As has been paraphrased millions of times in myriad contexts – and the axiom applies aptly to digital marketing as much as anything – the one constant in life is change. In the ever-evolving and (we believe) advancing world of digital marketing, here are four trends we’re watching that should command some of your attention too.
Virtual/Augmented Reality is the New Digital Currency
Underscoring the monetized potential, even Forbes has postulated that Virtual and Augmented Reality will be the next truly transformative technological advancement in our lives. As marketers, then, we have to ask ourselves how we can leverage that trend to our clients’ advantage.
Social media platforms have already started to adopt VR/AR into their algorithms. Facebook and Google Cardboard offer 360-video publishing. And most notably, Snapchat offers users the ability to project their virtual self into the real world in the form of an animated, 3-D bitmoji.
Voice search is transforming SEO
We all know you can order stuff from your Alexa device. But have we really thought through the implications that carries for marketers and SEO for their brands? In many ways, we’ll eventually be moving from marketing to humans to marketing to devices themselves.
The future of search will be diametrically altered because we will need to figure out how to build applications to the devices. That will mean that organic content-writing on websites will become less valuable to consumers because the Alexa’s of the world will be accessing the web and serving it to the user without the user ever visiting your site.
The message: don’t abandon your organic content focus just yet. But start migrating your thoughts to how you improve your ranking in the voice search world that is fast upon us.
Mobile is driving, well, almost everything
This is not exactly one of the digital marketing trends as much as it is a deepening reality. We’ve been talking to our clients about mobile-first for years now. But as mobile takes on even greater importance, it creates a marketing opportunity that must be leveraged. Forbes reports more mobile traffic to mobile sites than desktop. As that consumer behavior continues to shift to mobile it demands different marketing approaches. Most compellingly, it allows you to make marketing decisions that are driven by data and not by intuition. That’s a win for agencies and clients alike.
Video content wins over all
I think we all intuitively recognize that video is the king of the digital marketing universe. Here are some numbers to back that up when you need to fight for marketing dollars to create the content needed to support a robust digital marketing strategy:
One billion hours of video are watched each day on YouTube, 100 million hours of video are being watched on Facebook every day, and Instagram, Twitter, and Snapchat generate billions of video views every day.
The sheer volume demands that marketers steer their clients to those platforms and on the medium of video. But remember this: it’s an increasingly crowded space. You can’t create video content for the sake of creating video content; you must create compelling, innovative content to stand out. That is where agencies can truly shine.
If you’re looking for a marketing firm that has the experience, insight, and capabilities to capitalize on these digital marketing trends, contact us. We’d be thrilled to help you attain your marketing goals.
Phil Loscoe is Managing Partner at RDW with a few decades of experience leading client strategies in healthcare, construction, higher ed, lottery services, and other industries. He also believes he is the world’s biggest Notre Dame football fan.