The Rise of Hybrid Marketing

With the advancement in technology and the the ever increasing use of social media platforms, the businesses are more inclined towards making their offerings more mobile as according to a survey an average person owns about 3 digital devices in total and with the active internet users crossing the 4 billion mark outlines the importance of being upfront with use of digital media and to have a coherent digital marketing strategy to survive in this era of globalization.

There is an obvious question which arises that how businesses can stay relevant and complete in this fast pace digital era, According to a survey conducted by a private consultancy recently which interviewed more than 4,000 marketers from the business world, the top two digital trends in the year 2020 were identified as customer experience (24%) and personalization (23%). These trends poses a wide array of challenges and opportunities for businesses. With the use of latest AI and Machine learning, we are seeing a dynamic shifts in corporate strategy towards greater customer centricity.

In the last decades, we witnessed a complete turnaround in the ways how businesses used to do marketing, we are seeing more open innovation, increased online presence, leveraging from social causes. The increasing use of predictive analytics in the marketing has given startups and companies to gain deeper insights about their customers and how to design and offer products for greater customer experience and satisfaction. Brands irrespective of their size and geographical location need to stay on top of these advancements to successfully reach their customers, especially as consumers become savvier and more skeptical of advertising which is forcing the marketers to think about marketing from a completely different perspective .Some of the most recent trends in marketing ranging from virtual reality, artificial intelligence, influence marketing, and account based marketing.

As the recent trends continue to emerge. Some of the challenges that lie ahead for marketers is to incorporate these tools effectively to reach out to customers by using virtual reality is an effective way for brand messaging and target audience before the competition. Another trend is the emergence of interactive web experience to engage customers especially in a B2B setting this can be used the content in a more visual and compelling way.

Another rising trend is the use of Pintrest which is often perceived as a niche social media platform but it is increasingly becoming very critical marketing tool among businesses using Pinterest Lens to engage and offer products to customers is going to become increasingly important in the coming years. The brands will also need to focus on increasing the level of user generated content as 86% of customers says that they trust a brand more with a higher level of user generated content.Chat-bots are also becoming increasingly important both in social media and other live chat platforms. With. the emergence of chat-bots,we will see and increasingly utilization of this technology is customer service facilitation service like placing order and responding to customer service needs.Based on these emerging trends marketers needs to embrace these changes and to use them to ensure that the company is delivering customer value.

What we will see in the years going forward is the rise of Hybrid marketing where businesses using multiple communication channels would be become the new normal.The companies using hybrid marketing would have an edge over their rivals by adding multiple channels in an opportunistic and incremental manner. This posses opportunities for businesses to leverage from hybrid marketing by increasing coverage and lowering costs without losing control of the marketing system.