The Best Digital Marketing Trends for 2021 | BairesDev
One of the most challenging aspects of being in modern business is marketing. Long gone are the “Mad Men” days of hiring a marketing firm that could employ the tried and true techniques they’d been using for years. Drawing up a marketing campaign designed specifically for print, TV, and radio and blasting it to the networks and publishers to later sit back, and enjoy the rewards doesn’t work that anymore.
In fact, the very idea of marketing sends chills up and down the spine of most business professionals, even those actually in the business of marketing. Why? Because everything has changed. Thanks to social media, a dwindling attention span of the public, and binge-watching, the marketing tactics of yesteryear simply do not work.
And so, every business is desperate to know what to do, in order to get their product or service in the eyes of the public. If that sounds like you, sit back and read on because we’re going to talk about the digital market trends you should know about for 2021.
Social networking still reigns
Social networking isn’t going anywhere. In fact, look for social networking (such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram) to keep monopolizing the attention of most consumers in the coming few years. In fact, according to MarketingCharts, social media made up 13% of marketing budgets for 2020. Expect that to rise in the coming year.
It’s funny because, no matter how many times the masses want to boycott one or more of these services, they remain on them as though their lives depend on it.
So your business must fully embrace social networking. If you do not have a Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram account for your business, get one and start promoting what you offer. But remember, just blasting your social networking followers with “Buy our product” or “Try our service” will get you nowhere. You must engage with your audience. The key to social networking is building relationships, not one-off transactions.
You could also create a bot that could serve as the first point of contact on your social networking account. For this, you’ll probably need a quality Python engineer on staff.
Importance of product availability
The COVID19 pandemic has caused shortages of products and services across the board. Unfortunately, we can expect some of the issues to carry on during the upcoming year. That’s why one of the biggest advantages you could give yourself in 2021 is the ability to effectively communicate to your current and prospective customers that you have product stock on hand.
To do this, you’ll need an effective communication strategy, which could include social networking, mailing lists, and SMS messages. Of course, to really make this effective, you might want to employ some form of automation into your delivery pipeline. To begin building automation into that process, you’ll want to include languages like Java and Python.
No matter how you deliver the word to the masses, the most important aspect is to make it timely and regular. Know, in advance, when you’ll have products in stock, and give your customers ample time to order.
Given the current state of the world, any company that can keep their customers and clients aware of product availability will have a major edge in marketing.
Semantic search
Semantic search refers to the ability of search engines to consider the intent of a search phrase when serving up content to users. In other words, search engines don’t just consider the string typed into a field as though it exists in a vacuum. Because search engine algorithms are far more sophisticated than they once were, it is now possible for them to consider the contextual meaning of a search. Semantic search is guided by two principles: the intent of the user and the semantic meaning of the phrase being searched.
One factor driving semantic search is voice searches. Users are more likely to ask Siri or the Google Assistant to help them search the web. Because of this, users are more apt to search for regular phrases and not just keywords. On top of that, the intent of the phrase will be as important as the phrase itself.
Because of this, your company might have to adjust your SEO to make use of topics instead of keywords and match content to search intent. As well, you’ll need to start using related keywords and structured data in your content.
Real-time marketing
Simply put, real-time marketing is marketing done on the fly. This type of marketing is very much based on up-to-date events, using data that is reported instantaneously. By making use of this data, marketing experts are able to make decisions based on current trends and what is happening in the moment.
This style of marketing is challenging because it requires you to have access to real-time data of trends. The biggest benefit of real-time marketing is that it allows your business to connect customers to products or services they need in the moment.
This style of marketing will become incredibly important in the coming year because trends are evolving faster and faster as technology is capable of delivering at a higher rate and consumers are able to take in information faster and from more sources. If you’re not using real-time marketing in 2021, chances are pretty good your marketing strategies will be behind the curve.
Personification is somewhat confusing and, to many, might seem counter to everything marketing departments understand their jobs to be.
This marketing strategy is defined as targeting digital experiences to individuals that are based on an inferred membership in a characteristic segment instead of individual identity. In other words, it’s almost like marketing to a clique and not a person.
Once you understand how this style of marketing works, it starts to make sense. Why? It’s become quite clear, thanks to social media, that people tend toward groups of people who hold similar beliefs, share similar interests, or have related ideological beliefs. And because the average consumer prefers to follow and not lead, marketing toward a segment (and not an individual) makes perfect sense.
The idea of the persona, where a data-driven segment of consumers has been stripped of their personally identifiable information. They become a persona and not a person. Personification serves as a bridge between one-on-one marketing and broad-brush branding and it’s already setting up to be a big thing in the years to come.
This is just the tip of the iceberg for future-proofing your marketing. But if you’re serious about improving your company’s visibility in the coming year, you’ll take these ideas very seriously. Give them some thought and give them a try, and see if your business doesn’t benefit in 2021.
This content was originally published here.
