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17th Snippet Sharing Session

Here are the Top 10 Trends for 2021. While you’ve probably heard about these, how many details do you really know to make each one effective? They’re all the standards for this year and into the coming decade. So, take a look at each one and see how much you really know.

1. SEO

There isn’t anything more important to digital marketing than SEO, something that might still mystify you in its ongoing complexity. While it’s true Google’s algorithms can still become confusing, you can better grasp how it works when you work more with the concept.

It’s always better to have an expert to manage SEO for you if you want to truly succeed. While you can learn some basics, you’ll want someone who’s worked in it a while to fully help you realize the best strategies.

One recent strategy involves new HTTPS requirements already impacting SEO results. If you’re used to using HTTP pages, Google now suggests you to switch to a HTTPS format. The reasoning behind this is many contact forms using HTTP pages aren’t deemed secure enough.

2. Search Engine Marketing

If you’re new to search engine marketing, you’ll usually see it abbreviated as SEM. It’s a form of Internet marketing where you increase your SERPs through paid advertising methods. This one you’ll need an expert to help you especially one who’s worked with Google Ads and search/display ads. In the case of Google Ads, you’ll want to educate yourself first on how the process works.

What you’ll appreciate the most is Google makes its Google Ads easy to use through their attention to customization. They let you choose whether you want graphic display ads, YouTube video ads, text-based search ads, or in-app mobile ads. All of these are going to depend on your business style and the targeted customers you need to reach.

 3. Local Search Marketing

There has been a lot more attention on local search marketing in recent years. To get started with local search marketing, you can again utilize more gifts from Google. Through Google My Business, you’ll be able to have your listing turn up the second someone does a Google search based on the user’s keywords. This includes your business appearing on Google Maps. Google makes it easy to update your listing as well so nothing becomes out of date. Don’t forget about how important online reviews are, as well as your social reputation. You’ll want to inspire customers to write positive reviews on places like Yelp. On social media, starting conversations and posting targeted content helps you utilize inbound marketing. Inbound techniques attract customers to you rather than you seeking them.

 4. Content Marketing

Content marketing is a big part of attracting your target audience. What’s essential about content marketing is that you need to make your content valuable, relevant, and consistent to make it worth the time of those consuming it. In today’s time, you need to focus on creating content that can solve pain points and stay evergreen.
So always keep “content is king”, as many like to put it. To make content marketing work well, you need to focus on mobile content, native advertising, influencer marketing, and marketing automation.

Think seriously about mobile content because smartphones are already making up 50% of all global devices. This is going to affect digital advertising, and how influencers promote your brand.

Automation tools send content to prospects on their mobile devices at just the right times.

 5. Remarketing

Another critical aspect of digital marketing is going after prospects again with marketing content if they didn’t respond to your site’s banner ads the first time. This works by tracking these visitors through cookies and creating new ads on related sites. You can also create new ads on your site to better target your prospects. The information you get from your site visitors gives you valuable data to tweak your ads to their pain points.

Ultimately, remarketing helps you stay more engaged with prospects, aids in brand awareness, and increases conversions. You can also gain the customers of your competitors, helping pay back any investment you place in creating new ads.

6. Responsive Web Design

The average handphone has more than 20 apps in it. Reaching customers by mobile is more or less the standard now, and that’s going to go on into the coming decade. Making your website conform to mobile screens is one of the most essential parts of digital marketing. The only way you can make this work successfully is through responsive web design.

You can make your website automatically conform to all mobile screens. Google gives precedence to websites using this, so take it seriously. It’s especially useful if you are using a blog or post content to your website on a regular basis.

7. Email Marketing

Email marketing is a great tool for generating more leads than possible through any other marketing method. You can also increase your sales and conversion rates. If you’re already suffering from overspending on other digital marketing, email marketing is one of the most affordable methods out there. In some cases, it’s free, unless using outsourced services.

Since you can combine it with other media, it’s also one of the most integrated marketing methods. You can add social share icons, plus referral reward systems. Email marketing ultimately helps you shorten your sales cycles when using compelling content.

8. Social Media Marketing

No doubt you’ve posted content to social media already and each of you may have more than one social media account. Yet, what can you do to make it more effective this year and the next? To capture today’s audiences, Forbes notes various things, including automation to post your content when you know your audience is reading. Using tools like Hootsuite for post scheduling helps immensely when reaching users in other time zones. Otherwise, just discipline yourself to post your regular staff daily at certain times. Best times to post on FB is on Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday 9 a.m.–1 p.m. The worst day is Saturday.

You’ll also want to curate some content if possible to prove your clout. Don’t be too proud to do this since it adds luster to your expertise and brand. When you curate content from others, they’ll likely reciprocate. Plus, don’t forget about using influencers to post content for you on popular social media channels.

9. Influencer marketing.

Use influencers in your digital campaigns because firstly they already have a following so your message will have an instant audience even before the core target audiences are reached. Secondly, the attention is higher with an influencer with a ‘bad copy’ than you with a ‘good copy’. That is sadly the truth because people are always attracted to people than to facts or figures. Influencer marketing is also seen as a quick-fix move as you get both visibility and credibility. However, influencer marketing is also the costliest among all strategies. So if you yourself can work your way up as an influencer, albeit in a junior way, you can save some hefty cost in employing this strategy. Influencer marketing can be in a form of endorsement or product placement (the second being cheaper) where you let the influencer being seen with your product (think of the coke on the American Idols) table.

10. Video

We’re at the point now where more consumers of content prefer video above any other visual medium. Recent statistics show 87% of all online marketers now use video content of some sort. A lot of this comes from massive viewership on places like YouTube and Tiktok. Regardless, where you post videos isn’t going to matter without compelling content.

The personalized video has become a norm lately, or at least ones directly addressing pain points of targeted viewers. The same goes with making your business look more human. Successful video marketing can mean behind-the-scenes tours of your business, or testimonials to show the human side of your brand. This means paying attention to one major trend in video marketing: Storytelling. When you can tell a compelling story about your business and prove you can solve the pain points of customers, you have a can’t-miss formula. It’s also smart to keep your videos as short as possible. Attention spans are as short as ever, and you’ll need to tell your story in a compact way with a compelling hook. 1 .5 mins is the average duration time now for a video to capture viewer attention.

 

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