Every year the digital marketing landscape shifts as new trends emerge that disrupt and alter it. For any business looking to stay competitive it is important to keep an eye on new trends and try to take advantage of them.
To be perfectly honest there have been many trends that have either been introduced or grown by leaps and bounds throughout 2019. However the four that have had the biggest impact are:
- Artificial Intelligence (AI)
While technically AI is not new, it is still being rapidly developed at a breakneck pace. Throughout this year there have been a growing number of ways in which AI is being used to assist digital marketing – mainly as a tool to identify trends, analyze data, and conduct more in-depth research.
Make no mistake AI is not going to replace content writers or other human roles in digital marketing – at least not yet. It can author some articles, but the results leave a lot to be desired.
The potential of AI is limitless however, and it will undoubtedly continue to be used in an increasingly diverse number of ways in years to come.
- Chatbots
In the last year chatbots have started to show up more and more frequently, and businesses deploy them as virtual assistants or concierges. As you can imagine this trend is directly related to AI, and is likely to continue to grow in the future as chatbots become more and more capable.
- Voice search
With the growing use of Siri, Cortana, Google Assistant and Alexa – voice search has become a very important digital marketing trend. Because of their popularity, it is important that all digital marketing efforts take it into account.
Simply put your content and marketing material should be optimized for speech. Ideally you should try to make sure that it sounds good when read out loud, so that it is a more natural fit for voice search.
- Live video
Over the last few years live video has exploded and has proven to be the most effective type of video to draw in large numbers of viewers. That has made it an essential part of digital marketing, and one that you can’t afford to ignore.
The key to live video is that it needs to be done right. It must take advantage of the spontaneous nature of the medium, as well as its potential to let personalities interact with viewers directly.
Keeping tabs on all these trends (as well as the many others that are out there) can be time-consuming – but it is essential. The alternative is to look at ways to outsource digital marketing Cornwall.
At the end of the day your goal should be to make sure that you are up to date on the latest trends, and try to figure out how they can be used to improve your digital marketing efforts. If you can accomplish that you’ll be able to give your business an edge over its rivals.
