Introduction
The very popular phrase “Content is the King” is not a just a phrase anymore. It has become the reality of the digital marketing landscape. It has become an extremely important entity for any brand to make a name of its own in the market. Digital marketers consider content and everything related to it a part of their marketing strategy. Over the past few years, content marketing has made some surprising and remarkable changes and hence proved its worth by delivering excellent results. As a result, it has led to be a foundation for building brand awareness, demonstrating expertise, trustworthiness & authoritativeness.
With the growing use of internet both by the brand to publicize their brand as well as the users to get to know about the different brands, it has become imperative for business to use content marketing in a wise and beneficial manner. If content marketing is used optimally and efficiently, brands have a sure shot chance to stand out of the crowd. In the course, companies must learn to know the expectations of their customers. This will help them to create content of their brand that is most relevant to its target audience thus leading to a higher brand value. Content marketing being a plethora of various different form of marketing tactics, also includes trends that help the marketing strategy to work in the most efficient way. Fresh and authentic content is always appreciated and that what content marketing trends put forth. When these trends are used correctly and at the right time, they result to do wonders for a brand.
Why is Content Marketing Important?
Content marketing has lend to be become the new normal from the customers end. Besides that it is also important because it works amazingly well when it comes to building trust, generating leads, and cultivating customer loyalty. Content marketing helps in evolving customer expectation that they have from brands. The actual reality is, content marketing has enabled brands to operate in manner that shows customer centric reality. As a result, content is changing the relationship between the brand and consumer.
Every brands must understand and effectively implement content marketing in their daily digital tasks. The question now comes, why is content marketing important? The various reasons being, when customers make a decision of purchasing a product or use a service, they preferably buy from a credible brand rather than an unknown one. Trust plays a major part of every consumer’s final purchase decision, and content marketing is the perfect means for creating a signature style that builds recognition and conveys a brand’s personality.
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Top Reasons That Content Marketing Is Important to Businesses:
- Increases brand authority
- Builds a community of loyal customers
- More client interactions
- Improves SEO strategies
- Adds value to marketing campaigns
Top Trends of Content Marketing for 2019
The main factor why content is said to be important is because it is said to be a point of connection between a brand and its customers. Content either opens the minds and hearts of customers to pay attention to a brand or it would completely shut all doors. This is all about the brands take on their content. But on the other hand, technology is constantly evolving and that too at a very rapid pace. This means that marketers or business owners need to be aware of the latest changes, developments and be prepared for change at any minute. And it’s not just technology that keeps changing, but so do your audience’s preferences.
As a brand’s content is not going to market itself, it is the responsibility of the brand owners to take care of it. A marketer should follow the following content marketing trends to accurately execute their content strategy & take their business to the next level in 2019.
Social Media is the King
Social media is known to be become one of the most fastest moving channels. For content to perform well on any of the social media channels, it has to be authentic and personal. When it comes to social media, networking and interacting with other accounts is just as important as personal contact. On this platform, stories are meant to be told faster, through regular posts. Continuity, playfulness and authenticity are the key elements to become a star on social media networks. The trend is now moving away from Facebook towards short-lived audiovisual media such as Instagram and Whatsapp. This is especially the case for younger audiences and especially influencers.
SEE ALSO: The Boom of Influencer Marketing in Today’s World
Influencers On a Rise
Influencer marketing is not about finding a famous influencer and paying them to post about a brand on their own platforms and social channels. Instead, it is more about thinking how marketers can partner with them. The concept of influencer marketing is not new but as a matter of fact it is not well understood by most of the marketer. This type of marketing is more about considering co-created content where in marketers can ask influencer to post on their content on their own platforms that they can use to promote as evergreen content which technically lasts for years. This also includes choosing the right influencers to succeed, as well as a well thought out program to maintain relationships, set goals and measure results.
Click Bait Content is Old News
Personally relevant content increases purchase intent is the opinion of about 78% of consumers. It is pretty simple. For content to be original and relevant, it needs to be created by the brands themselves, created out of their own ideas. Consumers and decision makers are getting smart at avoiding clickbait. They are seeking for real content that can help solve their problems quickly and easily. They want marketers to earn their trust. The scope for lazy marketers copying the hottest viral headlines and topics, and fooling themselves into thinking they’re making it their own or adding their own personality, when in reality, they’re almost word for word copying and pasting is now left in the past.
Mobile Devices: The Ultimate Tool
In this fast moving world, Most users use a mobile device to watch videos on the internet, shop, inform themselves and basically stay connected with others. According to studies, in three years, smartphones will replace desktop computers as the main way of accessing the internet. Which has also resulted to mobility to becoming the latest trend. As a result, all content should be first implemented on the basis of mobile and then other devices idea. For mobile to become more powerful for a brand than any other medium, the content has to be compact, funny and definitely original. It also has to be authentic enough to quickly convince users. Only then will the user want to take a closer look at the small display.
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Growing Importance of AI
Artificial intelligence is being built in a way that it is working towards changing content marketing in big ways over the next few years. For now as well, it is already heavily impacting content marketing. Though for now AI technology already exists, it is usually not highly accessible. It is being said that when most marketers get to know about the effects of AI on content marketing that is when it will have a proper impact. AI has the power to use all the possible data to build powerful, highly targeted audience segments. Which in turn allows marketers to create truly personalized content for each of your audience segments. Personalized based on their personality traits, their shopping behavior, their interests, their location and their needs, among other factors. As a result, if artificial technology is comes to be used as the primary medium of technology, even content marketing will become a automatized version of all times.
Conclusion
For marketers to be at the top of their game this year, the most smartest thing they can do is to stay updated about about all the possible content marketing trends and use it for their own benefit. Sometimes it so happens that there is a lot of content to compete and the pressure that marketer feel when their content does not appear in the search result of your audience’s newsfeed is quite obvious. Up till now, this year seems to have popularity of omnichannel marketing and brands are constantly making an effort to create innovative, unique content that enables them to set themselves apart.
SEE ALSO: Top Social Media Trends of 2019
91% of B2B marketers claim to use content marketing to reach customers, as a study from the Content Marketing Institute and Marketing Profs found. This research also showed that creating a documented content marketing strategy, leveraging AI, optimizing content for voice search, making use of different types of content and collaborating with influencers in unique ways are some of the most useful mediums of keeping up with the latest content marketing trends. But it was also said that it is surely crucial to keep with current content trends, content marketer should also continue to build on a solid foundation of quality content aimed at target audiences. 2019 is year full of using and marketing content as much as possible. It is henceforth everything about updating, reusing, and republishing content no matter what trends fall in and out of favor with your audience.
