Top digital marketing trends for 2021
Digital marketing has made rapid inroads during the pandemic with businesses leveraging AI to bring in greater personalisation and tools such as video advertising, voice search and Google ads to retain competitive advantage.
The year 2020 has seen brands, and the marketers stumbling to survive the unpredictable events that have been unfolding. Digital marketing has become a boon for companies despite these uncertain times. While the digital age had already started changing lives across industries and various verticals, the current year mainly saw it grow exponentially.
For businesses that had to be forced to close shops and operations, digital marketing was the go-to alternative to stay on top of the customer's minds.
COVID era has changed the way businesses used to function and has shaped a new marketing framework for them. As we advance, digital marketing will be considered by many more businesses to retain current customers, generate more revenue, and result in a quantum increase in sales.
Listed below are a few trends that the industry would foresee in the coming year. Check them out.
Artificial Intelligence trend
AI is being implemented in all different ways across various business processes and marketing. One can use it to improve communications, analyse the available data, track operations, and predict customer behaviour patterns, thus helping in reducing manual work. AI can majorly be used for improved customer satisfaction as it can help in easily reading what the customers expect.
With advanced software development, AI has become more accessible to businesses, making itself a very valuable tool for marketers. It also influences the customer's choice by giving relevant recommendations as per the taste and preferences.
It helps in growing the brand by meeting the customer's expectations.
Google verified listing for local SEO
For local businesses like plumbers, tailors, mechanics, etc., the best way to have a digital presence is to have a presence on Google My Business (GMB) profile. This will also give the geographical location to the users searching. Verifying Google listing and keeping it up to date is necessary.
GMB profile will ensure a better chance to make it to the top search results on Google. It also helps in responding to the queries on the business, feedback, etc., which makes it easy for a customer to opt for the service.
Using video advertising
App developers are now updating their features to a level to create customer loyalty and reducing the shift between various applications. A few such examples are Instagram reels and LinkedIn story. App companies promote such features on their own to get the users hooked on it, making it the right option for marketers to showcase their product/service.
Aside from being informative and engaging, they also convey large chunks of information in a short time. Thus, video advertising helps in explaining the product or service in a better than any other ad format, thereby leaving a greater recall value.
Voice search
With rapid technological advances like Google Home and Alexa disrupting the innovation space, they have created a boom for voice search. The voice search queries need to be optimised. While choosing the content and keywords, ensure to choose the keywords based on what the users would ask Google, Alexa, or Siri.
Voice search optimisation gives a rare opportunity for businesses to level the tech-game. Optimising features like using natural-sounding language, forming queries into question phrases, targeting long-tail keywords, having a mobile-friendly website will ensure easy usage of voice search for customers.
Google ads – automated and smart bidding strategies
Automated bidding strategies allows Google to analyse large amounts of data, and adjusts bids in real-time. This strategy helps in maximising the results based on campaign goals. The first step in an automated bidding strategy is choosing the right strategy as per the business model. Automated bidding is available for both search and display ads based on the bidding strategy chosen.
Smart bidding is also associated with automated bidding. It includes mostly conversion-based strategies. Some strategies include: maximising clicks, maximising conversions, enhanced PPC, etc. It provides auction-time bidding which helps in optimising conversions.
Summing it up
So, there you have it – a few of the digital marketing trends you cannot ignore in 2021.
As they say, change is the real constant. You have to keep looking ahead and strive to embrace new technologies, tools, and methods to stay ahead of your competitors.
(Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of YourStory.)