In 2018, marketers face the challenge of continuously improving existing solutions and discovering new, effective tools and strategies to reach their target audience even more effectively, collaborate with them, and build engagement.
Generation Z and Generation Y - millennials, who are the most active consumers, are using traditional media less and less; for years, a strong tendency has been noticeable of moving everyday activities into the digital sphere.
The growing importance of online shopping, the availability of mobile transactions, and finally the change in lifestyle thanks to increasing activity in social media have forever changed the face of marketers' work. Although the most effective forms of promotion so far, such as advertising campaigns in traditional media, SEM campaigns, content marketing, or promoting sponsored posts in social media, are not losing importance, these traditional solutions may no longer be enough.
How can you outpace the competition and achieve your goals more efficiently in 2018? We present 11 trends in digital marketing that will shape the face of global marketing in the coming years:
Micro-influencers instead of big stars
Nothing builds trust in a brand and creates greater desire for its products like the face of a celebrity - this is the belief that big and smaller brands have operated on until now. The past year was full of various, at times grotesque, collaborations between brands and famous people. Indeed, one cannot deny the effectiveness of such a strategy. Some of the top influencers, such as the Kardashian sisters, actors, and well-known athletes, have gigantic reach in social media and are role models for their fans thanks to the popularity they have gained.
However, a brand's collaboration with a star can turn out to be a gigantic trap and bring disastrous results - you can never be sure whether a star's popularity-based authority will diminish as a result of a scandal or a fratricidal war on Twitter. Some of the big influencers and their space in social media increasingly resemble paid advertising spaces. They undertake so many collaborations with brands that their fans lose track of which products they should buy.
That is why in 2018 it is worth betting on micro-influencers! Although they have a much smaller fan reach, they can boast much greater effectiveness thanks to authenticity built among a narrow but devoted group of recipients. A brand's collaboration with a micro-influencer not only seems more authentic, but can also turn out to be a great investment for both sides, building an active community around the product.
Video content on user demand
Quite recently, Coca-Cola released a campaign that changed the way video marketing is perceived, thereby proving that 'content is still the king'. What will change is the form of the content. Coca-Cola's campaign is a micro-series shot from the perspective of social media, which users can watch thanks to the producer's special app.
Why go to such lengths? The answer is simple - video on demand is a clever way to build attachment to the brand and to build impressive conversion! The target group is up to 85% more interested in buying a product after watching a dedicated video.
[easy-tweet tweet="The target group is up to 85% more interested in buying a product after watching a dedicated video."]
The previous year was the year of live streaming in social media - now it is time to go a step further and share video content not in real time, but on user demand. Research shows that as many as 85% of videos on Facebook are viewed by users in silent mode.
Time for mobile-first content
We use phones at every moment of our lives. The mobile device segment (i.e. mobile), such as tablets and smartphones, is more important than personal computers. Often, the first thing we reach for after waking up is not the proverbial glass of water or a cigarette, but a smartphone. We use them while standing in traffic or using the toilet. They provide an escape during a boring meeting and while waiting for something, unlike personal computers, whose role is work and, to a lesser extent, entertainment.
That is why in 2018 digital content should stop being merely "adapted to mobile devices" - it is time to start creating content primarily for mobile devices.
Competition is not sleeping, and the younger generation entering the market is very demanding. Consumer expectations toward brands and their ways of satisfying needs are constantly growing. Once, to pamper a customer, it was enough to organize a large promotional campaign. Currently, a seasonal price reduction alone seems insufficient - the customer needs to build a good experience with the brand in order not only to remain loyal, but to become interested in using its services/products at all.
[easy-tweet tweet="The customer needs to build a good experience with the brand in order not only to remain loyal, but to become interested in using its services/products at all."]
This is perfectly illustrated especially by Polish consumers' interest in such additional benefits as free shipping of goods, the possibility of obtaining help and exhaustive information about the product, and free service services.
Year by year, the importance of AI - artificial intelligence - and communication solutions such as chatbots is growing. In the digital sphere, it is chatbots that will build a positive customer experience for the customer and provide essential information about their expectations.
Increasingly effective algorithms make it possible to create learning software that communicates with the user as if they were talking to another human. Investment in chatbots will pay off very quickly - Gartner research shows that they can generate as much as 20% of a brand's content! Above all, they improve the process of communication with the customer. A chatbot does not need to sleep, eat, or use the toilet. It has no bad mood - it will always behave toward the customer as it was programmed to do, and it can conduct many conversations at once. Moreover, a chatbot will be able to make strategic decisions, analyze data and collect it into dedicated segments, may have access to contact history, and thanks to that better personalize communication and easily switch from automatic mode to contact with a real consultant.
[easy-tweet tweet="A chatbot will be able to make strategic decisions, analyze data and collect it into dedicated segments. "]
Thanks to the ability to delegate the program to routine customer service tasks, a company can better use the creative potential of its employees and their experience.
You do not know what Programmatic is? Quickly catch up by reading our article here. The trend is still decisive, because fast and automated purchase of advertising space optimizes the marketing campaign and allows reaching the user at every stage of interest in the product!
[easy-tweet tweet="Programmatic Marketing - Fast and automated purchase of advertising space optimizes the marketing campaign and allows reaching the user at every stage of interest in the product"]
Traditional advertising messages often "missed" the customer. As a result, the number of generated campaign impressions did not translate into results. In this way, not only the potential of the advertising message was wasted, but also the budgets allocated to advertising in digital channels. A change in running online campaigns was brought by the ability to direct the advertising message directly to the advertiser's target group.
A real revolution was brought several years ago by RTB (automated model of purchasing advertising space). This model assumes an auction-based process of buying places where previously prepared advertising is presented. It is the price offered at auction by the advertiser that determines which content will be displayed to the user.
2018 does not bring good news for those who invest a significant part of their company's marketing budget in Google campaigns and other formats on websites. Google is currently testing a solution that "mutes" videos placed in this way, and users are increasingly installing Ad-block type software.
However, we still have Facebook and Instagram, which know their audiences much better and have prepared solutions supporting integration with online stores and the sale of products on them. Every year we observe changes in the reach of traditional TVP, TVN, POLSAT channels in favor of paid video platforms such as Netflix or Showmax.
It is possible that it is precisely in these channels that new solutions will appear in which brands will be able to smuggle user-tailored personalized advertising content, consistent with the user's interests, retargeting them to the brand's home page.
[easy-tweet tweet="Netflix - will brands be able to smuggle user-tailored advertising content, consistent with the user's interests?"]
Blockchain has so far been mainly associated with cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin. Every now and then someone finds new, interesting uses for this technology. What is blockchain in short? It is a system of sharing information that prevents freely sharing it in an illegal way. Users can store information and distribute it, but they cannot copy its content, as is the case, for example, in downloading torrent-type files. Thanks to this, an intermediary in the exchange of information ceases to matter - because it ceases to be part of the transaction!
What does this mean for marketers? Blockchain means significant savings in the marketing budget! Until now, a significant part of it was allocated to paying expensive intermediaries, content providers to the target group such as Google or Facebook, and transaction intermediaries such as banks or payment service systems. Thanks to blockchain technology, their share will decrease year by year, and the message reaches the user directly, bypassing them.
[easy-tweet tweet="Blockchain means significant savings in the marketing budget"]
How to apply, implement, and use blockchain technology in marketing? You will learn at our conference!
Marketing department heads are being required year by year to have stronger digital competencies; they are the link between the organization and customers, and the future of companies may depend on their competencies. If they can cooperate with individual departments within companies and together with them create services and products for future generations, they will protect the organization from falling into stagnation and losing importance in the category.
That is why outstanding Chief Marketing Officers (CMOs) are already developing and educating themselves in areas that were still unknown a few years ago; this year will certainly be another in which marketing departments will undergo a real revolution. To adapt to upcoming changes and be effective, marketing managers must leave their comfort zone.
A good CMO must learn how to effectively use many areas of their activities. Marketing goes far beyond promotion - now, to manage marketing, you must simultaneously be a visionary, trendsetter, analyst, theorist, and practitioner in one, who is also familiar with digital issues.
Why? If you do not understand the changes, you will not be able to meet them. If you do not understand the solutions you implement, they will be ineffective. That is why a good solution is the 70 / 20 / 10 strategy, which you should convince the board to adopt and introduce into planning activities for each year. What is it about? It is about allocating 70% - of the budget and activities to proven solutions, 20% - of the budget and activities to new solutions, and 10% - as trendsetters to innovative solutions in order to learn them and be able to use them better in subsequent years.
And all this because of...
All elements of the marketing strategy must not only form a coherent, mutually complementary whole, but also reach the user with what they need, when they need it.
[easy-tweet tweet="A marketing message must reach the user with what they need, when they need it."]
How to perform this miracle? The goal is to integrate the purchasing cycle with the functioning cycle of the user from a given segment. Do you sell clothing and gadgets for runners? Your customer probably gets up early in the morning to run. Before leaving the house and turning on their favorite sports app, they will probably check Facebook or read a few articles. During this time, your ad can start being displayed to them, educating and suggesting the purchase of a new product, solution, or service. When they set off for work, they will familiarize themselves with the details, watch an influencer's video reviewing the product, and in the evening, after returning home, they can be reminded and sent a personalized offer with a coupon to encourage them to make a purchase decision.
What integrating marketing activities with the customer lifecycle means is creating and managing marketing communication in such a way as to support the consumer on their path from interest in the product to its purchase, making it as easy as possible, through the use of targeting and re-targeting campaigns and all other activities that are nothing other than the proven AIDA principle: A-Attention, I-Interest, D-Desire, A-Action, and the final S for Satisfaction!
Women are still a growing group of recipients of marketing messages. Their purchasing power in the market is growing more and more every year - not only in the segment of products dedicated to women. Because, as research shows, it is women who ultimately make most purchasing decisions in relationships and households! It is wives and partners who choose the car model, the location of a new apartment or house, the TV model, not limiting themselves to the traditional sphere of their influence.
[easy-tweet tweet="The need to create dedicated messaging for women remains a strong trend in marketing "]
Women value individualized messaging not of emotions, but of important product information. They value completely different features in a product than men, rationalizing their decisions. The need to create dedicated messaging for this group remains a strong trend for the coming years.
In the era of fake news, hacker attacks, and growing cybercrime, GDPR - the personal data protection reform, the implementation of marketing strategies is exposed to attacks by ordinary trolls and unfair competition - especially in the digital area. Can you imagine how great the losses could be from a successful attempt to sabotage a marketing campaign promoting a product just entering the market?
Fortunately, Polish and international tools already exist that are able to support you in this fight.
If you want to learn more, I invite you to the conference, DIGITAL MARKETING TRENDS 2018, where we discuss the above trends in more detail.
We invite you to the website of the conference in the Marketingsummit.eu series - DIGITAL MARKETING TRENDS 2018, which will take place on March 20 in Warsaw; learn the details, schedule, and list of speakers.
Summary
The year 2018 requires marketers to have courage in testing new solutions. Key trends include betting on authentic micro-influencers instead of stars, creating video content on demand (85% of recipients buy more willingly after watching material), and moving from mobile-friendly to mobile-first. Chatbots will take over routine customer service, and blockchain - by eliminating intermediaries - will lower campaign costs. It is also worth remembering the purchasing power of women, who make most purchasing decisions in households, and about integrating messaging with the entire customer lifecycle, for example according to the AIDA principle. Success will be achieved by those who balance their budget in the 70/20/10 model.
