Access to information today is everywhere.

Customers can enter a query and, within seconds, be led to hundreds of resources that may help them reach a conclusion or find the answer they need.

While this, at first, looks like a positive, all too often, consumers become overwhelmed or paralyzed due to what is referred to as information overload.

Such a phenomenon isn’t new.

Variations of information overload date back through history, particularly showing up in the Renaissance and the Industrial Revolution.

Yet, today, it continues to build thanks to online accessibility and shows no signs of slowing down anytime soon.

Why should your business care about information overload? Consumers may knowingly or unknowingly experience various levels of stress from information overload or even suffer from information anxiety.

In most instances, this information overload and anxiety are caused by the massive amount of irrelevant information out there and not the voluminous data itself.

As a business, you can help fight increasing information overload and help your customers by reexamining and refining your own digital marketing strategy.

Find out how in this blog post.

The Risks of Information Overload

Information overload and the stress and anxiety it can cause are not only affecting consumers but can lead to a negative impact on your business as well.

Essentially, with such an overload, the brain can lose some of its power to process all of the available information. This leads to stress and can even stop your customers from taking action, which is what you don’t want.

With constant input of information and the task of storing it all, the brain is in constant activity. With no down periods, cognitive efficiency is altered and can affect the consumer’s concentration and contemplation skills. 

This can lead to delays in decision-making or keep them from making any decisions at all.

Further, information overload is leading to conditions somewhat similar to attention deficit disorder, or ADD. As a result, consumers are feeling increasing levels of burnout and depression.

Another risk of information overload is that it can affect individuals by making them less productive and less innovative. 

They also can suffer from psychosomatic complaints, such as breathing interruptions, as they contemplate all the information available before them.

Some folks even report that their sleep takes a hit because they can’t “turn off” the mental noise after a long day of scrolling and digesting news or work documents. You might have heard someone joke about doomscrolling, but it’s got a basis in reality—those late-night information binges don’t just eat up time, they can leave you waking up groggy, overloaded before your day even starts. The real kicker is that this state isn’t easily fixed by just taking a break or turning off notifications; the effects can linger and influence mood and productivity for days.

All of these risks of information overload can directly affect your potential customers, and in turn, your business’s bottom line.

How Can a Company Fight Information Overload?

Information overload needs to be a concern for all companies.

But how can a business fight this information overload and help potential customers along the way?

Start by creating information that better matches the needs of your target audiences and keep the customer experience positive rather than confusing or overwhelming.

Here are several ways your company can help fight such information overload and win over new customers.

1. Improve Your Website with the Right Content

Start fighting information overload by reviewing and improving your own company’s website.

You want just the right amount of content on your web pages. That is, enough content to make it relevant but not lead to information overload for viewers.

Also, make your website easy to navigate. Consider including pillar pages to aggregate content for all your customers’ needs and help them find exactly what they need to solve a problem or answer a question without having to go elsewhere.

2. Rethink Your Buyer Personas

Take a close look at your current buyer personas. Are they still effective, or do they need revising in some way?

By reassessing and rethinking your buyer personas, you can make sure you are sharing relevant information for the right audiences and not just adding more content.

Sometimes, it’s tempting to flood your website or socials with every tidbit you know about your product, thinking more must mean better. But honestly, when was the last time you, personally, read through a 30-paragraph FAQ or scrolled to the bottom of an endless landing page without skimming? Curating what you share by referencing your buyer personas can make the difference between a real connection with your audience and just another bounce.

3. Conduct a Content Audit and Content Pruning

Conduct a content audit of your current offerings and consider ways to improve your strategy. 

What are you currently sharing? Is anything outdated? Can you update anything to make it more relevant to today’s consumers?

The next step is content pruning. What can be deleted, combined, or redesigned? 

Prune your content to better provide for potential customers without overwhelming them with information.

4. Use More Interactive Content

One helpful way to fight information overload is by creating interactive content. This type of relevant content is easier to consume and also benefits engagement in a fun way.

Think interactive polls, quizzes, calculators, and other content which entices engagement. 

Today there are software options that can help you more readily and easily create this type of content, saving your company both time and money.

Interactive content brings a personal touch, and potential customers may steer to your information offerings instead of the many others out there offering only static content.

5. Incorporate Empathetic Marketing Techniques

Today’s younger generations are looking for brands to trust and who treat them more as individuals than profit potential.

By incorporating empathetic marketing techniques into your content, you can capture their attention while also providing them with valuable information.

To get started, answer these questions of your buyer persona:

• What is the problem (or problems) that needs solving?
• Can the particular problem be broken down in any way?
• What type of information is needed to resolve the defined problem and find the best solution?

By putting yourself in your potential customer’s shoes and seeing the problem through their eyes, you can create a content marketing strategy that meets their needs and wants more effectively.

6. Develop a Content Matrix

Instead of remaining reactive to the latest trends or providing disconnected content for potential customers, develop your own content matrix to keep your company on track.

A content matrix provides a framework to help direct your marketing efforts and includes a plan for addressing all the phases of the buyer’s journey.

It is a way of planning and organizing your content, avoiding repetition, and filling in any gaps in information relevant to your targeted audience.

7. Monitor Visitor Behavior

To identify how well your content is meeting the needs of potential customers, monitor user behavior on your website.

Do visitors stay long enough to read the entire page, or do they leave your website entirely after just a few seconds? Are they clicking on recommended links or engaging with your content in some way?

Use what you learn from this data to revise your website content, link building strategy, and anything else that can lead to less information overload.

8. Vary Your Content Types

Not all consumers have the time to read through dozens of blog posts, articles, or web pages to find answers.

Today, different content types are meeting their needs more efficiently, including videos and podcasts.

Keep this in mind as you determine how best to reach your particular audience, and vary your content types to find what works best.

To fight information overload takes commitment on your part and that of your marketing and management team.

All of the actions mentioned above can benefit both you and your potential customers in this fight. They can also provide clues as to the value of your content and help lower the effects of information overload consumers are experiencing today.

Additional ways you as a company can fight information overload is to keep the following guidelines in mind:

• Keep content relevant to your customers.
• Think clarity for all content, making it clear as to what it is providing and for whom.
• Present less information, keeping it simple and easily understood.
• Include supporting data in a concise manner.
• Stay balanced in your presentation, so readers don’t have to look elsewhere for information.
• Include easy ways for the customer to take a preferable action.

Essentially, if you provide a potential customer with everything they need, succinctly and completely, without overwhelming them, decisions can be made, and information overload is avoided.

Wrap Up: Businesses Can Help Fight Information Overload and Its Effects

Consumers need to make decisions daily, and when too much information is available, it can be detrimental to their ability to take action on what they learn.

Even when they do act, the decisions they make may not be the most advantageous for them due to that overabundance of information.

While the causes for information overload vary, from quantity over quality thinking to the ease of access to new and expanding mediums, there are ways to alleviate the strain your potential customers are experiencing.

As a business, you can help fight this information overload in a variety of ways, including providing more interactive content to help them along their buyer’s journey.

To find out more about it and how to make it work for your business, check out this all-inclusive Interactive Content guide to help set you on the right track.

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