If you spend any time at all on social media, you’ve no doubt seen them. Which State Do You Actually Belong In? Which Sandwich Are You? And a personal favorite, How Many Justin Biebers Could You Take In A Fight?
Online quizzes are everywhere these days. The website BuzzFeed has created the most popular and has watched traffic grow exponentially to a record 130 million visitors in November 2013. Its most widely shared quiz, “What City Should You Actually Live In?” had over 20 million views.
Beyond their popularity, however, these quizzes also have a great deal of value. Think about the way they work. The quiz Which State Do You Actually Belong In? asks respondents to select favorites €’ or the choice they most closely identify with €’ from a list of fast food chains, musicians, baby names, TV shows, actors and songs, among others.
Not only are millions of people happy to share this personal information, they actively encourage their friends and family to do the same. This is viral content that returns incredibly useful demographic information at the same time – a great combination for content marketers.
BuzzFeed says it has done nothing with the data collected from its readers. But many expect this will change. Kate Kay, a reporter for Advertising Age, told National Public Radio she believes BuzzFeed asks questions the way it does because the data will eventually be used to “inform where their ads should go and who should see their ads.”
Better targeted advertising is just one application. Travel brands could offer a quiz that helps readers find their perfect vacation destination. A beverage brand might distribute a quiz to determine a person’s perfect drink. A career site could create a quiz to help respondents discover their ideal jobs.
Or a quiz can serve as a means for marketers to find out more about their customers. They might act as a more reader-friendly way of producing a survey. Brands can create quizzesto find out how customers are using their products.
Creating an online quiz is not difficult. There are a number of tools available to do so online, and these quizzes are powerful content marketing instruments that show no sign of wearing out their welcome any time soon.
