Digital marketing captures the audience attention with powerful messages through various channels. In 2019, the method of delivery and the channels are improvised and new channels are added. Search engine optimization, pay-per-click, search advertising and social media continue to be channel-led from which people consume content. Here are the digital marketing trends for the year 2019 that need to be applied to business that is looking to scale up to the next level.
1. Artificial intelligence
As the benefits of using AI come to light, more companies have started using artificial intelligence.
The biggest growth benefits of AI are,
- Improve customer experience
- Locate factors that can improve existing products and services
- Provide new revenue streams
- Increase customer lifetime value
AI can analyze data to understand patterns and provides insights. For example, if you are working with educational institutions, you can use AI to analyze past and current enrollments of those institutions. What AI does is, scans through the data and provides insights on what zip codes and neighborhoods should be targeted to increase the number of enrollments. You could also scan for other patterns such as, common attributes of parents that have enrolled their children. Such reports would help understand the market segments; geographical locations that can be further targeted proving to be quick lead closures.
AI can help in several ways, such as customer segmentation, push notification, retargeting and click tracking. The possibilities of using it are limitless.
2. Chatbots
Human beings like to be greeted on the meeting. What best way to greet a visitor on your website than chatbot? It is easy and cost-effective. You can program the conversations that your chatbot will have with different segments of visitors – first-time visitors, new customer, a prospective customer who might want to probe more on the services before reaching out in person, or any other.
Websites offering live chat experience long wait time and chatbot is the solution to it. Earlier, it was plain text that can be used by bots. But now with advancement in technology, a personalized conversation is made possible by a chatbot. appropriate smileys can also be inserted to make the chat lively.
Benefits of chatbots include,
- 24-hour service
- Instantly attend a customer eliminating wait time
- Answer simple questions
- Resolve complaints quickly
- Easy communication
- Good customer experience
- Automated tasks performed faster than a human can
- Reduce customer service cost You can even customize the conversational content of your bot based on the web page the visitor is on. For instance, if the visitor is on a page that explains how to book a flight ticket, the chatbot will help make the booking. If the visitor is attempting to use a tax calculator on your website and is unable to find what he’s looking for, the chatbot will direct him to the relevant webpage that has more information on it. or book a consultation appointment at your company.
Voice search
Voice search has been popular with people on the move and it is becoming increasingly popular with people as it is faster than typing on a search engine. Annual spending by voice shoppers today is $300 in the U.S. Smart speakers like Amazon Echo, Google Assistant and Apple Home pod are becoming popular household items. 39 million Americans currently own a smart speaker. Since it is impossible to ignore such huge numbers, businesses are optimizing their websites for voice search.
To optimize your website for voice search, you need to note the following:
- Voice searches are conversational:
People talk to the smart speaker when they are using a voice search. So it is important to make your website content conversational.
- Optimize content for long-tail keywords:
Since voice search is always longer than a typed search, it becomes important to optimize your website content for long-tail keywords.
Live video
The video is at the top of content marketing and it’s a better connect when it’s live. Since the video has been on top of the game, there is a lot of video content out there. To make it work for your company, it’s important to create a robust content strategy. The best way to do this is to put yourself in your customer’s shoes and think upon the kinds of videos you would want to watch. Based on the products and services you provide, would it be behind-the-scenes tours, events, seminars, product demos, live Q&A, product launch, etc. anything that is useful, fun and helpful would resonate with your customers and help you build a connect with them that goes beyond customer relations.
If you are just starting out, it’s best to focus on the platforms where space is less crowded – Instagram and YouTube Live. Later, as your audience grows you could pick the platform you want to focus on. It could be YouTube Live, Facebook Live, Instagram Live, Periscope or Livestream.com.
People relate to people and their stories. Your live videos can demonstrate how your team is carrying out the goal and vision of your company through the years. A video is just the starting point to grab the attention of the larger audience. Once you have their attention, you could leverage it across other platforms and use other forms of content like blogs, social media, audio, infographics and white papers.
Influencer marketing
YouTube stars, journalists, celebrities and well-known bloggers can help spread a word about your business to a larger market. Word-of-mouth has worked better than traditional methods of marketing as people tend to be influenced by the people they know and admire. In case your focus is local influencer marketing, you could partner with local influencers for long-term campaigns. You could check YouTube, Snapchat, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and podcasts to make a list of top influencers locally. After following them and learning more about them, you could reach out to them to have a conversation. If the cord strikes well and the influencer catches well with what you are looking for in a person to endorse your brand, your promotions will work out successfully.
In case you have been working on this already and want to try something different, tapping into micro-influencers is a great marketing strategy. Micro-influencers can be real consumers of your products. People tend to trust consumer opinions over the celebrities they don’t know personally.
Omni-channel marketing
Omni-channel marketing is a step-up from multi-channel marketing. Multi-channels worked better than a single channel as prospects could communicate with businesses through multiple channels. Say, Facebook ads, Twitter, Instagram, Google AdWords or by stepping into your brick-and-mortar store. A website visitor can communicate through comments or chat and e-mail subscribers receive all the information via e-mail and can communicate through the same channel. Still, it did not solve customers’ problems.
Omni-channel works by connecting your business to your customer in multiple ways as a cycle.
For example, if you are interacting with a customer for the first time on Facebook, it continues through your SEO rankings and the next step of communication would be via e-mail. Later when the customer has more questions on your e-mail or would like to purchase your product/service, you get the prospect on phone and convert the lead. Hence, multiple channels of communication are involved and work in continuation of the previous conversation on another channel.
Virtual Reality
Virtual reality or augmented reality is soon catching up in the market. It’s well received by the customers as they can test if your product would work for them before actually buying it.
What virtual reality essentially does is, creates a completely new environment for an individual to experience and helps them decide if that is what they want. It can be used in games, businesses and marketing.