Category Archives: Marketing Trends

Mar 05
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Marketing Trends 2024

What are the Key Marketing Trends for 2024?

By | Digital Marketing, Marketing Trends, Marketing Trends | No Comments

As we move towards the end of the first quarter of 2024, the marketing landscape continues to evolve at a rapid pace. We have been asked by clients, what are the latest trends, and how do we stay ahead of the curve? This is crucial for business owners looking to maintain a competitive edge. Therefore, we have put together some key marketing trends you should be aware of this year.

  1. Personalisation at Scale

Consumers now expect a personalised experience. Advances in AI and data analytics allow businesses to tailor their marketing messages to individual preferences, even on a large scale.

  1. Voice and Visual Search

With the rise of smart speakers and visual search technologies, optimising for voice and image search is becoming increasingly important. This means adapting your SEO strategies to be more conversational and image-friendly.

  1. Interactive Content

Interactive content, such as quizzes, polls, and augmented reality experiences, is becoming more popular. These formats not only engage customers but also provide valuable data and insights.

  1. Sustainability and Social Responsibility

Consumers are more environmentally conscious and prefer brands that prioritise sustainability and social responsibility. Transparent and ethical marketing will become even more important.

  1. Video Marketing

Video remains a dominant force in digital marketing. Short-form videos, live streaming, and interactive video content will continue to engage audiences effectively.

6. AI-Driven Marketing:

AI is not just a buzzword; it’s a tool that can automate and optimise many marketing tasks, from content creation to customer service.

As a business owner, adapting to these trends is vital for success. Not sure where to start? Contact us for tailored marketing solutions that keep your business ahead of the curve.

Jan 22
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Marketing-Trends 2016

Marketing Trends for 2016

By | Marketing Trends | No Comments

With 2016 well and truly here, we thought we’d take a look at the marketing trends to watch out for this year so that you and your business are always one step ahead of the game.

 Mobile technology

Marketing has changed dramatically over the years and now, more than ever, it’s important that all of your advertising is streamed directly to people on the move. Gone are the days when people sat down at their desktop computers in the evening to explore the world wide web; instead, consumers are just a click away at all times thanks to mobile phone technology. If your marketing material isn’t optimised for mobile phones and tablets, you could find it far less effective.

Accessibility is key

If you’re not continuously being presented to your key target markets, the chances are they’ll buy from your competitors instead. As consumers explore new formats and social platforms, businesses must follow. For example, Snapchat is a relatively new social platform which is widely misunderstood, and as a result many businesses are missing out on its potential. Many high profile businesses and news services are beginning to flock to Snapchat thanks to the ease of sharing important messages, special offers and product launches directly to consumers’ phones without the need for them to go searching for it.

Time to become transparent

The advent of social media has made transparency in business ever more important as consumers have the power to not only instantly contact you from anywhere in the world, but also to air any complaints or success stories they might have. This means if your business isn’t 100% transparent, it could be public knowledge within a matter of hours.

Aim for the bullseye

Not only is social media highly successful when it comes to building brand awareness, it’s a great way of specifically targeting key target markets. Personalised data driven marketing (that is, marketing that focusses in on individuals who fit into a particular category by age, gender, location, likes, dislikes, etc) is becoming a highly important and successful tool to reach people who may benefit, or be particularly interested in your product or service, without spending money on reaching those who will have little or no interest.

 ‘Word of mouth’ is becoming ‘strike of keyboard’

Whilst social media is a fast-growing area of business, we mustn’t forget the power of SEO. If a consumer has discovered your advertising material somewhere, whether it be digital or not, the chances are that if they’re interested in your product or service they will use a search engine to find your website and further marketing material. Whilst an optimised website and well-written marketing content goes a long way to aiding your search engine ranking, consumer-created content is also becoming a key part of any successful SEO strategy. Just the same way as good reviews spread fast through word of mouth, the internet readily provides consumers with the opportunity to share their experiences and opinions instantly and to a worldwide audience. These reviews, whether good or bad, are becoming linked to your business through third party review websites, all of which could help, or hinder, your SEO.

As we enter 2016 with new plans and strategies, make sure you become more innovative, tech savvy and focus heavily on content creation that’s specifically targeted towards your customers’ individual needs, wants and desires, and you’ll soon see your customer base growing successfully throughout the year and beyond!

Jan 14
0

Spring Clean your marketing…..

By | Digital Marketing, Marketing Planning, Marketing Strategy, Marketing Trends | No Comments

New Marketing Strategies for 2014

Happy New Year to you all, and welcome to my first blog post of 2014, and my first ever blog post.

I hope you all have had a great time with you families over the festive period, whilst managing to rest and rejuvenate yourselves ready for the new business year!! It’s amazing that we have reached 2014 already; I still can’t believe 2013 has gone – it went so quick.

It’s always that first week back to the office, and you realize that you have a whole new year in front of you – I don’t know about you but I always like the first week back. You have a clean slate; and you know that you have some time to breath (even if it is only a week)! If you feel like this it’s always good to take a step back and wonder if there is something you can do different with your marketing this year – almost an early Spring Clean!!

Starting the spring cleaning

So you think you want to do something different but your not really sure where to start…. We have all been there.   It sounds obvious but start with your customers! Who are they? What do they want? How do they like to be communicated with? The time you have to communicate with your customers is getting shorter. One of the biggest trends for 2014 is personalisation and relevance of communication to customers’. A one-size-fits all approach to marketing will not win over your customers. Relationship marketing is vital, make your customers feel special and they will become loyal.

I know what the next thing that comes into mind – I don’t have a big marketing budget so how & what can I change?

This is the case for most businesses, but it shouldn’t be a concern. Content marketing will generate leads for your business through simply communicating valuable, engaging content for a specific audience. Content marketing is going to become bigger and bolder in 2014 and with a possible increase of 7.8% in sales with this strategy there is no surprise why.

Content Marketing

Content marketing allows you to communicate constantly with your customers without selling to them! Through creating and distributing content, which makes your customers more knowledgeable, they will reward you with their business and loyalty. This links nice back to the relationship marketing I have just mentioned!! The beauty of content marketing is that it will fit seamlessly into aspects of your digital marketing strategy. Through using social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+ and YouTube; as well as blogging weekly. The more customers that follow you the more they will feel enriched by the value added service you are supplying them.

If you’re a small business, it might be worth reading this article by Adrienne Smith on “How Facebook Marketing for Small Businesses is Dying Fast” She explains how Facebook are changing how the advertising works and the effects this will have on small businesses. It’s certainly worth taking 5 minutes to read it whilst you’re having that second cup of tea! Click here to read more.

Google+ could have an interesting role to play in social media for 2014. Where do your customers look for your services…Google! With that in mind, having a presence on Google+ can only be beneficial in the long run. In addition Google now rank companies with Google+ pages higher in the SEO scoring. So if you already have a Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Pin interest account, it won’t take much just to add Google+ to the list – remember you have to be in it to win it!!

What else is on the horizon for marketing in 2014?

The marketing world is expecting to see the coming together of retail and digital. Retailers will be working harder to connect the customer to the online store and offers. Alongside this they will be developing an in-store mobile connection that will put the fun back into shopping allowing customers to buy in-store or online with free home delivery.

In addition, look out for the further development of 3D printing; location based marketing; and more viral videos. Overall, 2014 is looking set for a fun year!

Time to share

Please don’t forget to share my blog with your friends and family, or share through the various social media links. I would love to hear your thoughts on my post, what you are planning for 2014? Tell me about your experience of content marketing, blogging, social media etc.