Online Marketing Trends – 2021

 

The year 2020 has seen brands and marketers make every effort to survive the unpredictable events that have been unfolding. Despite these uncertain times, online marketing has become a boon for companies. 

While the digital age had already begun to change lives across industries and various verticals, 2020 mainly saw it grow significantly. In-person experiences were replaced by virtual platforms for consumers, and therefore it became crucial for marketers to re-strategize and organize their marketing campaigns. 

With social marketing continuing to grow in 2021, there will be a major shift in the way brands connect with consumers.

Here are few Online Marketing trends that all marketers should keep an eye out for 2021:

 

Social Media to Engage and Retain:

Companies should start dedicating more resources to social media platforms. Marketers are progressively making customer retention a priority after the pandemic hit the market. 

This will continue well into 2021. The pandemic has rapidly increased the amount of time people spend online, which also comprises how they research products, brands, and organizations. This consumer shift generates new prospects for marketers to expand their reach with new audiences and retain long-time customers. 

A good social media marketer can create a content plan, make regular posts, observe and drive customer responses, and attract new business. Our recent blog on social media marketing will give you more insights into how a well-thought and well-intentioned strategy can work wonders.

The new Digital 2020 Reports by We Are Social – published in partnership with Hootsuite, reveals that mobile and social media have become a crucial part of everyday life for people all over the world. With more than 4.5 billion people using the internet currently, social media users have passed the 3.8 billion mark. 

Nearly 60 per cent of the world’s population is already online, and the latest trends suggest that more than half of the world’s total population will use social media by the middle of this year.

Source: We Are Social

 

UGC to enhance the customer experience:

Customer experience has never been more important.

Consumers desire enjoyable experiences with brands that are easy and eye-catching. They want proof before deciding to buy and be reassured because no one wants to make the wrong decision.

User-generated content (UGC) Advantages:

• It builds and strengthens communities
• It’s relatable and uplifting
• It helps brands to meet customers where they’re already spending a lot of their time
• It helps brands to generate tons more content for their customers

 

Ecommerce orders are up 108%, daily usage of Facebook is up 27%, and 42% of consumers plan on changing the way they shop moving forward, which has opened up opportunities for various brands.

UGC has always been a successful way for brands to build relationships with their customers and furnish social proof, and this will be a common theme in 2021 as well.

 

More purpose-driven missions:

While social media has always directed engagement with causes, the global pandemic has glowed even more attention towards these causes. Individuals want to help more than ever, and they also expect brands to enter.

In fact, in a Twitter survey, 74% of respondents desire brands to showcase acts of kindness. And 77% feel more firmly about brands that make an effort to support society throughout this crisis.

So for 2021 also, we can expect brands will help out; however, they can through purpose-driven social media campaigns. 86% of respondents in the survey want brands to support vulnerable members of the community. And 82% of respondents expect more support for frontline health staff.

Companies like Starbucks have already taken steps to support emergency efforts.

Source: Twitter

 

Programmatic Advertising:

Programmatic advertising assures an exciting time for online marketing in 2021. It uses AI to automate ad buying which helps you target more specific audiences. This automation is more effective and quick, which ultimately means lower customer acquisition costs and higher conversions.

Digital ads were earlier bought and sold by human ad buyers and salespeople who were expensive and unreliable in comparison to programmatic ad buying. The help of Programmatic advertising technology will make the ad buying system cheaper and more efficient. Skilfinity’s blog on Programmatic Advertising will help you evaluate the next right step for you.

Source: Smart Insights

 

Core Web Vitals:

In late 2020, Google announced that another core algorithm update would be coming in May 2021 which will focus mainly on user experience. The update will concentrate on-page experience as a key ranking signal. Core Web Vitals are formed to measure how users experience the speed, responsiveness, and visual stability of a page.

The big metrics at play are:

• Largest Contentful Paint which means the time it takes for a page’s primary content to load. You should be chasing for 2.5 seconds or faster.
• First Input Delay means the time it takes for a user to be able to interact with a page. Less than 100ms is a good score.
• Cumulative Layout Shift means the amount of unexpected shifting of visual content on a page. Less than 0.1 is a good measure.

Source: Search Engine Journal

 

Automated Bidding for Google Ads:

 In 2016, Automated bidding on Google Ads made its first debut but, we expect it to come into its own in 2021. 2020 could be the last year that digital marketers manually tweak their Google ads for optimum performance. Automated bidding can help tweak and optimize the ad much better than any human digital marketer.

Will this make digital marketers obsolete? Not if it frees them up to devote time and effort to other channels of online marketing—not just the advertising section but the overall brand awareness, which is much harder to automate.

 

Increase in Voice and Visual Search:

The number of consumers managing search via voice-activated tools like Alexa is increasing rapidly. Most probably, that’s because people have been stuck at home, with limited opportunities for conversation, or maybe it’s merely because this type of technology is more readily available. 

But it’s not only voice search that will dominate 2021 – we can also expect other creative search methods to rise this year, like visual search. 

One such tool is Google Lens which allows consumers to search for whatever they can see. Image alt-text and sitemaps for images will become the focus of attention because visuals will become more pivotal in the SEO game next year.

 

According to Retail Customer Experience by 2021:

“Early adopters that revise their websites to support visual and voice search will increase their digital commerce revenue by 30%.” 

Statista Research Department estimates that by 2024 the number of digital voice assistants will reach 8.4 billion units – a number greater than the world’s population.

Source: Statista

 

Customer Segmentation

One more trend that’s not new but rather newly popular is customer segmentation. 

The idea is instead of a small number of large marketing campaigns targeting general audiences; it’s better to have a large number of small marketing campaigns targeting specific audiences. 

Customer segmentation means assembling your target audience by certain traits or behaviours, which can be demographics, shopping habits, etc. This helps you to precisely compose your content to suit their preferences; for example, sending diverse newsletters to each that feature different products or having two separate email lists for big spenders and small spenders.

After all who does not like a personalized – “exclusive for me” approach?

 

Influencer Marketing

Influencer marketing means using key leaders to amplify your brand message to a larger market. Influencers can be well-known celebrities, but they are often Instagram or YouTube personalities having a huge niche following who can help expand your business or product through their various social channels.

 

Influencer Marketing Statistics, forecasts and facts – 2021: 

 

• Influencer marketing is expected to increase in worth by $13.8 billion in 2021.
• In 2019, 240 extra platforms and influencer marketing-focused agencies appeared on the scene.
• 56% of brands make use of the same influencers across different campaigns.
• 83% of firms take their influencer marketing spending from their marketing budget.
• 67% of brands make use of Instagram for influencer marketing.

Source: Influencer Marketing Hub

 

Social Media Stories

Snapchat first came out with the “My Story” concept, then Instagram and Facebook started the story option, and then YouTube unveiled their own story format: Reels. These types of stories disappear after a definite period of time; this is a great opportunity for marketers to make excellent use of FOMO (fear of missing out).

The advantages of using social media stories include:

• Increased brand awareness
• Constant engagement with followers
• Cost-effectiveness
• Increased traffic to your web page
• Opportunity to reach younger audiences

 

A SocialInsider study discovered that images in Stories have a 5.65% more tap-forward rate than videos. Tap-forward rate is basically the number of people who actually saw your Story and moved on to the next one before finishing it. 

The same analysis further found that photos in Stories had higher drop-offs than videos, exhibiting that people are more inclined towards viewing videos. No wonder 51% of brands are already using videos in Stories, and the number will likely increase in 2021.

Source: Social Insider

 

Are you ready for 2021?

In a year filled with unprecedented change, online marketing has forced brands to ponder long and hard about how they associate with their customers. We can clearly say that 2021 will consist of continued digital modification and engagement, where marketing strategy and creative ideas will make or break brands.

Rise above your competitors by shifting more resources to social media and local search, adding more personalized and interactive content, and keeping tabs on both voice and visual search in 2021 to develop SEO for both.

If your business has been putting off or not giving expected results, then now is the time to approach Skilfinity for adding social media services to your marketing mix. 

Don’t hesitate to ask us if you have any query related to online marketing in the comments section or send that mail on our id if you need a more detailed description. We are here to help.