Leveraging the current digital marketing trends is essential to your company’s growth and success. From artificially intelligent chatbots to social video ads, the digital marketing trends for 2018 are huge opportunities for business growth and expansion.
How important is digital marketing to your 2018 success? Well, marketers and businesses are investing more in digital solutions, with an estimated investment of $113 billion dollars dedicated to them in the U.S. by 2020.
However, choosing the right digital marketing strategy for your business can prove challenging. With so many trends being tossed around online, it can be difficult to pin down the one in which to invest your marketing dollars.
Luckily, we did a bit of research to help get you started. Let’s take a look at the digital marketing trends you should implement in 2018.
1. Make Your 2018 Digital Marketing Campaign About Videos
The traditional text ad with image is simply not going to cut it in 2018. To spark success this New Year, think video marketing. Videos are a creative way to raise awareness about new products and services and churn customers down the buying funnel, and they’re cost effective.
Over 50 percent of marketers used the engagement power of videos via YouTube in 2017, and this trend will continue. Not only is YouTube the second largest search engine in the world, it also can appear on Google search results.
You can also leverage your videos on social media by using Facebook Live Ads. In fact, over 70 percent of marketers are integrating video ads into their social media marketing strategy. Video was a key point of discussion for many posts about SEO trends for 2018.
2. Get Personal with Your Audience
One of the biggest trends of 2018 will be personalized marketing initiatives. Consumers no longer want the one-size-fits-all ads. They want rich, meaningful experiences that make them feel special. If your marketing messages are not personalized, 2018 is a good time to start.
How important are personalized marketing messages? A study conducted by BCG found that 66 percent of companies estimate a six percent boost to revenue from them. If you are in the tech industry, you can expect a 10 percent increase in personalization profits.
A few ways to personalize your digital marketing in 2018 include:
- Segmented marketing gets personal. To personalize your marketing message, you’ll need to develop buyer groups based on past engagements and purchases with your company.
- Personalize email marketing. Instead of sending your marketing emails from your brand or business, send them from an actual person, like your marketing guru.
- Retarget ads in a personal way. You can use all those 2017 analytics and offer deals and promotions to buyers based on abandon carts, past purchases, and product queries.
3. Put AI Chatbots to Work for Digital Success
Innovation is amazing, and it almost always spills over into the marketing industry. AI chatbots are innovative marketing machines that can have serious ROI for your business in 2018.
Artificially intelligent bots are effective at learning about your customers and engaging with them in a meaningful way. They also don’t require a monthly paycheck. In fact, 80 percent of companies plan on having a bot on the payroll by 2020.
Branded chatbots can upsell products and services, process payments, and direct people to take actions, like leave app reviews to boost your company’s online visibility.
Online platforms like ChattyPeople and Botsify are useful for businesses that want simple bots to help make their 2018 an artificially intelligent year.
4. Use Dark Social Media Digital Marketing Tactics
This is less mysterious and frightening as it sounds. Dark social is going to be a big digital marketing trend in 2018, and don’t let it be something you shy away from.
Dark social is simply the online social channels that are less monitored, like WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, emails, and native mobile apps. You have probably used one of the listed dark social mediums, and so has most of the world.
In fact, dark social accounts for 84 percent of all outbound social sharing. By combining AI chatbots with dark social, you get a digital marketing perfect storm. You can request an Uber, order pizza, transfer money, and even get a home loan, all from dark social channels.
It is vital to your company’s growth and success to stay in tune to digital marketing trends . They’re ever changing, and 2018 is a hallmark year for some of the most innovative game-changing trends in decades. How will you make the most of your digital marketing efforts this year?
