As technology and consumer behaviour evolves, so do digital marketing trends. With a huge shift in in-person shopping, consumers now expect more personalised experiences from the comfort of their homes. Keeping up with these trends can be tough, but we’re here to help. Here are the top digital marketing trends to watch out for in 2021.
Artificial Intelligence
Artificial Intelligence continues to be a boon for digital marketing. AI can be used to analyse customer behaviour and search patterns to gain insights into consumer trends. It can also be used to provide a personalised experience to customers, like showing featured products based on their preference or sending personalised marketing emails that cater to their interests.
TopShop, a British clothing retailer, has taken AI a step ahead by coupling it with augmented reality. They use this technology to provide customers with a virtual ‘try before you buy’ experience in their stores.
Visual SEO
With so much visually consumed content online, optimising your videos and images to target keywords will be a huge boost to your page rankings. To optimise your visual content, include the target keywords in your image/video file name, use HD images and videos and don’t forget to add alt text to your image descriptions.
Companies like Google and Pinterest also allow image-based searches, where you can search based on one image to find other similar products or images. The algorithm also shows a bunch of keywords related to this image, which then lead to more pins and search results.
Chatbots
Chatbots have been thriving in the past couple of years and will continue to do so in 2021. Chatbots are software that simulates human communication via text messages. They mimic customer service executives by responding to customer queries in real-time using pre-set responses. With a chatbot, you can automate the responses to frequently asked questions by customers and keep your customer service reps available for more pressing queries.
For example, Amtrak, the passenger railroad service provider in North America, has a chatbot called Julie that answers over 5 million queries each year and can help customers book their tickets by just mentioning the destination and date of travel.
Live Streaming
Ever since the beginning of the pandemic in 2020, live streams viewings have surged greatly on platforms like Twitch, Youtube, Facebook and Instagram. Now, several brands and e-commerce platforms too have expanded to live streaming, with live shopping options.
Amazon has introduced ‘Amazon Live’, a platform that allows sellers to advertise their products on a live stream through Amazon.
Social Media ‘Stories’
When Snapchat first introduced its ‘Stories’ feature back in 2013, nobody could have predicted the revolution it would create in social media. Today, almost every social media platform has the vanishing Stories feature on their app, which leverages the ‘Feeling Of Missing Out’. This feature is designed to make consumers return to the app more often so that they don’t miss any of these time-bound stories.
Brands and companies too can utilise Instagram Stories to their advantage by sharing promotions, CTAs, behind-the-scenes, and so much more. Lululemon wonderfully used Instagram Stories to make people relate to the brand. On one particular day, one of their employees posted regular multiple stories on Lululemon’s official Instagram account during her early morning run. Not only did she sport her favourite Lululemon leggings, but she also showed her running route, the music she listened to while on the run and the things she saw and experienced while on the run.
Influencer Marketing
Unlike regular TV ads, online influencers are known to have a very niche audience that is more likely to buy a product advertised to them. Most influencers have built a basis of trust with their followers and can market products to them without any big-budget ads. The way this works is a lot similar to word-of-mouth marketing. To make influencer marketing more meaningful, choose influencers whose online personality reflect your brand values.
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