It seems like just yesterday we were talking about marketing trends to prepare for last year. 2018 flew by, and now that 2019 is around the corner, it’s time to see what has stayed that same, what has changed, and what to look out for in the coming year.
Marketing is vital to every single business, especially online companies. There are multiple ways to market your brand. You can use content, email, dynamic ads, optin popups, and more.
All of these different marketing methods can seem overwhelming at first. However, if you look at the different takeaways from the section, a clear picture comes into focus. There are certain trends that everyone should pay attention to next year if they want to be successful.
We are going to break it down for you today and show you how to ring in the new year with some of the best marketing strategies you need to know about in 2019.
Long-Form Content is In
Website content is a cornerstone for most businesses. Owners and marketers spend plenty of time thinking about the material they are going to publish and how they will share it to the world. One of the things that tend to get left on the backburner is the length of your articles.
A study has shown that long-form content is the way to go. Out of 100 million articles, ones that were over 2000 words were more likely to be shared on social media, appeared more reputable, and overall received better feedback. But why?
The simple answer is that long-form website content is usually explaining a concept or a “how to” guide — both subjects are information. If someone is specifically looking for a guide, they are more likely to find a longer guide more useful because it contains more information and solves the problem.
(Website Ranking when Compared to Word Count: https://neilpatel.com/blog/create-long-form-content/)
Long content doesn’t mean fill it up with as much filler as you can. It means you should provide detailed information to your audience — something they can sink their teeth into and enjoy. Ask questions that you think your audience would ask if they were researching your niche, and answer those questions in as much detail as you possibly can.
Gen Z is Here
People born after 1995 to mid 2000s are considered part of Generation Z. This group of young adults is quickly becoming a force to be reckoned with in the marketing world. Gen Z has about 44 billion dollars in buying power — that’s nothing to shake a stick at!
In order to reach out to this group when you’re marketing, you have to understand their habits and how they think. If you can learn this information, you’ll be opening up the door to lifelong customers. A study revealed that Gen Z is more brand loyal than any other generation before them. They have a strong connection with the businesses they frequent.
Connecting with this group involves you meeting them where they spend most of their time, which is on social media. Gen Z adults were one of the first generations to grow up with high-tech technology available to them all through their lives. They had smartphones young, connected on social media, and never stopped.
There is a connection between brand loyalty and their social media presence. They are 59 percent more likely to connect with companies they like on social media. In other words, you should start to focus your marketing on social media ads and customer interactions on messenger, because that’s what they like.
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You’re going to want to try to connect to this group as soon as possible. In a few years, their buying power is expected to increase, and they are going to become one of the most appealing groups for marketers quickly.
Voice Control is the Future
Up until recently, we always thought that people would use their keyboard to search when they need to find the answer to a question. Now with smartphones and devices like Amazon’s Echo, a swift change is coming to the marketing world.
People are now searching with their voice instead of their keyboard.
Because of this change, marketers are now open to the wild west of voice search. The most significant difference with voice search you should note is that of Search Engine Optimization keywords. Commonly, when planning for content and optimization of articles, marketers used keywords that people would type. Now, you should start considering what people will stay instead.
For example, instead of someone searching with their keyboard “Used Car Lots,” someone might instead say “Where can I buy a used car?” This shift is causing marketing to quickly push out to new content with keywords that likely to be spoken instead of typed.
Location is something that’s getting left out of this new SEO optimization. Why? Simply put, most devices have the place noted due to GPS features. Someone would typically have to type “In New York, New York” at the end of their request. Due to GPS features, there is no reason to add the location because the device already “knows.”
As we move into 2019, we are going to start seeing more devices using voice controls as more people invest in devices that allow voice search.
Conclusion
Marketing trends are always rapidly changing. We are looking forward to 2019 and seeing how these previously mentioned trends evolve and change by the end of next year.
It’s time to start making changes and small adjustments as you go. By the time the new year comes, you’ll be in an excellent position to take advantage of these trends.
If you want to be successful, you have to be willing to look ahead and see what’s coming up next. Hopefully, the following trends have helped you get an idea of what to expect when the holidays are over and the new year has set in. Best of luck!