Now that we’re a good way into 2018, it’s a great time to check out what’s working and which trends look to be around for the long haul. Whichever way you look at it, the fact is that content has become the largest growth area for marketing, and that trend doesn’t look like it’s going anywhere anytime soon.
However, it’s the content itself that is evolving, and that’s where you need to be focusing your efforts. If you want to stay ahead of the marketing curve for the rest of 2018, then here are the content changes that you need to be focusing on.
The transformation of content
It’s no secret that one of the major factors that has affected marketing and the content that now drives it, is the problem of personalization. This form of one-on-one marketing is nothing new of course, but with the rise of automation and AI, personalized content is the key to your 2018 marketing strategy.
With personalized marketing increasing conversion rates by up to 20%, it’s clear that the days of generic content without targeting is a thing of the past, so your business needs to concentrate on the accumulation of data, which is the key to personalization. Build your data slowly and in a natural way, and you’ll be able to target your marketing at key individuals who can help drive your sales.
The importance of mobile
The mobile market has transformed much of the way that PR and marketing departments are expected to function, and that looks set to continue. However, while many PR experts and marketing departments are concentrating their efforts on ensuring that their websites are optimized for mobile, they aren’t making the mental leap to recognize just what mobile use has led to.
With voice searches now increasing in popularity, and up to 20 percent of current Google searches done via voice, your content itself is going to have to change. Vocal searches via mobiles or through home devices like Echo or Home have different sentence structures than typed searches, which is why you need to be thinking less about keywords and more about answering vocalized questions. With the millennial market continuing its embrace of the vocal internet, whether it’s through Google Assistant, Alexa, or Siri, this is a growing trend that looks set to dominate the marketing sector over the next few years.
Short, visual content
Social media is driving an increasing amount of traffic, and threatens to overtake search engines as the primary means of finding new markets. That’s one of the major reasons why marketers are using shorter, more visual content now, whether you opt for infographics or video.
The younger generations especially are more likely to view, like, and share your content if it is easily consumable and relevant, although the older generations are still inclined to lean more towards in-depth articles.
Expect the future of marketing to become packaged in increasingly easy-to-digest formats, with branding at the forefront of all content. That’s why so many businesses are choosing to make use of a professional creative agency able to create unique content experiences that appeal to both broad and targeted audiences. With shorter, more impactful marketing strategies that focus on brand and emotion, you are far more likely to achieve those site visits and a much deeper reach to new audiences.
The rise of content as your key marketing tool is not a new phenomenon, but that content is evolving. If you want to remain at the top of your industry, then it’s time to start focusing on content as your main marketing driver, and adjust your strategies to mirror the evolving trends of 2018.
