In this day and age, it’s a no-brainer that digital marketing should form a substantial part of your marketing strategy. An effective digital marketing strategy has the potential to increase brand awareness, brand loyalty, market share and engagement among other things. This is why it’s important to understand digital marketing trends.
At the beginning of this year, media update highlighted that the following five digital marketing trends can help accelerate the growth of your business:
- Shoppable Content
- Video Marketing
- Conversational Marketing
- Green Marketing
- Inclusive Marketing
1. Shoppable Content
Shoppable content enables consumers to easily make purchases on a digital channel of their choice. This could be through a social media post, a YouTube video or an online advert, where consumers can click on that ad to buy that item.
“Essentially, shoppable content is about taking an activity that consumers are already engaging in and adding a “Buy Now” button to everything. This means potential customers don’t even have to “go shopping” to stumble upon the perfect pair of sneakers. Instead, those sneakers magically appear at the ideal time in their feed, and with one click, they’re on their way to their doorstep.”
Vaimo
H&M is a great example of how to leverage shoppable content. Most of their Instagram posts direct consumers to the online store, where they can purchase that specific item or discover other items and purchase those.
2. Video Marketing
HubSpot defines video marketing as “…using videos to promote and market your product or service, increase engagement on your digital and social channels, educate your consumers and customers, and reach your audience with a new medium.”
In light of the COVID-19 pandemic, video content in 2021 surpassed all other content on social media channels and it’s likely that this trend will continue going forward across all channels including email marketing campaigns and website landing pages.
WeVideo states that the following video marketing trends will dominate in 2022:
- Short-form videos in social media stories
- User-generated video content
- Unedited smartphone videos
- Vlogs
- Vertical videos
- Interactive shoppable videos on social media reels
- Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality video content
- Animated explainer videos
- Silent videos
- Social media video ads
- Livestream videos and live webinars
This goes to show that in the video marketing space alone, there’s so much room for creativity and an opportunity to create impactful brand content and stories that will resonate with consumers.
Budweiser’s Good Times Are Coming campaign leveraged user-generated video content, cause marketing and the COVID-19 pandemic to create impactful, nostalgic videos that pull on consumers’ heartstrings.
On National Beer Day (07 April), Budweiser shared a video with images of real people having a good time over some beers. This emotional video encourages viewers to reminisce about the good times before the pandemic, and appeals to them to get vaccinated, so that they can get back to the good times.
Cause marketing can be tricky, because brands run the risk of being portrayed as ingenuine or be seen as jumping onto whatever social responsibility bandwagon is relevant at the time. However, Budweiser executed its strategy well, by showing empathy and images of real people to effectively resonate with consumers.
3. Conversational Marketing
Conversational marketing is all about creating a dialogue with consumers on a channel of their choice in real time, without forgetting the human touch. Getting a response now instead of later significantly enhances the customer experience in the buying journey, which can result in brand loyalty.
According to Inbenta, the following three conversational marketing tools lead to great results:
Chatbots: These 24/7 virtual assistants simplify processes and eliminate repetitive tasks. The DStv WhatsApp self-service chatbot enables customers to communicate in a language of their choice, make payments, reconnect or change their DStv package, rent a movie or browse the TV guide.
Callbots: Bots are embedded into Interactive Voice Response systems to respond to customers in a natural way and save them time. For example, FNB has a callbot that asks “How can I help you?” when you call in to the call centre. Instead of you listening to a whole list of options, it immediately directs you to the relevant department.
Live chat: For those looking for a one-on-one human interaction on their preferred channel i.e. speaking to a brand representative via Facebook Messenger or FNB’s Secure Chat.
4. Green Marketing
In a world where consumers are quickly becoming more and more environmentally conscious, it’s important for brands to communicate how they protect and preserve the environment. Particularly companies who actually offer environmentally-friendly products and services, as they already have the upper hand. This is called green marketing!
Although this tool is also used in the traditional marketing space, it’s been rapidly gaining traction in the digital marketing space and will continue to do so. According to media update, “Climate change is a major concern and customers will select brands that are committed to looking after the planet. Ninety percent of millennials say that they’ll spend more money on sustainable and environmentally-conscious brands. And for once, Gen Zs are agreeing with millennials.” Since the majority of millennials and Gen Zs spend so much time online, it makes sense to target them on their preferred online channels.
We typically see big and great initiatives from brands on Earth Day (22 April) each year. This year’s theme, “Invest in Our Planet”, encourages us to make the urgent, necessary changes to protect our world. It calls on companies, citizens and governments to come together to protect the planet.
BMW’s The Future Finds Us campaign definitely stood out as one of the impactful Earth Day initiatives this year. The company used video marketing (social media video ad) to promote its all-electric car, the BMW iX. The car is described as the combination of sustainability, technology and craft at its finest. The brand also highlights that the car was built at BMW’s Dingolfing plant using 100% renewable energy, and that the BMW iX uses game-changing sustainable materials.
“Watch as the future meets the present inside the 2022 BMW iX. The all-electric BMW iX brings to life the fine balance between beauty and progress you can come to expect from luxury automobiles of the future. Discover the interconnectivity of the future of premium mobility with the natural world around this luxury vehicle, fuelled by sustainable thinking.”
BMW
5. Inclusive Marketing
According to media update, digital marketing campaigns should reflect real people through demographic factors such as age, race, ethnicity, gender language, socio-economic status, health, disabilities, religion, diet and diverse body types.
Naturally, a brand can’t cater to every single demographic in one campaign. However, you can plan it in a way that in each campaign, different ads target different demographics. This way the campaign will resonate with various consumers and your brand will be portrayed as inclusive.
Oldie, but a goldie…Nike’s You Can’t Stop Us campaign won the Emmy for Outstanding Commercial – 2021, mainly due to its brilliant display of diversity and inclusivity. The social media video ad celebrates sport and the similarities shared by athletes around the world. 24 sports, 53 athletes, and 72 clips combine movement, inclusivity, and diversity to create this remarkable video.
Such impactful videos are usually intended to go viral – regardless of whether that actually happens or not – which is why brands make use of video marketing, to make them easier to share online.
In conclusion, all five of these digital marketing trends are still definitely relevant locally and globally for 2022, and will potentially continue to be relevant for 2023 too. Shoppable content, conversational marketing and video marketing appear to be the most popular out of the listed digital marketing tools, as it seems that they provide a quicker conversion rate and their ROI is more tangible. Green marketing and inclusive marketing appear to currently be more “nice to have” tools that aren’t that pressing or urgent, but are still very relevant in shaping the future. Either way, all small e-commerce companies should be leveraging the tools that are most in line with their digital marketing strategies, to ensure that their brands and businesses thrive.
Can you think of any cool examples for these five digital marketing trends? Feel free to drop a comment below.
Video marketing is very effective in thought provocation. However, it can be highly intrusive at times and so powerful to derail you to watch and follow its links.
Great content
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