This framework aims to solve three critical problems prevalent in today’s marketing landscape:
- The Customer-Centricity Gap: Many businesses talk about being customer-centric but fail to truly embody this principle in their actions. Marketing efforts often remain focused on the company’s perspective rather than genuinely understanding and addressing customer needs.
- Limited Marketing Vision: Marketing strategies are frequently too narrow, missing significant opportunities to engage with customers across their entire journey. This constricted view leads to squandered potential and missed connections.
- Irrational Measurement Strategies: Success and failure are often measured using limited and misaligned metrics. This narrow view distorts understanding of what truly works, hindering optimization and progress.
This article will present a framework that will reshape your approach to various aspects of your business. We will explore the following key components:
- The See – Think – Do Framework: Understanding the fundamental stages of customer consideration.
- Content Strategy: Developing content that aligns with each stage of the framework to engage customers effectively.
- Marketing Strategy: Creating marketing initiatives optimized for each customer consideration stage to maximize reach and impact.
- Measurement Strategy: Implementing appropriate metrics to accurately assess the effectiveness of efforts at each stage of the customer journey.
- Epilogue: The See – Think – Do – Coddle Framework: Extending the framework to prioritize customer loyalty and long-term relationships.
By the end of this article, you will gain a fresh perspective to navigate the complexities of your daily tasks and build a content marketing program that your customers genuinely value.
The See – Think – Do Framework
This framework is built on the foundation of putting customers first, effectively evaluating marketing programs, and aligning success metrics with actual outcomes. It revolves around understanding customer consideration stages and tailoring your approach to the audience within each stage.
Let’s illustrate this with an example of a clothing retail business.
The See stage encompasses the broadest possible audience: “all people who wear clothes.” This is the largest addressable market, including everyone who could potentially become a customer in the future. For other businesses, this audience could be defined as “all people who own smartphones” or “all businesses that use cloud services.” The key is to define the widest possible relevant group, excluding only those who are entirely outside your potential market.
The Think stage narrows the audience to “all people who wear clothes who think they might need some.” This segment represents a subset of the See audience, characterized by a nascent level of intent. These individuals are beginning to consider a need for your product or service, even if they are not actively looking to purchase right now. We can infer this intent through their online behavior and engagement.
The Do stage represents the most targeted and immediately valuable audience: “all people who wear clothes who think they might need some, and are currently looking to buy them.” This is a subset of the Think audience and represents those actively seeking to make a purchase. This is the audience that most businesses directly target with sales-focused marketing.
These three distinct stages – See, Think, Do – represent a simplified view of the customer journey. While purchasing behavior isn’t always linear, particularly for impulse buys, for most considered purchases, customers move through these stages of awareness, consideration, and decision.
The framework emphasizes viewing these stages and audiences from the customer’s perspective, not the company’s. This customer-centric approach is crucial for developing effective content marketing programs that resonate.
By applying this framework to digital and even traditional marketing efforts, businesses can:
- Identify Content and Engagement Gaps: Pinpoint where content and engagement strategies are lacking across the customer journey.
- Optimize Marketing Initiatives: Evaluate if marketing and advertising efforts are appropriately targeted and effective for each customer consideration stage.
- Refine Measurement Strategies: Determine if success metrics are accurately reflecting the value and outcomes at each stage, avoiding the mistake of applying inappropriate metrics.
This simple framework provides powerful insights, enabling businesses to create more targeted and effective strategies across all customer touchpoints.
The See – Think – Do Framework: Content Strategy
Businesses often operate in silos, with sales teams focused on sales touchpoints, marketing teams on marketing touchpoints, and customer service on service interactions. However, a successful content marketing program requires a holistic approach that provides valuable content for customers at each stage of their journey: See, Think, and Do. This content strategy is the foundation upon which effective marketing and sales efforts are built.
In the digital realm, a website or mobile app solely focused on transactional content (the Do stage) will inevitably limit its reach and impact. By only catering to customers ready to buy, businesses miss opportunities to engage with a much wider audience in the See and Think stages.
To achieve sustainable growth, a robust content strategy must include engagement points designed for each stage. Content for the See stage broadens reach to the widest possible audience, while Think stage content nurtures potential customers, builds relationships, and lowers acquisition costs by engaging them earlier in their journey. This ensures that regardless of a customer’s consideration stage, they find relevant and engaging content that meets their needs.
Consider ModCloth, a successful online retailer, as an example. ModCloth excels not only in driving sales (Do stage) but also in engaging customers in the See and Think stages.
On any ModCloth product page, the Do stage is clearly addressed with a prominent “ADD TO BAG” call to action. However, ModCloth doesn’t stop there.
For customers in the See or Think stages, ModCloth provides a wealth of engagement opportunities.
For the See stage, ModCloth offers features like becoming a “virtual fashion buyer,” engaging customers who love fashion even if they aren’t immediately looking to purchase. They also encourage blog subscriptions and social media follows, nurturing a broader audience interested in their brand and industry.
For the Think stage, ModCloth provides options like review notifications, connecting with “ModStylists” for personalized advice, and creating wishlists. These features cater to customers considering purchases, providing valuable information and fostering engagement without demanding an immediate sale. These micro-conversions build relationships and guide customers towards the Do stage.
By implementing See and Think content strategies, businesses, like ModCloth, position themselves for greater marketing and measurement success. Conversely, neglecting these stages limits growth potential and restricts businesses to a smaller, more immediate market.
Another crucial area for content strategy is mobile. Many companies, even large ones, underutilize mobile platforms beyond immediate transactional capabilities. Walmart’s mobile app, for instance, primarily focuses on the Do stage, offering features like product purchases, local ads, and price checks.
While functional for existing customers ready to buy, it largely ignores potential customers in the See and Think stages, missing significant opportunities for broader engagement and relationship building within the mobile ecosystem.
In contrast, Walgreens’ mobile app demonstrates a more comprehensive See – Think – Do content strategy. While also providing Do stage functionalities like purchasing and prescription refills, Walgreens effectively addresses the Think and See stages.
For the Think stage, Walgreens offers features like pill reminders, providing ongoing value and staying connected with customers even when they aren’t immediately making a purchase. This builds brand association and positions Walgreens as a helpful resource.
For the See stage, Walgreens integrates with Instagram, tapping into a vast audience potentially beyond their direct customer base. They also include a photo editor and a rewards program for tracking fitness activities, appealing to a broader audience interested in health and wellness, regardless of immediate purchase intent.
Walgreens’ mobile strategy effectively utilizes utility marketing, providing valuable services and content that attract and engage customers across all consideration stages. This approach maximizes mobile’s potential for building relationships and driving long-term customer value.
Developing a See – Think – Do content strategy, like ModCloth and Walgreens, is crucial for creating a content marketing program customers care about. Once a robust content foundation is in place, the next step is to develop a complementary marketing strategy.
The See – Think – Do Framework: Marketing Strategy
Creating a successful See – Think – Do marketing strategy begins with a critical evaluation of current marketing activities. The fundamental question to ask for each marketing program is: “Which customer consideration stage are we targeting?” The answer to this question dramatically influences the strategy’s execution, including ad creative, targeting, and objectives.
For marketing initiatives aimed at the See stage audience, such as display advertising, the approach should be broad and awareness-focused. Ad creative should be general, targeting should be based on demographics, psychographics, or geography, and the primary goal is branding and broad reach.
For the Think stage, marketing becomes more targeted. Ad creative can be more specific, targeting strategies can focus on content-driven placements and category-relevant sites, and the objective shifts to presenting brand value and driving initial engagement. Micro-conversions like email sign-ups, video views, or app downloads become key metrics for this stage, fostering early relationship building.
Marketing for the Do stage is highly focused and intent-driven. Ad creative should be specific and action-oriented, targeting leverages intent signals like retargeting and behavioral data, and the primary goal is to drive immediate sales and revenue. For customers in the Do stage, the marketing message should be clear, compelling, and facilitate a quick and easy purchase.
This framework can be applied across all marketing channels.
For example, SEO strategies can be evaluated based on the consideration stage targeted by specific keyword clusters. Keywords with clear purchase intent align with the Do stage, while broader, informational keywords target the Think and See stages. This understanding informs content creation, landing page design, and calls to action for each keyword group.
Similarly, PPC campaigns, affiliate marketing, and email marketing can be segmented and optimized based on the See – Think – Do framework. Email marketing, for instance, can deliver different messages to See stage subscribers focused on brand awareness and value, compared to Do stage subscribers receiving promotional offers and purchase incentives.
The core principle is to align marketing efforts with the customer’s consideration stage and perspective. While sales are the ultimate goal, bombarding See stage customers with “BUY NOW” messaging is ineffective and alienating.
By analyzing current marketing programs through the See – Think – Do lens, businesses gain clarity on their target audience and the effectiveness of their strategies.
This analysis can prompt crucial questions about optimization and missed opportunities. For example, if display advertising is solely focused on the See stage, questions arise:
- Alignment: Are ad creative, targeting, and objectives truly optimized for the See stage audience?
- Potential: Is display advertising being fully utilized, or are there opportunities to extend its reach and impact across other consideration stages?
Addressing the first question leads to immediate improvements by refining current campaigns. The second question can spark strategic discussions about expanding marketing efforts and leveraging the full potential of each channel.
For display advertising, this might lead to a more comprehensive strategy that addresses all three stages.
This optimized approach utilizes different display ad formats and strategies for each stage. See stage ads focus on broad brand awareness, Think stage ads deliver content and value to nurture interest, and Do stage ads utilize retargeting and direct response tactics to drive conversions.
The See – Think – Do framework provides a template for optimizing all marketing activities. By applying the same analytical approach to PPC, SEO, social media, and other channels, businesses can identify areas for improvement and expansion.
For example, examining PPC strategies might reveal a narrow focus on Do stage keywords, neglecting a vast audience searching for Think and See stage information. Similarly, SEO efforts may be limited to brand and product terms, missing opportunities to capture broader search queries across the customer journey.
This analysis can lead to a more balanced and comprehensive digital marketing strategy.
The specific channel allocation and stage focus will vary based on industry, business model, and target audience. The key is the process of analyzing current efforts, identifying gaps, and optimizing strategies to align with the See – Think – Do framework, creating a content marketing program that truly caters to customer needs and drives results.
The See – Think – Do Framework: Measurement Strategy
A primary reason for scattered or ineffective marketing strategies is often misaligned measurement. Companies frequently use inappropriate metrics, hindering their ability to accurately assess performance and optimize their efforts across the customer journey. Focusing solely on conversion rates, for example, provides a limited and often misleading view of marketing effectiveness, particularly for See and Think stage initiatives.
While conversion rate is a crucial metric for Do stage marketing, applying it uniformly across all stages is akin to “judging a fish by its ability to climb a tree.” See and Think stage audiences are not yet ready to convert, and measuring them solely on conversions will inevitably lead to underestimating their value and potentially prematurely abandoning effective campaigns.
This narrow measurement approach leads to flawed conclusions, such as “display advertising doesn’t work” or “social media doesn’t drive sales.” These statements often stem from measuring See and Think stage campaigns with Do stage metrics like conversion rate.
The See – Think – Do framework addresses this by advocating for stage-specific measurement strategies. This means using metrics that accurately reflect the objectives and expected outcomes for each consideration stage. Success should be judged by metrics that align with what each marketing campaign is designed to achieve at each stage of the customer journey.
For the See stage, the primary objective is brand awareness and broad reach. Appropriate metrics include:
- Interactions: Measuring engagement with ads, such as clicks on YouTube homepage roadblocks or interstitial ad interactions.
- Social Metrics: For social media campaigns, metrics like conversation, amplification, and applause (likes, shares, comments) are more relevant than immediate conversions.
- Brand Awareness: Tracking metrics that indicate increased brand recognition, such as brand searches or social mentions.
- New Visits: For channels driving traffic to the website, measuring new visits indicates success in reaching a broader audience.
For the Think stage, the goal is engagement, nurturing interest, and building relationships. Relevant metrics include:
- Click-Through Rate (CTR): Measuring ad engagement and interest in learning more.
- Page Depth: Analyzing website engagement and content consumption by visitors from Think stage campaigns.
- Per Visit Goal Value: Tracking micro-conversions like email sign-ups, resource downloads, or contact form submissions, which indicate engagement and relationship initiation.
- Assisted Conversions: Identifying the contribution of Think stage marketing channels to future conversions, recognizing their role in the customer journey.
For the Do stage, traditional conversion-focused metrics are appropriate:
- Conversion Rate: Measuring the percentage of visitors completing desired actions, such as purchases or form submissions.
- Cost Per Acquisition (CPA): Optimizing for efficient customer acquisition.
- Return on Ad Spend (ROAS): Evaluating the profitability of Do stage marketing campaigns.
- Customer Lifetime Value (LTV): Considering the long-term value of customers acquired through Do stage efforts.
- Loyalty: Analyzing repeat purchases and customer retention, reflecting the success of Do stage marketing in driving long-term customer relationships.
By aligning measurement strategies with the objectives of each consideration stage, businesses gain a more accurate and insightful view of marketing performance.
This stage-specific measurement framework enables data-driven optimization and informed decision-making. It avoids the pitfalls of narrow, conversion-centric measurement and empowers businesses to effectively evaluate and improve their content marketing program across the entire customer journey. It’s important to note that cost-effectiveness should still be considered at each stage, ensuring that marketing investments deliver value at every step of the customer journey.
Even for small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) with limited resources, the See – Think – Do measurement framework is applicable and valuable.
SMBs can utilize readily available, free analytics tools like Google Analytics to implement stage-specific measurement. While the depth and breadth of metrics may be adjusted based on resources, the core principle of aligning metrics with stage objectives remains crucial for effective content marketing and business growth.
Epilogue: The See – Think – Do – Coddle Framework
Customer relationships extend beyond the initial purchase. A successful content marketing program recognizes the importance of nurturing existing customers and fostering long-term loyalty. This leads to the fourth element of the framework: Coddle.
The term “retain” often used to describe customer loyalty efforts, carries a negative connotation of simply holding onto customers to prevent churn. “Coddle,” in contrast, emphasizes a proactive and indulgent approach to customer care. It signifies going above and beyond to delight and value existing customers, transforming them into brand advocates.
Many businesses underinvest in customer loyalty. Walmart’s mobile app, for instance, focuses primarily on acquisition and transactions, with limited features to engage or “coddle” existing customers. Similarly, many loyalty programs offer minimal benefits, failing to truly make customers feel valued.
A higher aspiration is to create a customer experience where existing customers feel genuinely appreciated and indulged. Some businesses even define a “customer” as someone who has made repeat purchases, recognizing that true customer relationships are built over time.
The “Coddle” stage of the framework emphasizes creating dedicated content, marketing, and measurement strategies for existing customers.
This includes:
- Dedicated Content: Creating exclusive content and resources tailored to existing customers, such as special newsletters, early access to new products, or VIP content.
- Customized Marketing: Developing marketing campaigns specifically for existing customers, offering personalized offers, loyalty rewards, and appreciation initiatives.
- Unique Platforms: Considering dedicated websites or mobile app features designed exclusively for loyal customers, enhancing their experience and sense of value.
- Special Metrics: Utilizing metrics like Customer Lifetime Value (LTV) and repeat purchase rate to measure the success of “coddle” stage efforts.
Just as with See, Think, and Do stages, a dedicated strategy for the Coddle stage is essential. By investing in customer loyalty and creating a content marketing program that extends beyond acquisition, businesses can cultivate lasting relationships, reduce acquisition costs, and build a strong foundation for long-term success.
The See – Think – Do – Coddle framework provides a holistic and customer-centric approach to content marketing. By understanding customer consideration stages, tailoring content and marketing efforts to each stage, and implementing appropriate measurement strategies, businesses can create a content marketing program that customers truly care about, driving engagement, conversions, and long-term loyalty.
