Here are some key digital marketing trends to be aware of this year.
#1: Content marketing continues to take the lead
- Entertaining, informative, relevant content is a top-3 reason people follow brands on social media.
- Think blogging and article writing only work for B2C? Nope—B2B companies with blogs generate 67% more leads per month on average than companies without a blog presence.
Source: inboundwriter.com, Oct. 2014
#2: In an ocean of content, quality is your life vest
- With charts and graphs proving content is king, expect more of it and expect a lot of it to be bad. Eventually, the cliché will change to “quality content is king.”
- Search engines like Google continue to refine their “popularity algorithms” to ensure only the best of the best content makes it to the coveted first page.
Source: 9to5google.com, May 2014
#3: The story is as powerful as it is ancient, and nothing tells it better online than a video
- Salesforce recently added an “Explainer Video” to their website and increased conversions by 20%!
- High-quality videos can increase online shopping cart sizes by an impressive 174%!
Source: conversionxl.com, Sept. 2014
#4: If you’re going to do it, do it SMALL
- Social media sites and other channels allow marketers to easily target narrow niche audiences and demographics. When done smartly, businesses average twice the return.
- In 2015, the number of specific target audiences is projected to increase and their size will decrease.
Source: Aberdeen.com, Aug. 2014
See our related article, Define Your Target Audience for Effective Branding
#5: It’s not the strong who will survive, but the responsive—the mobile responsive
- Morgan Stanley’s analysts believe the mobile web will be bigger than desktop internet use in 2015.
- Mobile advertising spend is currently growing 7 times faster than desktop advertising. All marketers have the mobile audience in mind.
Source: techcrunch.com, July 2014
See our related article, What is a Responsive Website Design and Why You Need It
Special thanks to Jeff Johnson, founder and president of the National Association for Small Business Digital Marketing, for hosting a great Orlando Summit this past February. It served as both inspiration and reference for this article.
