Digital Marketing in Melbourne FL Trends For 2020
As we approach the end of the year, it’s a great time to look ahead at where we’re going and the marketing trends we’re likely to see more of in 2020. Just in the last decade, Digital Marketing in Melbourne FL has evolved so much on a strategic level so let’s dive into some more detail of the specific trends to look out for.
Technology continues to advance at a very rapid pace, so of course, some of these trends will be focused around technology. However, there’s also a pushback against the increased digitization and automation of interactions between brands and consumers, and a desire to make marketing more human again.
While technologies such as AI and data-driven marketing will certainly be big trends for 2020, the overarching focus will be on people, not technology.
Here is a list of the top 8 Digital Marketing in Melbourne FL we’re likely to see:
Customer Experience
2020 is predicted to be the year of the customer. There are massive shifts in beliefs about what marketing actually is. It’s no longer about trying to convince people to buy from or work with your company, it’s moved towards providing fantastic customer experiences that will keep people coming back for more and bringing their friends and family next time. In a sense, when you focus on building a positive business culture and providing a great service to your customers, the marketing seems to almost take care of itself.
The growth of online content has also given consumers much more power than 10 years ago. They are no longer a passive party when it comes to learning about products. They’re going out and doing their own research about your products/services, not waiting to be force-fed information.
This means you have to offer them something more than information.
Customer Experience has become a pretty popular word recently and this is not because it is some quick to leave trend. 73% of people say that customer experience is an important factor in their buying decisions, but currently, only 49% of US consumers say that today’s companies provide a good experience.
What exactly makes a great Customer Experience? Efficiency, convenience, knowledgeable and friendly service, and easy payment options are what people value most in their customer experience. But aspects more traditionally considered as marketing’s domain are cited too: up-to-date technology, personalization, and easy mobile experience, brand image, and design all add up to the overall customer experience.
Strategic Marketing Transformation
When you’re reading about up-and-coming trends in an article like this, it’s all too easy to think that being successful in marketing can be simplified to following a list of best practices and making sure you’re using the latest techniques and technology.
The business of marketing is becoming increasingly complex. For companies to succeed in 2020, they’ll have to think beyond what they’re doing and link everything back to the why of the business as a whole. Your marketing goals and objectives must align with the overall goals of your business.
Strategic marketing transformation is the term used to describe the process when a business operating without a strategic marketing plan evolves by changing its fundamental business processes and procedures.
Undergoing a marketing transformation can help companies to improve customer service and experience, boost brand awareness and reputation, and ultimately increase revenue and profits.
Businesses achieve these benefits through a combination of data collection, using modern technology, building customer relationships and engaging with customers online, publishing quality content, and improving their online presence. All of these things are part of the underlying strategy that influences every department and employee in the company, not just the marketers.
Your strategic marketing plan defines goals and determines which Digital Marketing in Melbourne FL tactics you will employ to reach your customers including content marketing, SEO, email marketing, social media, advertising, and offline marketing. It then lays out a plan for how every part of the organization will be involved in these tactics.
To put it simply, the marketing strategy is no longer only the responsibility of the chief marketer or CMO. Strategic marketing transformation recognizes this and ensures that the brand, company reputation, customer relationships, and customer experience as a whole are considered in every business activity.
Personalization
Increased data collection and advancements in technology have already had a huge impact on the level of personalization that is possible and on what consumers expect from their interactions with brands.
Today’s consumers are flooded with marketing messages from multiple channels to the point where they have started to tune them out. Traditional advertising is losing its effectiveness, so what’s the answer? Personalized marketing messages that forge a real connection between the brand and the target market.
80% of consumers now say that they’d be more likely to do business with a brand that provides a personalized experience.
For example, in the 2002 movie Minority Report, the character John Anderton, played by Tom Cruise, is bombarded by a series of personalized ads calling him by name as he walks through the city. This was obviously complete science fiction at the time, but not quite two decades later, reality has almost caught up with the marketing future of Stephen Spielberg’s imagination.
Marketing personalization is no longer limited to automatically changing the name of the person you’re addressing in your email newsletters. Improvements in technology such as AI combined with increased data collection and insights from social media and other sources have made it possible and easy to hyper-personalize everything from content to design to product recommendations and everything in-between.
SERP (Search Engine Results Pages) Position Zero & Featured Snippets
SEO will continue to be an important aspect of Digital Marketing in Melbourne FL as we move into 2020, but we’re now seeing one of the most major shifts in the SEO industry in the last decade.
With the growth of mobile and voice search, people are changing the way they use search engines like Google. Being number one in the search engine result pages or SERPS is no longer necessarily the primary goal your business should be aiming for.
You’ve probably noticed your own search and browsing behavior has changed in the last few years due to Google changes and the fact that you’re looking for the fastest information when you’re on the move.
Featured snippets and other “on SERP” information means that you don’t need to click through to a website to get the information you’re looking for anymore – it’s right there on the Google search results page.
This on-SERP information may appear in various places, but the most sought after position is right at the top of the page, before the organic listings. This position has been dubbed “position zero”. As it’s often the only information that a searcher will view, it’s highly coveted. Over 60% of search results returned by Google are now position zero search results.
Brands are still trying to figure out how to achieve position zero as it requires different SEO techniques than those employed for a normal listing in the SERPs. If you can be the first in your industry to get there, you’ll have a huge advantage over your competitors. So expect to see more SEO companies offering this service over the next year, and pay attention to the latest best practices for optimizing your content.
AI/automation
Will 2020 be the year of the rise of the robots? Maybe! Just hopefully not the type from iRobot or Terminator!
AI is one of the major technologies behind voice search and smart assistants. It’s also made chatbots possible, which are now popping up on more websites than ever before.
AI technology and automation are helping to take some of the grunt work out of marketing so brands can concentrate on strategy and crafting a fantastic customer experience.
Remember, the human aspect of marketing is still important (and really more important than ever before), so the idea is to use this technology to enhance your marketing efforts, not replace the real people behind them.
Big data, supported by AI and predictive analytics, is also helping brands to learn more about their audience and customers. It’s enabling hyper-personalization of customer experiences and marketing messages at scale.
Voice Search
Voice search shows no sign of slowing down and will continue to be a major influence on how brands create content and market themselves online.
We’re not quite at the commonly cited prediction that 50% of searches will be driven by voice in 2020 (we’re currently sitting at about 20% according to Google), but this statistic is probably not that far in the future. The smart speaker business is booming, with around a quarter of US households now owning a Google Home, Amazon Echo, or another smart speaker.
Consumers are also expecting to use voice search more in the near future – 61% of those aged 25–64 who already use a voice device intend to use it more in the future according to research by PwC.
Voice search brings with it new challenges but also exciting opportunities. Tequila brand Patròn is an example of a company that’s seen huge success from using branded skills. Smart speaker users can ask their digital assistant to “ask Patròn for a cocktail recipe.” This not only helps to increase brand awareness and visibility, but it also enables users to buy the product directly from the recipe results.
Even if your brand isn’t ready for smart speaker advertising, it’s important that your content is optimized for voice search. Voice searchers use search differently. They use longer, more conversational queries, so slanting your content to serve these queries, as well as answering questions directly, can help to make it more visible to voice searches. This has the added bonus of making your content more likely to be picked up as a featured snippet or found on position zero on Google.
Focus on Customer Retention and Loyalty / Customer Advocacy
A huge part of providing a great customer experience is making sure that CX is ongoing and focused on keeping your existing customers, rather than just attracting new ones.
Recurring customers are more valuable than new customers. It costs five times as much to attract a new customer as it does to keep a new one, so it’s definitely worth putting in the effort to keep your customers happy.
Loyal customers also help to increase the reputation and awareness of your brand as they’ll talk about your company and products with their friends and family. Happy customers make great (and free!) brand ambassadors and influencers.
Many of the above-mentioned trends and technology can be helpful for increasing customer retention rates. Personalization, for example, is certainly expected from your existing customers if not your new ones, and it gets easier to personalize communications the more interactions someone has with your brand.
Be Ready for 2020
Now is the time to start planning your 2020 marketing strategy if you haven’t already. Make sure you start the New Year with a clear plan of your goals and how you’re going to achieve them.
We can’t really call it a trend, but it goes without saying that content marketing will continue to dominate the digital marketing landscape in 2020. Most of these trends rely on content in some way. To have success in them you’ll need to have a solid base of quality content across all your marketing channels.
If you are ready to get more traffic to your site with quality content that’s consistently published, contact The AD Leaf Marketing Firm by filling out the form or giving us a call today! Get ahead of the curve to generate more traffic and leads for your business by taking advantage of all Digital Marketing in Melbourne FL trends.
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