Digital marketing trends are very much similar to the world of fashion where newer trends rule the runway every new season. But every once in a while there comes a trend that just stays around longer than expected.
Same is the digital world.
It’s already 2020 and if you are not tightening your belts to take this year seriously, then you will definitely fall back in the race of competition. While a lot of new things are expected to welcome us in the new year, there are a few marketing trends of 2019 that are expected to rule the landscape in the following year as well.
If you are currently working on your marketing campaigns and want to make them future-proof, here are a few trends that you should watch out for.
Marketing automation
There are now innumerable ways to gain insights into consumer behaviour online. But it is almost impossible to manually go through all the data and collect the required insights in order to provide customised and personalised content.
This has significantly increased the popularity of marketing automation in 2020. Going forward, marketing and technology will combine in many more ways to further boost this trend.
Also Read: Community-driven marketing: What you need to do to get it right
AR/VR
While Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality have been making a lot of noise since 2016, it was in 2018/19 that they achieved their moment of glory.
An increasing number of brands such as IKEA, Michael Kors, L’Oreal, Starbucks, Nivea, and Volkswagen are now using AR and VR ads in order to offer something unique to the customers.
As per a report by Statista, the VR and AR market size is expected to cross US$200 billion by 2022. While more businesses would like to use these technologies, the cost of AR and VR ads is a major roadblock. But as these technologies get more popular, the costs are also expected to fall in the future.
Artificial Intelligence
Artificial Intelligence or AI is nothing new in digital marketing. But it is expected that the technology will witness exponential leaps as far as its capabilities are concerned. Understanding consumer search patterns and online behaviour is now an important part of digital marketing. AI is already playing a crucial role in the process.
For instance, AI-powered chatbots are very commonly used by businesses and online platforms. In 2020, the advancements in machine learning algorithms will lead to the rise of advanced AI chatbots that could emulate consumers with far better accuracy. As per a report by Gartner, 25 per cent of the customer service jobs would be handled by chatbots and not humans by 2020.
Social messaging apps
Social messaging apps are already everywhere. You yourself might have at least a few of them such as WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, WeChat, etc. on your phone. These apps have already been around for a long time and are expected to grow in popularity in the future too.
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As more and more people are spending a lot of time on these apps, it surely makes a lot of sense to market your services and products on these platforms. With these apps, you get to directly message your potential customers. This allows personalisation and also adds a lot of value to your customer’s experience.
Video marketing
It is not wrong to say that 2019 was the year of video marketing and there seems no end in sight. Apart from YouTube, live broadcasts and video posts on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram is also growing in popularity.
A large number of brands are already using live videos for product demos, interviews, office life, behind the scene event glimpses, and whatnot.
With video resolution of smartphones consistently improving and the cost of filming equipment falling, video marketing is now one of the most effective and most affordable ways to market your brand online.
Voice search marketing
By 2020 end, around 50 per cent of the queries will be voice-based as per a report by Comscore. From smart devices such as Apple Homepod, Amazon Alexa, Microsoft Cortana, Google Home, to desktop and smartphone apps such as Google Assistant and Siri, more and more people are now conducting their searches through voice.
This can be an excellent opportunity for digital marketers as voice search marketing offers excellent capabilities and is super affordable too. Using a lot of long-tail keywords and content in more natural language are some of the ways to solve the voice search puzzle.
Micro-influencer marketing
If you are into digital marketing, you might already know how big influencer marketing has become in the last couple of years. Right from Instagram, YouTube, to Facebook, people with a lot of users are promoting several brands and the brands are witnessing considerable results, which makes it a win-win situation for both.
Also read: Is influencer marketing still relevant in 2020?
But as compared to influencers with millions of followers, micro-influencers with the smaller but dedicated following are expected to rise. In 2020, it will not be the number of followers that an influencer has but the type of relationship he/she has with the followers that will be more important.
Personalised marketing
If you are looking for ways to stand out in 2020, you can no longer skip personalising the marketing strategies. Right from your products, services, app, content, to the emails, you need to give more importance to personalising everything if you want to improve your relationship with existing customers and reach more people.
Biggest of businesses like Amazon, Netflix, etcetera are making great use of personalisation for some time now and would only increase their reliance on the same in the coming future.
Email marketing built around engagement
Even marketing through email is getting more intelligent. An increasing number of digital marketers now give more importance to subscribers who are fairly active. For instance, someone who highly engages with the emails you send should be given more importance over others in your email list.
Nurture such subscribers with personalised emails and try to keep them updated about your products, services, business happenings, etcetera until the subscriber turns into a customer. Identifying and understanding lead behaviours play a crucial role in engagement-based email marketing.
2020 is expected to be about personalisation, automation, AI, and improved customer experience. Though we are close to starting the second month of the year, you still have adequate time to learn and master the trends listed above.
Hopefully, by the end of 2020, you will turn into a much better version of yourself as far as your profession of a digital marketer is concerned and would be all set to take your business to newer heights in the following year.
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