Year after year, digital marketing gets more exciting and challenging. With so many verticals like social media marketing, UX, pay-per-click, and search engine optimization, digital marketers also have to deal with new rules in social media and search, and personalization. In this blog, we talk about the most important and emerging digital marketing trends 2022 that are likely to stay beyond.
1. Social commerce to become unavoidable
As found by a study conducted by Accenture, social commerce (or social shopping) might reach $1.2 trillion by the year 2025 globally [1]. This growth, as per the study, is 3X faster as compared to traditional commerce. Social media platforms, like Instagram and TikTok, are now working on enhancing how they can provide a seamless shopping experience. During the COVID-19 pandemic, brands heavily steered toward these apps to set up shop online for customers, replacing their physical outlets.
This is one of the most powerful digital marketing trends in 2022 that will emerge drastically. This year will experience the next level of online shopping. Social media platforms are also expected to enable customer transactions to happen without them having to leave these apps.
2. Brands to focus more on YouTube Advertising
YouTube has more than 2 billion active users on a monthly basis. And collectively, users watch more than 5 billion videos every day! With so many users coming online on YouTube comes a great opportunity for marketers to advertise their products and services.
Apart from investing in organic video content, brands will also invest immensely in YouTube Advertising. It is one of the greatest digital advertising trends in 2022. In 2021, the global revenue of this video streaming platform (As announced by Alphabet) was almost $29 billion. The revenue was at par with that of the OTT Netflix. The increase in revenue can be attributed to the immense increase of advertisers on television channels.
SEE ALSO: 5 Exciting Cleantech Trends and Innovations for 2022
3. Digital Gig Economy to Accelerate
In the past 10 years or so, professionals are taking steps to get a better work-life balance by pursuing a flexible gig-based lifestyle. People are using opportunities provided by Deliveroo and Airbnb, as these companies have offered an alternative way of working instead of the conventional 9 to 5 job setup.
The State of Independence in America study also found that there are more than 40 million gig workers in the United States [2]. The report forecasts this number to grow exponentially with over 50%of American workers choosing to be independent by the year 2024.
This gig economy aims at opening the doors for marketers that have the skills in demand. More digital marketing professionals are opting for a ‘digital nomad’ lifestyle as it allows them to set and control their working hours and enjoy the desired work-life balance. Plus, they also make way more money than they did or could in a traditional job.
4. The metaverse to become an exploratory playground
There are many gaming platforms that are already involved in this area including Roblox, Minecraft, Fornite, and Pokemon. Many of these are known to the youngest demographic, which is known as Generation Alpha.
Though many gaming companies have already invested in the metaverse and it has been around for a while, it came to light when social media giant Facebook changed its name to Meta towards the end of 2021.
Yes, this digital marketing trend in 2021 is comparatively quite new for marketing your brand. However, recently, a few campaigns have seen brands like Gucci attempt to use its immersive nature for advertising.
5. Increased personalization
When customers get an alternative and have to choose between relatively equal products kept in front of them, they usually choose the product or the brand that managed to touch or win their hearts.
One of the brilliant ways to get the attention of your customers (And to keep it) is personalization. It is the key to keeping them engaged and helping them understand why your product meets their needs. For decades, we have heard that people love to hear and see their names. But marketers today are more focused on digging deep into identifying things that keep people up at night.
Personalized marketing and advertising messages aim at forging a connection between the target market and the brand. A survey by Elipson found that about 80% of customers said that they would be more likely to buy a product of a brand that offers them a more personalized experience [3].
SEE ALSO: 7 hot edge computing trends in 2022
6. First-party data in, third-party cookie out
The demise of third-party cookies, which is now pushed to 2023, is known for a long time. The decision to step away from collecting data via cookies was due to the privacy issue caused subsequently. Cookies, especially third-party cookies, keep a track of customers’ online activities without them knowing exactly what brands do with this collected data.
While some providers use Personally Identifiable Information graphs, search giant Google is now turning towards a privacy-preserving API approach. Meaning, that advertisers that use Google now have to look for alternative techniques to search and target customers.
7. Ranking organically on Google gets harder
Don’t let this digital marketing trend for 2022 demotivate you! As long as we have known search engines, Google has been known as the place to rank your content and make it found by customers. Getting your piece of content ranked on the first search engine results page of Google can get hundreds of thousands of users to see your brand. However, the problem is that many expert content marketers feel that Google is no longer playing fair in terms of ranking SEO-optimized, new, and relatable organic content on its search engine.
There are more ads and Google’s giving more of the search engine results pages to its own products. So, it’s getting harder to rank organic content. It is said that we are now moving closer towards branded search – search queries that have the name of your brand or product. The good thing is that if people know your brand or product and are searching for it on Google, it means they know your brand and have a high search intent.
There are some tools that can help you with your digital marketing needs. Check them out here.
SEE ALSO: 4 hot programmatic advertising trends in 2022
For more latest IT news and updates, keep reading iTMunch
Image Courtesy
Featured Image: Image by rawpixel.com
Image 1: Image by rawpixel.com
Sources
[1] Accenture (2022) “Why the future of shopping is set for a social revolution” [Online] Available from: https://www.accenture.com/us-en/insights/software-platforms/why-shopping-set-social-revolution?c=acn_glb_socialcommercebusinesswire_12755585&n=mrl_0122 [Accessed June 2022]
[2] MBO Partners (2019) “2019: The Changing Nature of the American Workforce” [Online] Available from: https://s29814.pcdn.co/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/MBO-SOI-2019.pdf [Accessed June 2022]
[3] Elipson (2018) “New Epsilon research indicates 80% of consumers are more likely to make a purchase when brands offer personalized experiences” [Online] Available from: https://www.epsilon.com/us/about-us/pressroom/new-epsilon-research-indicates-80-of-consumers-are-more-likely-to-make-a-purchase-when-brands-offer-personalized-experiences [Accessed June 2022]
