Year after year, technology continues to evolve so does your target audience. With each passing year, your customers are becoming smarter and they are less interested and responsive to the same marketing messages. Therefore, it has also become essential for marketing to improve and strive to become better in order to have to the same impact as before. One constant of marketing is the need to engage and reach your target audience. In order to accomplish this goal, it has become vital for every business to pay attention to emerging technologies, trends and platforms when it comes to digital marketing.
Doing so can help them in keeping up with competitors and also help in maintaining the attention and interest of their audience. Listed below are the top 5 digital marketing trends for 2024 that every business should be using:
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- Chatbots
Even though they have been around for a while, chatbots are emerging a bit more slowly than expected. It is expected that in today’s digital market, more and more businesses would implement chatbots because they can provide huge cost savings when it comes to providing customer service. According to estimates, chatbots will allow businesses to save around $8 billion every year by 2024. They have been deployed into various systems and can come in handy for answering typical questions that customers are known to ask.
Apart from customer service, chatbots can also come in handy for qualifying prospective customers through inbound marketing efforts, providing service or product advice and scheduling a consultation, amongst others. Generally, there are two types of chatbots available; those that are designed for customer service and the others are sales oriented. If a business is investing in a chatbot, they should first determine what function they want it to perform and then select the technology accordingly.
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- Artificial Intelligence
It can be difficult to understand exactly what artificial intelligence entails. Put simply, AI refers to a group of computers that are capable of analyzing massive amounts of data quickly and then making predictions based on the pattern they identify. Previously, analyzing large quantities of data would take days whereas AI can do the same job in minutes. While predictions made by Artificial Intelligence are amazing, they are not always 100% on target. However, they are still accurate enough to provide businesses with valuable insight, which can be used for creating highly targeted and optimized campaigns.
These days, Artificial Intelligence is being used in Ad targeting because they can help figure out the most effective stage in the buying process so businesses can pay more attention when running a campaign. Moreover, AI is also being used for finding prospective clients and customers whose profile matches the business’s existing clientele. These are just some of the ways AI can be used for boosting marketing efforts.
- Omnichannel Marketing
Even though this term is thrown around a lot, Omni channel is not simply a buzzword. The best way to understand its meaning is to compare it with multichannel. When a multichannel marketing strategy is implemented, different marketing touch points are set up that reinforce each other to help a customer through their buying journey. For instance, a business may use social media for attracting customers and switch to email for nurturing leads. Omnichannel is a bit more universal. The term ‘omni’ means ‘in all ways or places’. Thus, an Omni channel marketing strategy involves creating marketing touch points that can work together on every channel available.
If it is not possible for all channels, consistent touch points can be created on channels that are used by your customers. Search, social media and email are the most commonly used channels, but there are others that can also be explored for Omni channel marketing, such as smartphone apps, podcasts, live broadcasts, ephemeral video, live chat, virtual assistants and chatbots, SMS and press releases.
- Live Video
If content marketing is king, video marketing is no less than a queen where marketing is concerned. Nonetheless, it should be noted that video continues to evolve and now live videos have taken the spotlight. This means that marketing is now essentially in the hands of the customer as it is up to them to decide what they want or don’t wish to see. The audience wants to feel close to the brand and they wish to feel part of the community so they demand transparency.
So, businesses can invite them into their world by doing live product demos or live Q&As. But, it is important to note that before you jump in the world of video marketing, you have to have a content strategy that’s in accordance with your goals and is appropriate. Businesses need to take some time for coming up with proper content for videos. They can brainstorm ideas and think about what customers will consider fun, useful and informative.
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- Local Influencer Marketing
Everyone has heard of influencer marketing and it is not exactly a new concept. But, using local influencers is something new. Unless it is a giant e-commerce business or a global brand, most businesses will target local customers. There is no doubt that having celebrities and influencers endorse your products to thousands or even millions of their followers is exciting, but you don’t get to see a lot of results. It is more effective to partner with local influencers who can carry out longer campaigns and promotions.
But, businesses should remember that it takes research and time to leverage local influencers. You need to first find the influencers in your market by searching on social networks, such as Facebook, YouTube and Snapchat. You should follow influencers and figure out which of them you would want to represent your business. It is also necessary to know which social media network is best for your business. Look for one where your target audience is known to be frequent as this will help you get a higher ROI.
Follow these 5 digital marketing trends in 2024 for your business and you will be able to engage your customers and see a massive improvement in your bottom line.
