Content Strategy Users with NEEDs Vs. WANTs

Kris -

A user with a “need” for something is slightly more difficult to convert than a user with a “want”.  The content strategy when building your site, you should be aware of how you serve your site content based on your users’ point of view.

Users may have different intent when they arrive at your site, so catering your content based on such difference would be an important part of your content strategy. In this article, I’d like to talk about content strategy based on users’ needs and wants.

Here is a basic difference in definition for “NEEDS” and “WANTS”.
Needs are strong human desires to fulfill the lack of feelings or things.

The above NEEDS become WANTS when they are directed to specific objects that might satisfy the need.

  • So an American needs food but may want a hamburger, French fries, and a soft drink.
  • A person in Mauritius needs food but may want a mango, rice, lentils, and beans.
  • A person may need a computer but may want a Dell Laptop with 4GB of memory.
  • People may need to drink because they are thirsty, but they may want some beers, coke, tea, or coffee.

Overall, It is easier to sell to a person who already knows what he/she wants. That’s because it is likely that a user will search what he or she wants in search engines, and that person will land on a page that is relevant to what they want.

For a user with a specific needs, he or she has to be convinced into wanting something in order to make them take a desirable action.

Let’s look at a basic example

User A “WANTS” an iPod
1) Searches for “iPod” on Google
2) Lands on an online store that sells iPod
3) Makes a decision to purchase based on various info

User B “NEEDS” a portable music player
1) Searches for “portable music player” on Google
2) Land on an online store that sells different kinds of portable music players
3) User B will have to learn about various music players including iPod
4) Makes a decision to purchase based on info

What does this all mean??
That means you need to understand that how you position your pages’ content, you need to be aware of the keywords used from search engines, and assess to see if your content strategy is working properly (making users taking the desired action).

Since organic search keywords from Google Analytics is very limited now, I’ve been using Google Search Console’s data.

So it is advised to look at
1) Pages (perhaps landing pages) against the keywords from paid search, data from Google Search Console, or even using Heatmap to see where users engage the most within your content.
2) Assess the keywords from search and see what kinds of keywords (w/ different possible intent) generated lower/higher bounces, conversions, etc..
3) Optimize by testing your content or CTA (call to action) to drive users down the funnel
4) If a lot of your users are arriving based on their “NEEDS”, then make sure you have a nice user-friendly page that serves useful information. Make them “WANT” what you got!!