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2017 was a bit of a banner year for Digital Marketing practices, with the upcoming GDPR changes on the horizon right through to bots allowing for e-commerce transactions to take place on Facebook chat. We take a look at the biggest marketing changes of 2017, you would be silly not to invest in for 2018!
Social Media
We can probably agree on one thing; why does that video thumbnail keep saying ‘Like this video to automatically win’? It’s the popular Facebook people, using engagement to beg for your engagement which has resulted in more Likes to the page. But what happened to the other videos that aren’t so popular? Well, eventually they would disappear from the feed because you were watching the similar ‘clickbait’ videos over and over again. But not so much now. The new Newsfeed algorithm will mean stricter demotions (deleting posts, or less boost level) for people who are using bait tactics, and over time, allowing more relevant content to be better all round.
Google AdWords
As we all know, AdWords means more sales and more people visiting your site. The increasing amount of people advertising on the search-network means people are having to spend more on AdWords than ever before to gain a little ground.
So do you abandon the platform? Of course not! The key to this is to work more cleverly than ever before – the most expensive keywords that are out there for bidding also have the lowest conversion rate, as people are searching for more information before a purchase than they ever did.
So what do we do? We target the more niche terms – the ones that we identify people are searching for when they are ready to make a purchase.
Email Marketing
Mailchimp has made email automation free to ALL customers. Yes, you read that right, you can now schedule emails to go out either a week, month or even a year after someone buys a product from your site in order to upsell or resell any products with a shelf life.
Previously hidden behind a paywall on all email marketing platforms this was a gamechanger in 2017.
Content marketing
Companies running an active blog generate over 70% more leads on a monthly basis than those who don’t. How does this change marketing? It means that throughout 2017 so many blogs have been published, on websites and on their services/products. How we can help you, and how we help our clients?
Hubspot has identified that 90% of their leads from blogs come from blogs that were written 6 months or more in the past. This allows time for Google to index the blog as well as people to start picking up what you are writing about.
Visual content
Marketers still use content for SEO purposes, but the main traffic comes from visual content. That includes images, 360 degree photos, augmented reality and virtual reality, as well as video content.
As mentioned in the Facebook change for 2017, videos have been a big player in 2017,and the growing trend of 2017 is live streaming video.
Marketers have been taking advantage by showcasing new products, or making big announcements through outlets such as Facebook live. We can help you to engage by developing high quality banners, logos, and images for social media to help you increase your audience.
Mobile advertising
Mobile shopping has been on the constant rise for many years and this year there was a massive increase.
An infographic from Boostability reveals that 78% of consumers use a smartphone for online shopping, and 64% use online shopping to get ideas before they go into the shop.
Statistics like these make us think about why people go online and shop on the computer or a laptop. It has taken a while for marketers to adjust, but soon it will be the main way of shopping online.