As we quickly approach the end of the year, now is a great time to look ahead to where we are going and the marketing trends that we are likely to see more of in 2021. The key to framing a successful marketing strategy is to anticipate and inculcate the changing dynamics in order to ensure the most relevant and effective in terms of your marketing efforts.
To craft a solid short-term plan, it's important to keep an eye on your long-term goal. No one can say with 100% certainty what the future of marketing will look like, but industry professionals can offer useful insight and forecast on some of the possibilities that may be available in the years to come.
Of course, there is no guarantee that these predictions will come true. As marketers, it's important for us to keep an eye on statistics, research, and data trends to spot opportunities. But make sure there is enough room to adapt and change your marketing strategy.
AI Based Automation
Will 2020-21 be the year of the rise of robots? Maybe (but I hope not in the Terminator-style of sci-fi movies!). We have already seen huge strides in AI over the past few years and a surge in the number of companies using AI-based technology and automation to support their marketing efforts.
AI helps take some of the hard work out of marketing so brands can focus on strategy and create a fantastic customer experience. Remember that the human side of marketing is still important, so the idea is to use this technology to improve your marketing efforts, not to replace the real people.
Big Data, supported by AI and predictive analytics, also helps brands learn more about their audience and customers. It enables the hyper-personalization of customer experiences and large-scale marketing messages. Artificial intelligence will soon be the engine of many services and, currently, we are already seeing it implemented in areas such as:
- Basic communication
- Product recommendations
- Content creation
- Personalization of emails
- E-commerce transactions
Programmatic Advertising
Programmatic advertising is all AI Based real-time buying and selling of advertising inventory through an automated auction system. It allows brands or agencies to purchase ad impressions on publisher sites or apps through a sophisticated ecosystem. Programmatic advertising includes ad space for digital out-of-home (DOOH), online, streaming, TV, video and voice advertising.
It's changing the face of digital advertising so quickly that, according to eMarketer, 86.2% of digital ads in the United States will be programmatic by 2020.
Chatbots Will Dominate Customer Service
Chatbots is artificial intelligence (AI) software that can simulate a conversation (or chat) with a user in natural language through messaging apps, websites, mobile apps, or over the phone. Chatbots interact with humans in a fairly natural way, primarily through the use of text chat windows, but verbal interactions are also possible. Over time, as the system collects more information about the data, the AI learns more about the customers, which results in ever-improving service.
Throughout 2018 and 2019, chatbots have carved out a regular role on Facebook, by the tens of thousands, for different tasks. Everything from providing weather reports to automating some basic customer support functions can be easily handled by sophisticated software. Bots allow users to achieve personalized and targeted interactions without taking too much advantage of limited human resources.
80% of businesses say they want to start using chatbots this year. When you consider the benefits, it's easy to see why:
- 24 hour service
- Instant responses to customer queries
- No need to worry about breaks, vacations or overtime
Visual Content
With the explosion of smart speakers and voice search in recent years, you'd be forgiven for thinking that “readable” content is more important than visuals and design these days. In fact, it couldn't be further from the truth. While the advancements in voice search are certainly influencing how we will create content now and in the future, you shouldn't neglect visual content either.
Research has shown that people prefer visual content over plain text. Visuals are also easier to remember than written content. Adding data visualizations, infographics, images, and videos to your text not only makes it more interesting and engaging, but can also help your post be better absorbed.
An important Strategy - Good content
Content marketing strategy is an important part of digital marketing, although there is an increasing emphasis on nuance of content. Quality will always matter, but now the focus is more on context and targeting. Google is developing a deeper and more sophisticated understanding of online content, so marketers need to think carefully about their target market and how they can tailor content more precisely in 2020.
Much of it comes down to the BERT update, released to Google in November 2019. The new algorithm helps the search engine giant better understand natural language in users' search queries. Google is getting smarter and prioritizing current content that is deep, precise, and tightly aligned with user intent. Businesses should keep this in mind when creating new content in 2020-21.
Personalized Email
Email remains a major medium, with billions still using it for personal, business, industrial, legal, scientific, and academic purposes. However, email marketing is evolving and generic marketing emails are no longer as effective as they once were. Now it's a combination of automation and, more importantly, personalization that makes email marketing important for 2020.
When you can trigger your email marketing on something specific like a user browsing a particular product and then follow up with a promotional price or demo video in a personalized email it can be very effective. Email is often the last trigger to motivate action, especially when paired with your remarketing techniques.
Voice Search
Voice search shows no signs of slowing down and will continue to be a major influence on how brands create content and market themselves online. We're not quite at the commonly cited prediction that 50% of searches will be voice-driven in 2020, but that statistic is probably not that far down the road. The smart speaker industry is booming, with households now owning a Google Home, Amazon Echo, or other smart speaker.
Consumers also expect to use voice search more in the near future - 61% of people aged 25 to 64 who already use a voice device plan to use it more in the future, study finds by PwC.
Omnichannel Marketing is Vital
Omnichannel marketing is the practice of marketing across multiple platforms including email, apps, social media, and your website's blog. This approach allows businesses to connect with customers on more digital touchpoints, providing a better user experience.
By delivering a consistent, seamless voice and cohesive branding message across all channels, you can drive much better results. Omnichannel marketing generates more than 3 times engagement than a single channel approach. Best of all, customer retention, average order value, and purchase frequency are all higher when you have multiple channels.
Live Videos
The live video industry is expected to be worth more than $ 70 billion by 2021. Live video is incredibly popular with consumers, and people spend three times as much time watching live video as they do. watch pre-recorded videos.
Live video is good for grabbing the attention of your social audience on Facebook or Instagram. These types of videos are so appealing to viewers because they either exploit "FOMO" or are afraid to miss it. When you're not sure that a live video will contain information that you can't get anywhere else, or that it means you're the first to find new and exciting news, you're going to want to watch it.
Social Commerce & Shoppable Posts
With e-commerce and social media both growing at alarming rates, it's no wonder that brands are using the two together to maximize sales opportunities.
In March 2019, Instagram unveiled Instagram Checkout, which allows users to complete their purchase from Instagram: Social Media is an integral part of digital marketing, and visual platforms like Instagram are gold for marketers. Better yet, visual commerce is taking off as more and more consumers are ready to purchase products through the ads they see in their feeds.
Final thoughts
Anticipating and Adopting the new marketing trends before your competitors is highly recommended in today’s cutthroat competition. A firm’s marketing wing should be highly adaptive and agile leveraging the benefits of changing trends in their favor. Technology is transforming the marketing process and hence aligning to changing technology is a proven successful strategy for businesses.
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