Customer service is not only about everyday relationships and contacts with the recipient of our products and services. It is also about constantly analyzing their needs, desires and finding ways to satisfy them. Due to the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic, a large number of companies had to work remotely, which made identifying customer needs quite a challenge.
Customer service. Promotional tools that must be used
The COVID-19 epidemic has caused the term customer experience (CX) to gain importance. Analyzing and solving customer problems has become much more difficult. So how can we improve customer service in the new era, since we already know that there is no going back to what it was like before the epidemic?
There are many tools on the market that can be useful both in remote/online and direct contacts. Below we have selected the key and most helpful ones, the operation and method of use of which may be essential to improve customer service.
Media monitoring. Social listening tools and brand image
Social media monitoring tools are designed to listen to what is being said in social media about a company, brand or any other topic. The market offers many solutions in this area that are more or less tailored to the needs of companies, but they all undoubtedly have one basic feature in common. They allow you to search social media for mentions of a company/brand/product and extract not only what is being said, but also valuable information.
Internet and social media monitoring is perfect for analyzing the effectiveness of current campaigns, analyzing opinions and comments on new products and assessing the general reception of any decisions made by the company. But that’s not all. This type of software can also be used to check what our competition is doing. This will make it easier to compare their strategy with our own. This in turn results in the introduction of necessary changes.
Internet monitoring will also play a key role in avoiding or suppressing image crises that can occur anytime and anywhere. We are talking about media that live 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Fortunately, social listening works in real time, so if any negative reactions appear online, we will be able to quickly locate the source of their origin and take concrete steps to nip the crisis in the bud.
Internet monitoring. Sentiment analysis and analysis of emotions in Internet user opinions. Insight marketing
Explaining this is a bit complicated, but sentiment analysis is essentially a tool for reviewing communication – whether it is emails, tweets or other – and extracting the information contained within it. However, it is more than just reading text. Sentiment analysis is the analysis of tones and contexts to best assess the meaning of words, rather than taking them at face value.
Sentimenti has an excellent tool to help analyze feedback. It also goes beyond the simple sentiment that companies have known so far, as it provides insight not only into whether a given opinion is positive or negative, but also to what extent. Additionally, the emotions contained in the customer’s comments are examined. There are as many as 8 of them.
Interestingly, Sentimenti tools, thanks to the use of artificial intelligence, examine tens of thousands of opinions in the blink of an eye as if over 20,000 people were reading and evaluating them. If one person did it, the analysis would take several or a dozen days. This is a revolutionary solution that has not been available on the Polish market so far. It is also based on science and is the result of months of expensive research on real people, not an artificial algorithm.
Sentimental analysis is particularly useful in markets where opinions change quickly and services must be constantly updated. However, any organization that wants to save time and respond to customer opinions faster and more effectively will also benefit from this analysis. It is good that ready-made software already exists for this type of analysis, which – considering the complexity – is much more convenient.
SMMW, behavioral analytics and consumer behavior research
Behavioral analytics involves studying consumer behavior on the web. The primary use of such tools is to predict customer needs and desires and proactively solve problems that may arise even before they occur. By checking user demographics, their previous purchases, and similar information, you can predict much of what general problems may arise. Using personal data, you can better understand their unique behavior.
A/B testing, which can be obtained from Google Optimize or a similar tool, is particularly important for checking the effects of changes to the page, while session replay tools such as Hotjar provide more in-depth insight. Behavioral analytics can also be used in sales, where cross-selling and personalization can provide a big boost in revenue by ensuring purchases in places where customers might not see the right products.
It is also useful for creating personalized marketing campaigns and tracking return on investment. Hotjar and Lucky Orange offer tools such as heatmaps, which are particularly helpful in this case. They will help you understand what your visitors are doing on your website, what they are clicking on, and what they may not be seeing.
Customer relationship management (CRM) systems. Customer segments. Ways of communicating on the internet
A customer relationship management (CRM) system is a relatively new technology on the market. The concept of CRM did not emerge until the 1980s. The idea behind CRM is to enable organizations to manage customer interactions and streamline processes to improve overall customer service. The goal is to increase profitability for the business, but it’s also a give-and-take approach that delivers real benefits not just to you, but to the customer as well.
The benefits to the business are wide-ranging. Sales teams can use CRM information to see how individual teams, campaigns, and products are performing. Marketing teams can use CRM data to predict the customer journey a particular person or demographic group might take and tailor their approach to the customer accordingly. Meanwhile, customer service agents can track cases efficiently across multiple platforms without the risk of misinterpreting queries.
Tools in action. Cloud software
Cloud software allows for a personalized approach to customers and extends its reach beyond anything that could have been expected just a few years ago.
Cloud computing not only allows organizations to track the effects of strategies and changes in real time, but also enables every department in the company to access information from anywhere. Key examples include Salesforce, a SaaS platform with useful marketing features, and file-sharing services like Dropbox and Google Drive.
This approach is similar to what is currently being used in scientific research. And for good reason. Cloud software allows teams across the company to instantly access any information in a database and use it to improve the customer experience. Instead of individual teams figuring out what works and what doesn’t, they can skip any mistakes that have already been tried and immediately improve the customer experience.
While this approach is more beneficial for large companies — also for cost reasons — there are advantages for smaller businesses as well. With a centralized place where all information is stored — online, without the risk of losing files or accidental corruption — teams can save time preparing for previous events.
What is omnichannel? Learn about omnichannel sales
Omnichannel often goes hand in hand with cloud databases. It’s simply a must-have if you have multiple channels of communication with your customers. This approach takes all of your contact lines and combines them into a single database, which varies from company to company. In some smaller organizations, a simple spreadsheet will suffice. In larger companies, a cloud database is often essential for cross-departmental and remote communication.
So what are the benefits of omnichannel for consumers? When communicating with someone about a query, no one likes to repeat themselves. Having easily accessible information that someone can access, even if it’s not the person who wrote the data, not only saves employees time and effort, but also prevents the customer from getting frustrated due to a lack of communication.
The best response is a quick response. Another thing is to provide the customer with all the necessary information without bothering them again.
Companies like Disney, Walgreens, and Starbucks have successfully implemented the omnichannel approach. And since tools like Salesforce Social Hub, TalkDesk, and Genesys Multi-Channel are available on the market and can help your business, why not give it a try?
Promoting your business online. Your company website and its constant monitoring
Google Analytics is a must. By that, we mean tracking user behavior on your company website, how they navigate it, what sections they focus on with their mouse, and what links they click on. This is about tracking actions, which is completely harmless and non-invasive, since the customer visiting your website has necessarily given their consent to interact with you.
Tracking your website can reveal a lot about your site’s layout, allowing you to identify any awkward elements that may need to be changed, showing how users navigate irregularly, and where they may end up leaving without making a purchase.
The data collected from tracking your website can be easily translated into a mapping of the online customer journey, thus deepening your understanding of how your customer thinks. While it won’t directly benefit your customers, the information you collect can provide insight into how to best design your website to make it easier for your customers to access the key information they’re looking for.
What’s on the market? Adobe Analytics offers traffic and multi-channel data collection, while Clicky analyzes real-time data on page views and events. Which tool you choose really depends on your business’s needs. Each offers the same basic tracking features with different analysis options.
Chatbots in Marketing and Process Automation
We left the topic of automation for last. It’s exactly what it sounds like: creating a system that does the job for you as much as possible. There are many ways to successfully implement it in customer service. For example, fully automated call centers or chatbots, which have become increasingly popular in recent years.
Some business leaders still scratch their heads at the thought of bots talking to their customers. But they’re very advanced and can be a great way to narrow down online queries — much like the aforementioned automated telephone switchboards.
More advanced versions can also tap into previous interactions or FAQ databases to find answers without involving a human agent. In this case, the benefit to the customer is speed, as a computer program can respond to any interaction almost immediately.
One of the most important benefits of automated responses is 24/7 support, not just during business hours. While there’s certainly no human touch that comes with talking to a team member, those needing help will prefer a bot’s response to waiting until the next morning to get valuable information that could ultimately be crucial to making a sale or turning a customer over to a competitor.
To sum up…
Customer experience is all about information. The more of it we have, the harder it is to find anything meaningful in it. However, with the right tools, which we wrote about below, you can let your computers do most of the work and still get much more meaningful analyses.
Speed is key these days when it comes to customer satisfaction, especially the younger ones. That’s why it’s worth taking a closer look at our advice and checking which of them meet the needs of companies.
The study of emotions contained in content is today eagerly used, among other things, to analyze and predict consumer behavior. No wonder. Reading the motivation of internet users helps to better define the target group of a given product or service and then facilitates more precise construction of marketing communication. One of the parameters that should be taken into account when analyzing the emotions contained in the text is emotional arousal. Why? What benefits do we get from it? Check it out in this article!
What should you know about emotional arousal to begin with? Let’s start with a definition. In a previous article, we pointed out that emotion is an experience and also an affective stimulus, causing an action to be taken.
One component of this experience is emotional arousal (arousal).
This arousal reflects the degree of activation of the central nervous system. It directly affects the way (intensity) of feeling a particular emotion. However, it is not a state that is always reflected in the dynamics of a particular person’s behavior. It can lead to increased liveliness, but it can also cause apparent calmness, indifference or even its withdrawal.
Interesting fact. The nature of the emotion experienced has no effect on the value of emotional arousal. Sadness, disgust, or joy can have the same arousal value.
Emotional arousal in terms of content emotion analysis means the level of intensity of a given reader’s emotions towards a particular event or information read. It can be zero, in which case we speak of indifference. It can also be measured and felt as strong: for example, excitement or agitation.
Features of emotional arousal
Emotional arousal is a state whose symptoms can be observed in the body. Noticeable physiological reactions include:
elevated heart rate,
more frequent and more intense heartbeat,
accelerated breathing,
increased perspiration,
goose bumps on the skin,
dilation of the pupils and accommodation of the eyes to see at a distance,
dilation of blood vessels in the external genitalia.
These symptoms may be accompanied by other, less obvious visceral reactions, that is, reactions of internal organs:
due to the activity of the adrenal glands, adrenaline is secreted into the blood,
the liver releases glucose into the bloodstream,
intestinal peristalsis is reduced and bronchial tubes dilated.
As you can see, this is atavism. The so-called reptilian brain is at work here. In the body, mobilization occurs, leading to an immediate reaction to the occurring changes. For example, in the case of fear it will be flight, and in the case of anger or rage – aggression, fighting.
Why measure emotional arousal?
Unlike sentiment analysis, emotion analysis can indicate the level of emotional arousal in statements or other types of content published by internet users. For analysts, communications professionals, marketers and even salespeople, this is a very important factor. Why?
Measuring arousal, sometimes called the temperature of an utterance, gives those measuring it the ability to determine the overall strength of all emotions. It additionally conveys two pieces of information:
it indicates the severity of the tendency to perform the response attributed to a particular emotion,
and, at the same time, it shows the magnitude of the obstacles that may block a person from taking a particular action.
The analyst thus gains knowledge of the person’s propensity to act. If, in addition, he knows what emotion is behind the statement, he will also know what action to expect. He will also learn about the extent of the blockages inhibiting the person. With knowledge of the emotions involved, he will be able to more easily determine whether it is an external obstacle or rather a mental block.
Emotional arousal in the context of emotions
What do we gain by having our level of emotional arousal examined in conjunction with a given emotion?
First, we gain the ability to identify the emotional state that results from the content examined, in terms of its intensity
Thus, we distinguish between:
mood – when the intensity of the emotion is low but can last for a long time,
emotion – sudden and short-lived emotional states,
affect – a sudden physiological state of short duration but high intensity, ending in passing and a phase of weariness.
Second, when combined with a given emotion (or compilation of emotions), the analysis will make it easier to determine the source of that emotion
Depending on the type of emotion, the arousal will be sensory or internal, visceral (i.e., aggregated due to the body’s biological imbalance, deprivation of needs, etc.).
And we are only talking about emotions in a primal, animal context! When we begin to operate with derivative, complex emotions, a more complicated and simultaneously more desirable picture will emerge. For we will enter into the so-called reasons of reason, emotions of a transgressive, reflexive character.
Their level and intensity may even give the researcher an idea about the system of values adhered to by the commentator, its violation or realization. It is probably not necessary to convince anyone about the importance of such data for their interpreter.
Third, and finally, the juxtaposition of emotion and arousal allows the analyst to estimate the impact of a given piece of information on an individual’s cognitive development
In what ways? First of all, we know that cognitive processes are connected to emotional processes. The latter affect cognitive processes by giving them a sui generis emotional coloration that stems from the emotions that we are experiencing.
The high intensity of a given emotion will therefore restrict cognitive processes, because these processes will be, as it were, filtered through the filter of the emotions experienced. However, positive stimulation (“reward” that introduces a positive feeling in the subject) improves the process, while the expectation of unpleasant consequences slows it down.
The analysis of primary and secondary emotions in combination with emotional arousal will allow the researcher to attribute specific actions to the results obtained. It will give him a specific picture of the structure of needs behind the analyzed statement. As a result, it will be possible to tailor a marketing message that is much more personalized. If we gather a sufficiently large group with similar results (i.e. similar needs), with such data we can begin designing marketing strategies.
Emotional arousal in practice – analysis of emotions including the arousal factor
Let’s proceed to test the knowledge described here in practice. As a basis for the analysis we will take comments and opinions from the Internet. They were scanned with SentiTool for the emotions they contain. Sentiment and the degree of emotional arousal were examined. We will see the relationship between emotional arousal and predicted action.
Example 1:
Panel prices drama – just like any other store. I will never again buy anything from the damn XX. This floor is crap, and the company that produces this crap is a huge failure.
Message analysis results:
anger – 51%,
fear – 31%,
anticipation – 30%,
surprise – 52%,
trust – 20%,
sadness – 45%,
disgust – 42%,
joy – 19%,
positive sentiment – 18%,
negative sentiment – 45%,
excitement – 59%.
In the results obtained, the high scores of anger, disgust, sadness and surprise are immediately striking. However, these are obvious in a consumer disappointed with a purchase. These values are supported by a strong negative sentiment, which hints that this state will persist and can be nurtured in the way people harbor resentment.
The emotional arousal of the Internet user is high here and will certainly lead to impulsive actions. What are they? The anger factor (51%) may indicate a desire to take retaliation, probably in the form of leaving aggressive, unfavorable comments and opinions online and among people familiar with the author of the post in question.
However, the most important part of the statement is the author’s identification of the “guilty” of the whole situation and, at the same time, the one responsible for his emotional state. And it is … no, contrary to appearances, not the manufacturer of “crap and junk”, that is the company “great failure”. The culprit is a popular DIY store!
We are witnessing an interesting shift of aggression from the manufacturer to the distributor of floor panels. The reason for the transfer is the unattractive price of the purchased product. As a punishment, the customer threatens to give up shopping in this chain. It can be considered that the quality of the product in this statement is of secondary importance. The customer guessed what he was buying and probably had an internal agreement about not the best specification of the product, but he expected a much lower price.
How do we know this? He did some consumer research and compared prices in other stores, he probably checked opinions of other users about given panels. Finally, despite everything, he bought this particular product. The first two sentences of the internaut’s statement (out of three!) refer to the store’s activity, and only the last sentence refers to the low quality of the floor panels. Something tells us that if the author of the opinion had bought the panels in the promotion, the above entry would not have been written at all.
What about the threat of a chain boycott? This boycott will last with the consumer… until they need to make their next purchase. There are a limited number of players in the building and finishing products market, and the aforementioned market is well established and has the fourth largest distribution network in the country. The results of the emotion analysis are not so high in this case as to suggest abandoning the relatively convenient (and, paradoxically, price-competitive) market in favor of seeking similar merchandise in other chains.
Example 2:
Anything better than G… and their latest “toxic masculinity” anti-male campaign, spreading propaganda saying that whites are responsible for all the evil and hate in the world. I will never buy anything from this crappy company again.
Message analysis results:
anger – 58%,
fear – 43%,
anticipation – 24%,
surprise – 53%,
trust – 13%,
sadness – 52%,
disgust – 50%,
joy – 10%,
positive sentiment – 10%,
negative sentiment – 57%,
emotional arousal – 64%.
In the message examined, we immediately see a contradiction. The high levels of anger, fear, surprise and sadness are a reflection not of the products themselves, but of the mission or idea that the concern represents. This mission does not agree with the commenting consumer’s vision of the world.
The man is filled with anger (58%). He had largely identified the company with masculinity and suddenly this image began to change. This thesis is supported by high rates of surprise (53%) and fear (43%).
Fear, however, reveals something more to us. It appears because of the blow to the consumer’s fundamental values, which are hidden in the words: whites are responsible for all the evil and hatred in the world. What we get is an image of a conservative person who will not necessarily be appealed to with facts, but who will not mince words when it comes to defending his or her rights or values.
What action can such a consumer take? Anger combined with fear is an explosive mixture – with increased arousal, it can and will lead confidently to an attack. After all, the first step was to post the comment in question. There are bound to be other posts: people with high levels of anxiety are closed to change and are very aggressive in public discussions that undermine their higher values.
Such a person will opt for a consumer boycott (arousal 64%), although we are not sure they will persist in it. Why, you ask? The commentary begins by saying that the campaign is anti-male, showing the toxicity of masculinity. But all the anger focuses on the message of white guilt for the evils of this world. This consumer may nevertheless return to the brand’s products in some time, because he is used to them. He is, after all, masculine.
Example 3:
Irrigation of our greenery is important. At this point I too am going to buy a rotary sprinkler and have already seen several models in the store.
Message Analysis Results:
anger – 16%,
fear – 15%,
anticipation – 41%,
surprise – 40%,
trust – 34%,
sadness – 19%,
disgust – 13%,
joy – 35%,
positive sentiment – 37%,
negative sentiment – 6%,
emotional arousal – 48%.
In contrast, the text to be analyzed is seemingly unemotional, neutral. The results of expectation, surprise and trust stand out the most, supported by a not inconsiderable (48%) arousal factor.
What do these results say? The person who left the comment is in the process of buying the product. Heightened anticipation (41%) combined with joy (35%) indicates that she is somewhat excited about the search, checking out the available options and looking out for the optimal offer (again, anticipation).
She is also surprised (40%) but still not frightened (15%) by the number of solutions available on the market. She believes she will find the right device (confidence – 34%). Agitation indicates an advanced process that is likely to end in a purchase.
The statement does not contain many details. You can see from its shape that it is a response to a comment from another person looking for such a product. It starts with a truism and, after a slightly stylistically convoluted construction, quickly moves on to the substance – a declaration of a common goal of the search. Now it is enough to add a link to the relevant product to the entry and… we have a typical whisperer’s comment.
If you would like to know, practitioners of whisper marketing, how your work looks like from the point of view of the study of emotions by artificial intelligence, it looks like this.
Example 4:
I bought such a decanter for my father and am eminently pleased. It is so beautiful that I myself gladly reach for it sometimes just to admire it. Lovely!
Message Analysis Results:
anger – 12%,
fear – 14%,
anticipation – 61%,
surprise – 50%,
trust – 65%,
sadness – 12%,
disgust – 12%,
joy – 72%,
positive sentiment – 75%,
negative sentiment – 1%,
emotional arousal – 72%.
The statement is made by an extremely satisfied consumer who chose the product as a gift for his father. We will not find out whether the gift was to the liking of the recipient. Probably neither does the commentator himself. As evidence we have high expectation supported by surprise at 50% and slightly elevated indices of anger, sadness and fear. For the same reasons, we also don’t know if the gift performs well as a decanter.
What we do know is that the purchaser himself certainly enjoyed the purchase. He exalts the beauty of the product, describes holding it in his hands, and we sense the desire to repeat this action. Such emotional state of the commentator towards the product will last – this thesis is supported by our high positive sentiment (75%).
The arousal factor in such conditions can mean a desire to return to the store and buy the same product. Well, unless the son finally gets up the courage to ask his father what he thinks of the gift. There is a chance that he will get this decanter for himself…
Is the practical application of knowledge about emotional arousal difficult?
The analysis of the comments described above is detailed, almost meticulous. So you may be tempted to respond: This is impractical! What about processing large amounts of data? After all, in order to prepare the communication strategy, monitor the brand image in the network, social listening, advertising campaign, etc. we will need thousands of mentions. How to deal with them?
It’s simple – the analysis of emotions contained in the content is automated. Content is analyzed by AI algorithms operating on the basis of deep neural networks. All mentions or posts are in turn categorized in such a way that a person starting to analyze the data has a simplified task. In addition, the analysis tools used today can be calibrated to the needs of a specific task or use selected classification systems.
So if you need to take your work to the next level with data analysis for marketing, advertising or communication projects, consider analyzing emotions in content.
In marketing, advertising and customer communication, negative emotions tend to be overlooked. No wonder. Companies, brand owners or agencies – everyone prefers to know what positively attaches customers to a brand or product, what customers have a good experience, an experience, what finally makes a consumer a customer and why they return to buy later. Sales are what counts! But from a research perspective, negative emotions are valuable.
Analyzing negative emotions is important from the brand’s point of view, to say the least. Suppose a product sells badly, or an advertising campaign is not successful. Then, by studying the emotions of customers, you can find out what they feel and how this translates into the perception of the product or campaign. Today we are talking about why it is worthwhile to study negative emotions in marketing and communications as well.
Negative emotions are… positive.
At the outset, let’s clarify beyond a shadow of a doubt: we will treat the phrase “negative emotions” in this article exclusively as a key word (and even a crowbar word!). All emotions that arise in us are necessary, and all of them also have their concrete consequences in action, so they are positive. By negative emotions we will mean here those whose common social perception has a contrasting connotation opposite to concepts like joy, surprise, or admiration.
Sadness, anger, fear, disgust… what are they, and what are they for?
Among the eight basic emotions (as in previous articles – we talk about them in the context of Plutchik’s theory), those having a negative or rather unpleasant to feel context include sadness, anger, fear, and disgust.
Sadness
It is an emotion of loss. It will appear, for example, in a situation of loss of an important person, loss of material resources, inability to achieve a goal set for oneself or to satisfy a particular need. It is usually accompanied by other unpleasant emotions, sensations, and reactions from the body.
Sadness is one of the most essential human emotions for the reason that without it it is impossible… to feel joy. It also indicates what is significant to a person and can be a motivating factor to transform this emotion into action and achieve the desired goal. Related behaviors to sadness include passivity, numbness, isolation, surrender, and self-criticism.
Anger
This is an emotion that people are very much afraid of. At the same time, however, it is the one that in a crisis gives a person the most energy and motivation to act. Anger initiates fight or flight. It builds tension and alertness, causes the release of adrenaline – so it corresponds to the physiological response to stress.
Anger is a signal of disagreement and a response to threats. It appears when boundaries are violated and when needs are not met. It can lead to impulsive confrontation and even aggression against the cause of the emotion. However, it can be and directed at the feeler himself or be aggregated into sadness or a range of other emotions.
Fear
It is a reaction to danger. It often occurs with anger, and its intensity increases with the level of danger. It can sometimes turn into anxiety. Fear is a powerful motivator for action. It appears when there is a threat to, for example, health, life, possessions, when comparing the current situation to an analogous one in the past, when recalling a difficult situation, or when witnessing an event in which someone is being harmed.
Fear can activate even in the face of thoughts or imaginings. Behaviors of a person in fear include excessive focus on threatening factors, narrowing of attention, distraction, sometimes loss of self-control.
Disgust
It is an emotion of a warning nature: It informs about health and life threats, such as poisoned or stale food, dangerous plants and animals, contagiously ill people, etc. Repulsion can activate in unpleasant, rejecting situations. We won’t list here specific examples of when it occurs, so as not to trigger a revulsion reflex in readers!
Negative emotions in marketing – why study them?
Planning communications, marketing and advertising campaigns or customer service cannot be unsupported by the emotions of the audience. Yet, as we mentioned at the beginning of the article, emotions with negative overtones are usually consistently overlooked in such activities.
Wrongly. With such an approach, we lose the rich palette of emotions (both primary and secondary) that help us evaluate the feelings, attitudes, and reactions of some target audience of our activities. And after all, these activities do not bring only positive effects and associations. After all, both positive and negative emotions can be excellent catalysts for action in marketing communications.
And – more importantly – particular negative emotions entail specific behavioral reactions from consumers, which a marketer or a public relations officer should anticipate in order to take countermeasures in advance.
These reactions are primarily:
brand detachment,
brand switching,
negative PTO,
complaints and claims.
What opportunities does emotion analysis offer in this regard?
By checking negative reactions (e.g., in social media comments, under articles, products, statements in forums, etc.), we can define and outline the space where people with certain prejudices or using negative stereotypes and heuristics will be found. Through emotion analysis, we will estimate their percentage and be able to correct our communication in the future, which will improve its effectiveness.
Using emotion analysis in text (a step further than just sentiment analysis), we can also see what kind of negative emotions our audience feels. Are they anger, fear and sadness, or rather more complex, multi-layered emotions.
Here again, let’s emphasize the superiority of emotion analysis over sentiment analysis. Consumers feeling anger, disgust, or sadness will be classified as feeling negative sentiment. However, emotion analysis will indicate that consumers feeling sadness will show a tendency to withdraw and be inactive. Meanwhile, those feeling anger will rather confront and try to remove the cause of their anger.
This is an important piece of information. After all, negative emotions can be harnessed to marketing and advertising efforts in such a case, provided, however, that the brand applying such a procedure hastens a solution that brings relief. One just has to remember not to overdo it with these negative emotions. When consumers are unsure of how the brand intends to solve their tension – they will leave.
How do consumers who show negative emotions behave?
Now let’s look at the different emotions in terms of their impact on the relationship with a particular brand or product.
Anger towards the brand and the behaviors that manifest it
Anger can be shown by consumers through indignation, irritation or resentment in varying degrees. Such a state can manifest itself when, for example, a brand strikes at the principals of its audience, when its actions are overly pushy or provocative. Anger will cause frustrated customers to become active. It is also an emotion that stimulates taking action to find a solution on one’s own to neutralize this emotion.
Customer anger is often caused by product failure or other situations where the company is clearly to blame. Customers often get angry when a product fails them or they experience other problems that are clearly the company’s fault. And even more so when it is easy to prove its responsibility for causing the defect. In this case, the reaction of consumers will be to file complaints, write grievances, etc. In addition, they will show their dissatisfaction by spreading negative opinions about the company (negative WOM). Finally, they will be eager to confront the company in the form of protests, boycotts, etc.
Interestingly, in the so-called cross, that is, the combination of felt primary emotions, anger is not infrequently accompanied by shame, for example, in the form of a sense of humiliation. A simple mechanism is at work here: the manifestation of anger will occur due to embarrassment or humiliation precisely. It is worth knowing that in such a situation, the behavioral reactions of both emotions will be very similar to each other.
Shame is also an emotion whose manifestation will occur when the consumer experiences inconvenience due to his own interaction towards a particular brand. Under such circumstances, consumer behavior may steer toward re-building a relationship with the brand, but already on a different basis. This relationship is definitely not going to occur in the manifestation of sadness, where a passive attitude will prevail.
Disgust – what it manifests itself as
This negative emotion will arise when a brand strikes at consumers’ core values, e.g., violates labor rights, uses reprehensible market practices, conducts environmental robbery, tests products on animals, etc. Consumers’ response to feeling revulsion will definitely be to switch to competing brands (brand switching). Negative WOM (word of mouth) can also often be observed. Manifestations of disgust can also be aggressive actions directed against the brand, such as organizing protests and boycotts.
Fear – how consumers who feel it react
It is associated with feelings of anxiety, a state of insecurity and insecurity. Customers feel fear when they perceive something in a brand or product that disturbs their aforementioned sense of security. This feeling, even subjective, will, over time, project negatively on the brand that the consumer feels threatens him.
Fear is absolutely a stimulant for action. Unlike anger, however, the action taken by customers is not to attack the source of frustration, but to run away from it and avoid an unpleasant confrontation. And this is what happens to brands that, in the opinion of customers, for example, pursue overly aggressive marketing policies – consumers avoid confronting them.
As a result, they develop attitudes such as reluctance to try a new product or use the company’s services in general (brand detachment). On the other hand, when they need a product with certain parameters, however, they may initiate a switch to a competing brand (brand switching).
Sadness and its manifestations in behavior
Sadness (and all its shades) is an emotion characterized by directing energy inward, into oneself (as is anger). Saddened consumers withdraw from interactions with brands and – often – from public space (including social media) in general. In consumers’ actions, sadness tends to be reflected in moving to a competing company and choosing an analogous product or service.
Sadness typically manifests itself jointly with fear because the behavioral reactions in both cases are similar. Causing withdrawal and passivity, sadness has the same effects for the brand as fear, the result of which is a flight from the relationship. Sadness, however, will not induce actions besides severing the relationship with the brand (and possibly brand switching), while fear can also initiate negative comments, filing complaints, writing complaints, denunciations, etc.
What else can cause negative emotions when it comes to marketing?
So, what is it that can consequently trigger consumer reactions toward a brand? There are several factors, such as:
an inappropriate name or an annoying advertising slogan,
excessive focus on one target group and preparation of advertising activities with only them in mind, resulting in the inability of others to identify with the brand,
advertising narrative that is incompatible with reality,
outdated, almost old-fashioned ideas for advertising campaigns,
unpleasant impressions caused by direct contact with the point of sale or product,
the company’s pursuit of a negatively perceived policy.
A consumer’s dissatisfaction with a brand policy most often leads to his expression of anger. The reason is usually the company’s lack of response or a response that is inappropriate from that person’s perspective. These factors cause an escalation of tension, resulting again in anger or even hatred.
Anger and dissatisfaction are commonly experienced negative emotions by customers towards a particular brand
Having a high power of affective action, these emotions cause a reaction in various forms. Therefore, from the point of view of companies, it is important to analyze one’s own actions in terms of the emotions that will be triggered in consumers. After all, by analyzing emotions, one can try to stop the angry and disgruntled from showing aggression. As a result, you can make sure they don’t file complaints and grievances, spread negative information or, finally, leave for a company that is less frustrating and offers analogous products or services.
Modern marketing tools. From studying negative emotions to using them
The most common consequences of consumers’ negative emotions are that they abandon the brand in question and move on to a competitor, and spread negative information. For these people, it is much easier, less stressful and requires less effort than even filling out a complaint form and sending it to the relevant unit of the company.
In such a situation, the company has to face loss of profits, a drop in sales and a decrease in the group of customers for its products. Moreover, it basically knows nothing about the reasons for such behavior of existing customers. If only for this reason, emotion analysis with a focus on negative emotions is so recommendable.
But that’s not all. Negative emotions carry a range of information that can be used in communications, advertising and marketing. Knowing the reasons for the occurrence of such emotions in their audience, a company, or brand can correct its policy in a given area, but also take up the fight to improve its position in the market.
How? Simply diagnose the negative emotions of your product’s target audience, but in the context of competing brands. Then you can use them to:
make consumers more permanently attached to their brand (show the flaws of the competition to your customers),
reducing brand switching,
targeting your competitors’ audiences more effectively.
In marketing and advertising, brands even use strategies based on constructing activities that arouse strictly negative emotions
Of course, the assumption is that as soon as they are aroused, the recipients will be provided with a feeling of relief. Examples of this are most often found in social campaigns.
Emotion analysis is the primary (next to sentiment and emotional arousal analysis, of course) function of the science-based Sentimenti tools we have been developing for many years. With the new year our solution has grown in value and can handle perfectly not only Polish but also seventeen other languages. The following study proves that we do it with almost equal efficiency.
Many languages, one tool. Sentimenti already handles 18 languages
In a summary posted on our blog at the beginning of 2021, specifically on January 4, we reported on new challenges. The Sentimenti team has not settled on its laurels and is working hard to develop and improve the tools. The result? We can now analyze large collections of texts in… 18 languages! However, in order to prove (not only to ourselves) that we are doing this effectively, we decided to analyze one solid text translated into many languages, and then check the emotions, sentiment and emotional arousal it contains.
To raise the bar for our tools, we took a rather funny and often sarcasm-laden text. These requirements were met perfectly by the content of Maysoon Zayid’s speech during TEDWomen in December 2013. Zayid is a writer, actress, comedian and co-founder of New York’s Arab-American Comedy Festival. Read/watch the entire piece below, or: HERE.
Thanks to the analysis with Sentimenti tools of the content of the speech in Polish, English, German and Spanish it has been confirmed that the results of the intensity of emotions are very similar. This proves high effectiveness. But that is not all! Our systems perfectly detected sarcasm and irony contained in the speech, which at times was indeed not lacking.
Emotion analysis versus sarcasm, humor, and irony. How effective?
“I have infantile cerebral palsy. I shake all the time.” – informs the recipient Maysoon Zayid at the very beginning of her unusual, comical speech. The content of her speech is not only sarcasm, humor and irony. Above all, the writer does it with great grace. As an aside, it is worth mentioning that her speech is mainly dedicated to the fact that each of us can do anything if we want to.
She herself has walked the red carpet, starred in a movie with Adam Sandler and worked with many other artists. She has also traveled the world, and the number of things she does every day would put many a healthy person to shame.
Returning to the analysis, however, the content study thus confirmed all the theses posed in the introduction. The percentage of positive sentiment, as well as the sum of the percentages of positive versus negative emotions, are higher. The text emotionally aroused mainly with positive emotions. The emotive data (on the scale), in turn, indicated the actual emotions evoked in the viewer.
This happened despite the strongly humorous style of speech throughout the speech. The emotion analysis and its results in the aforementioned languages are very similar to each other. The subtle differences (which we show in the graph below) between them are more due to the varying verbal volume of the same (in semantic terms) sentences. These differences did not exceed the value of 3%.
One content, multiple languages. For what purpose?
Analysis of emotion, sentiment, and emotional arousal in content has wide applications. Studying the same qualitative parameters in content in multiple languages offers even more possibilities. It is not only the analysis of web publications, extensive excerpts from books or magazines or chats with customers. Thanks to multilingual analysis we have an opportunity to get to know the attitude of the Internet towards various issues without language barrier.
The Internet is a huge space where people share opinions about everything. Internet users comment on practically every topic no matter where they are from. Therefore, we cannot remain indifferent to the potential that lies dormant here. Development of tools to analyze new languages is simply a market requirement.
Monitoring the Internet is a necessity and daily work for many companies, and researching emotions, sentiment and excitement on many markets (not only Polish) gives even more information without which it is difficult to do business.
Sentimenti tools have many applications in various fields – from e-commerce to politics, from image crisis research to customer experience. It’s also an excellent, already multilingual, research tool for various types of studies.
Additional perks? Sentimenti’s tools “read” data as if it were being done by the 20,000+ people who participated in Sentimenti’s research and creation. They also do it much faster than a manual survey. Explore our OFFER.
Fashion brands are very popular on social media. When we analyzed the Facebook communication of banks, we didn’t think the topic would be so successful – it’s our most-read post. We hope that hints and tips for improving social media communication can be drawn from it – with an emphasis on “let’s not overdo the display of surprise in official posts.” Now we want to show that we can study emotion on fanpages from different industries, including fashion.
Fashion brands on Facebook
Social media is now the most widely used way to maintain daily communication with customers. Even if they don’t bring direct purchase profits (here a newsletter still works better) they influence the perception of the brand by the wide audience. In short, they set a tone, including an emotional one.
We took a look at the Facebook activity of several Polish brands throughout 2018:
high-profile (Vistula, Monnari),
casual (Reserved, House, H&M),
youth (Cropp / LPP),
patriotic (Red is Bad).
We assume that the tone of their posts will vary, after all, brands want to create their image and react to who they are or what their audience is doing. First, we had to select a few companies with active followers. To do this, we compared the numbers of likes and comments under their posts. The size of the bubble showing the brand’s position reflects the number of posts. In this respect, all the companies we selected are very similar. According to the ratio of likes to comments (like to comment ratio), the best performers are those profiles where this ratio approaches 1.
We decided to analyze the profiles of: Reserved, House, Red is Bad, Cropp, H&M and Monnari. The first four are very similar in terms of Facebook activity, while H&M and Monnari not only stand out from the rest, but are also kind of opposites.
Emotions in fashion brand posts
How different are the various clothing brands? The chart below shows how they compare to the average. For example, a value of 60% for anticipation (orange emotion) in the case of House (black line) means that this company expresses this emotion in its posts that much more often than average. By the same token, -40% joy in the case of Red is Bad (violet) tells us that the brand expresses this emotion significantly less often than others.
Fashion brands create their image on Facebook as environmentally conscious (H&M), very cool (Cropp), elegant and friendly (Monnari), patriotically committed (Red is Bad). The differences between them can also be seen in the results of the sentiment and emotion analysis. Red is Bad expresses a lot of negative emotions: fear, disgust, sadness, anger. Much more than any other company.
House, on the other hand, heavily promotes its future activities while expressing surprise and expectation. Reserved seems to express a very “model” set of emotions, usually staying around the average (0% line) – just what we have come to expect from the communication of an everyday brand, aimed at a very wide audience. Cropp’s profile also has a very similar tone.
Emocje klientów
Facebook is used to communicate directly with the customer, but also with the brand. Observers, private individuals and other companies comment on official posts. What emotions do they express?
Let’s first look at the results of the sentiment analysis. Fashion brands, or rather their customers, seem similar to each other – the differences usually reach 10%, while those between emotions in posts reached 60%. Only Monnari outweighs the others in terms of positive sentiment (20% more than average). House turned out to be a model brand in this comparison, performing at the average level.
Being a model pays off: fashion brands Reserved and Cropp kept their posts within the average intensities of each emotion – and so do those commenting on these statements. Monnari, confirming the results of the sentiment analysis, stands out above the average in terms of joy and anticipation. Perhaps this was influenced by the competition under the slogan “I feel best…”. H&M receives a lot of trepidation in the comments – it’s mostly about complaints and questions about whether it’s possible to buy clothes from the ending collection. The most confidence is expressed by Red is Bad customers.
Fashion brands and their communication with the customer
For now, we know how brands differ. But what about the relationship, fit or rift, between the company and its customers? What is the ratio of emotions in comments to those in posts?
The chart above shows that customers always express more negative sentiment than the brand itself – an expected result. The brand does not complain and complain. But that, among other things, is why it has social media, so that it can quickly receive them from customers and be able to publicly show how efficiently it solves problems. And yet… In the case of Monnari and Red is Bad, this ratio is close to 1, which means that customers complain very little, almost not at all. They are faithful consumers of products and brand statements. What’s fascinating is that these are the only companies where commenters are even slightly more positive than the brand itself.
Fashion brand communication vs customer communication
In the case of Red is Bad, it may be about comments about soccer (the brand talked to observers about the World Cup) and the fact that it itself expresses a lot of negative emotion. However, this trend is observed throughout the year, except for the first quarter, so it is not affected by a single event. In the case of Monnari, we observe satisfied customers writing about when they feel best. We see this trend especially in the third and fourth quarters of 2018.
Finally, our most complicated graph – the relationship between the intensity of emotions in comments and posts. Red color means that a particular emotion appeared in the comments under the company’s posts twice as often. Gray – that it was about the same or a little less.
We immediately see two interesting cases.
H&M has received far more fear than it has expressed – and this has been the case for all quarters of 2018. In addition, commenters also expressed a lot of anger in the first and third quarters of last year – H&M’s customers use the company’s Facebook more often than others to seek help, report problems, and request refunds.
Monnari, on the other hand, shows the opposite, very positive trends. Customers express a lot of joy and (especially in the second and third quarters) expectations in the comments. They are confident that the company and its products are something good, pleasant for them.
We can also observe reverse trends between Reserved and Cropp and Red is Bad when it comes to the emotion of fear. In the case of the first two brands, it is rather expressed by customers. In the case of patriotic clothing – the retailer itself.
Emotions of fashion brands and their customers – conclusions
Monnari and Red is Bad are two brands aimed at completely different target groups. However, they have proven to communicate with their customers most efficiently. They receive positive comments from them, and seem very attuned to their audiences in terms of the tone of their mutual communication.
H&M’s Facebook situation turned out to be the most complicated. This brand received a lot of negative emotion in 2018, although it expressed itself in a moderate way. The other everyday brands and those aimed at a wide audience, Reserved, Cropp and House, stayed around average in both the emotion expressed in posts and that received in comments.
As in the case of banks, it turned out that customers tune into a company’s communications – unless the company lets them down. Then they don’t focus on reading and responding to its communications, but instead express their own opinions, often strongly negative.
Brand monitoring and emotion analysis
This is our next post showing how emotion analysis sheds interesting new light on about various companies in the market. Previously, we examined banks and their Facebook communications. We also examined how various beauty brands are talked about – and which ones are given warmer feelings than others. Sentiment analysis worked well in both the beauty industry, whose representatives differ little from each other, and the heavily diversified entertainment industry.
Sentiment and emotion analysis is a direct insight into the mechanisms that control consumer behavior of customers. That is, our decisions to like something on Facebook, sign up for a newsletter, and finally buy something. If we are not convinced by the emotional overtones of a brand’s communication, if it does not seem sincere to us, we will not want to listen to it. In this study, we found that the customized, out-of-the-ordinary communications of two extremely different companies hit the mark. Their customers wrote a great deal of positive comments on Facebook.
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