5 Predictions About The State of Digital Marketing In 2016

With 2016 just around the corner, you might be making an initial plan that outlines how you’ll spend your marketing and advertising money next year. If you’re thinking about simply copying your digital marketing strategy and budget over and doing the same thing you did in 2015—think again. Times are changing. If you want to continue reaching prospective customers online, you need to follow the trends. You need to stay ahead of the game when it comes to connecting with people through your digital marketing efforts.

Want to get ahead? Keep reading. Take a look and use the predictions below to get the most out of digital marketing in 2016.

Prediction 1: Content Will Be More Important Than Ever

Digital marketing in 2016 will definitely focus on caring customers/clients with all the available resources the brand could provide in its website. Content will make it easy for new and existing customers to locate and use the best products and services they intend to look for in various channels (search, social, paid advertising, etc...) Educating the target audience will now become the top selling point of many brands from whatever industry they are in.

The emphasis on helpful content with paid visibility will continue to grow. Content will always be a priority but getting visibility to it will not be as free because Google and other properties will continue their push to keep the visitors on their sites giving users direct answers such as contact info, stats, game scores, etc.

 Prediction 2: Marketing Channels Will Be Even More Connected

Content creation, search optimization and social media will be less siloed as specific departments and treated more like skills that exist across the organization. Optimization will move beyond individual tactics and focus more on overall customer experience across channels. Marketing is everybody’s job and more companies will leverage internal resources through social business and collaboration platforms as well as participation marketing with their community to integrate scaled content creation and social media engagement.

Brands will continue to increase the cost of media buying, and more savvy digital marketers will lean more and more on the social aspects of online marketing. There will be less separation between online and the real world, and marketing will reflect that.

As digital marketing is extended through and more tightly integrated with technology, the walls between Marketing and IT are weakening. If marketers are truly to harness the power of our content management, customer relationship and measurement platforms, they must not only communicate but “co-operate” with IT.

We must build a common vision, leverage one another’s skills, and be respectful of each other’s resource and time pressures. And it won’t be easy. In fact, it will be culturally disruptive for many companies – but absolutely crucial to the success of technology-enhanced digital marketing

Your messaging will be lost in the future if you aren’t optimizing content across channels and keeping in mind the unique nuances of each community and platform, while remaining consistent.

Prediction 3: Mobile Will Take Over

Mobile analytics is going to become a much bigger factor in 2016. We’ve already seen the massive ripple effects mobile has had on the digital marketing industry. We believe we’re going to see this accelerate in 2016 and beyond.

We think that wearable tech will surge (Apple Watch etc.) – and this surge will put an even greater emphasis on mobile for many companies. There will be more integration of technology with our daily lives and habits – which means more chances of hitting me with hyper-relevant messages when they actually matter, and even less effectiveness of broad message blasts.

We predict that B2B marketers will see their audiences cross over to “mobile first” for the first time in 2016 where greater than 50% of their marketing content will be consumed on mobile or tablet device.

Prediction 4: Marketing Campaigns Will Be More Data-Driven & More Hyper-Targeted

As usual data will get better, but in 2016 you will see proximity messaging take off. With so many mobile payments options that track your purchases, location and everything else about you, I expect to see targeted messaging based on who, what and where I am. 2016 will be the year of data-driven marketing. All design, advertising and social media will focused on driving measurable results using cutting edge tracking and predictive analytics. Websites will focus more on optimizing conversion rates then increasing website traffic.

Prediction 5: The Laggards Will Finally Adopt

Businesses will finally wake up to the fact that social media and mobile marketing are no longer new phenomena and should be integrated right from the start of any marketing campaign or inbound initiative. The future of digital lies in companies being social and mobile by design.