How 2018 Will Change Your Marketing Strategy
Remember the days of a “family computer”? Where did yours sit? The kitchen, your bedroom…or did your family have a computer room? By the mid-to-late aughts, most of us had wireless Internet in our household. This made it so that Mom or Dad could answer emails on the couch or the kids could pretend to do homework in their room as they watched the early days of YouTube unfold.
But then the iPhone came along; we downloaded apps, everyone signed up for Facebook and everything changed.
There’s little question that our mobile devices are becoming symbiotic to our lives. As we inch into 2018, we’re going to use our laptops–for non-work-related reasons–less and less. The majority of our online actions are done through a mobile device.
Who Runs the World? Girls. (Also: Facebook and Instagram)
While it feels like a lot of people say they like to avoid Facebook because of Uncle Tony’s political posts, the data shows that Facebook has never been more popular and it just crossed 2 billion monthly users. Also, Facebook’s relatively new acquisition, Instagram is seeing record numbers.
What does that mean? Ads. A lot of them, and they’ll be more tailored to you. This will be driven by better consumer data and will ensure the ads we see will, more or less, be ads that we want to see. Facebook and Instagram now have many tools in their marketing arsenal to adhere to these “trends” for 2018 and they should benefit businesses and consumers alike.
The Pivot to Video (and Visuals) is Real
Millennials are more likely to engage with video content than they are content with text or a link to a product page. This is a huge shift that’s greatly affected what we see in digital marketing.
Even if it’s not video, the “hook” is always the image or video area of an ad, and Facebook reports 80 percent of us look at the photo, not the text. The importance of this “ad area” is clear so why wouldn’t you make it as engaging as possible?
Facebook and Twitter are also streaming sports games. Most recently, TCU became the first Power 5 basketball team to have their game broadcast on Facebook. It’s the first step to the inevitable future of VR giving us an “in person” ticket to sporting events and concerts.
Paid-Partnerships
Paid-Partnerships have been around for a few years but with advances in Facebook and Instagram, these paid-partnerships become more and more apparent.
It used to be that a celebrity might just tag a post with #Ad or tag the product in the Instagram photo … that was very 2017. Now, you’ll be able to see the “paid partnership” where the location setting usually is.
Email Marketing Will Be Just Fine
A couple years ago, some predicted the death of email marketing. However, things like Mailchimp did just fine in 2017 and should continue to be a valuable asset in 2018.
A nice piece from Trusty Oak friend, Zilker Media explains the “why” a little further, stating that “47 percent claim that email marketing still generates the most ROI for their organizations.”
So, yeah … your email newsletter should rock on in 2018 and beyond.
Content & Storytelling are Still King
What do all of these more or less have in common? They’re benefited by the art of storytelling. Whether you’re telling a story in your Instagram stories, your newsletter, or ads run through a paid partnership with Nike, having a cohesive, impactful story will forever be the heart of a cohesive marketing campaign.
Content marketing shouldn’t be going anywhere either. People love to learn about brands, thought leaders, and everything in between by means of powerful storytelling.
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While it may not seem like anything groundbreaking will be happening in 2018, what will be significant is the need for everyone from small businesses to major companies like Target and Nike to apply similar ad strategies to their business model.
Oh, and to close: VINE IS BACK.
