Stay ahead of the competition! Discover the latest marketing trends and insights you must know to enhance your strategy and drive success.
As the year ends, blogs about marketing forecast are starting to spread so fast.
It is a considerable advantage for content marketing strategists to be the first to know about which information is useful and get on with the marketing trend. Of course, not everything that is published on the internet is right. That is why it is crucial to discern the information and check its source.
Marketing and Technology come together. Both are fast-paced and ever-changing. What is practised ten years ago may be completely different and ineffective now. With the intricacies of software and applications nowadays, they will certainly not work in an out-dated laptop or computer.
This analogy is similar to content marketing and SEO. Both are great marketing tools to attain a high conversion. However, the process to hit high conversion will never be perfected because of continuous innovations, but there are ideal blends or tactics to make it work.
As marketers and business owners, be the first to know the following pieces of information.
1.Rolling Out of BERT
Just when content and SEO experts thought they almost figured out a few of the many Google algorithms, another update has been released in the history of search.
Recently, Google rolled out BERT, which stands for Bidirectional Encoder Representations from Transformers. This technology is created to better understand natural language with its ability to train itself with a question-answering system. But Google confirmed that it does not replace RankBrain. RankBrain was launched in 2015 as the first artificial intelligence technology for answering queries.
How does BERT affect marketers, content writers and SEO specialists?
This update shall impact searches and snippets. It shall affect the ranking in Google search as a whole. Every single word and preposition matter and BERT aims to improve search by giving more relevant and specific results quickly like how an ordinary person perceives search queries. Therefore contents must be written in a manner that wholly and directly answers a search.
The advantage of using BERT has been tested as illustrated below.
In the BEFORE search, Google provided results which is the other way around that is US citizens traveling to Brazil. The search result AFTER BERT was on point considering the preposition “to”.
In this search query, the BEFORE result only matched the word stand to stand-alone instead of Google perceiving “stand” as a physical demand of the job which is the result obtained AFTER BERT.
In the BEFORE BERT, the result focused on the word “curb” when in fact the inquiry is parking on a hill with “no curb” which the AFTER BERT result gave a correct answer.
Here are two more examples that show BERT gives much specific search result.
Although the science of language understanding is still a long way to perfection, update on BERT is a milestone from the last five years.
2.Focus on Transactional Information
Still relevant to BERT update, content writers shall consider making blogs or articles that provide transactional information. Transactional information is more specific and detailed. Because of BERT’s ability to provide highly related search results, content that is a complete source of the best answer increases its Google search ranking.
By considering semantic search or how humans use their natural language to search, topics can be discussed explicitly and produce content rich in information. The snippets should contain the central paragraph that directly answers the search query.
3.Focus on Content and Refrain from Keyword Density
Danny Sullivan, Google’s search liaison on his tweet said that “There’s nothing to optimize for with BERT, nor anything for anyone to be rethinking. The fundamentals of us seeking to reward great content remain unchanged.”
Producing quality content or article remains to be the battle cry of every dedicated content writer. It is not wrong to write either long-form or short-form blogs as far as the overall material is cohesive, gives value and makes sense to its readers.
It is undeniable that technology in the history of search is continuously reaching its milestone. It now realises that keyword density and blog length are not extremely necessary in this time that Google can recognise what quality content is.
4.Acquiring Business Intelligence Solution
With the many digital platforms businesses are engaged with, manual analysis on the implications of these platforms to the organisation would be difficult. Business intelligence solution is the answer to put all those metrics in one system and compare it one platform to another. Aside from the discounted time and effort, the results may be referred to as basis to any major business decisions.
Business Intelligence Solution is regarded as a business partner that would show how effective or ineffective the company’s digital presence is. There are many available business intelligence solutions downloadable online for free. It counts to spare time checking out what these free business intelligence solution can do.
5.Optimizing communication channels
Businesses are already using different channels of communication to market such as telemarketing, postal mail and email automation. But today, instant interaction is trend such as communicating actively through social media where most people spend their time with.
The use of Chatbot has been useful to attend to inquiries or even accommodate orders. ManyChat and MobileMonkey are popular chatbot apps highly recommended by marketers.
Voice Search is also an emerging communication channel. Voice Search is practically used nowadays to take food orders. However, there may be compatibility issues in terms of gadgets used in voice search.
Both chatbot and voice search are helpful in business as it assumes human interaction and can respond quickly, delivering the same result. Getting on this trend also creates an impact on your business’s branding.
Should there be innovations or communication channel unique to your company, the better that you become the benchmark for it.
6.Email and SMS Automation
Not all companies use email automation, but this helps inform customers or potential customers of any updates, announcements and offerings.
Another automation that is being used now is SMS automation. SMS automation is more practical and reaches a more positive response since people check their cell phones regularly than they do in email.
Email and SMS automation are ways a business extends itself to reach out to customers. Automation, aside from it being a marketing tool, aims to retain its regular customers by frequent updates creating good relationship and loyalty to the brand.
7.Personalization
Personalization is an extension of creativity and expression. Injecting personalization in your products and services attracts customers thinking that it is custom made for them.
How can this be achieved? It is an effort to know your market.
Instead of marketers playing psychologists, a better tool to use is customer profiling and segmentation. A quick survey shall drill well what your customers are fond of. Or maybe know by heart what your customers usually purchase.
With the many applications available online, one can add a twist of artistry to make marketing appealing to the eyes.
From there, prepare a personalized package or offer that is fit and attractive to different types of group.
8.Branding
A strong brand shall create a remarkable impact. Once a brand has left an imprint in the industry, it would be difficult to erase it in people’s mind.
Marketers should continuously think of ways to make their brand unique and felt. The power of social media can quickly help spread one’s brand and make it contagious.
A brand is a company’s signature. It is the very reason why it is patronaged. So it is about time to brainstorm on what could be your company’s next gimmick and invest in it.
The ones that capture people’s attention are ideas that are fresh, relatable yet unexpected.
CONCLUSION
Marketing and Technology are a great combination. Technology has been opening more and more channels to improve marketing strategies. There are different applications available that would aid one’s need. Apps are user-friendly, stimulates creativity, and most importantly, apps intend to serve their purpose.
Any update in both marketing and technology makes marketing people stimulate their attention. Marketers should not be left behind. In the field of marketing, learning and doing it first matters is an advantage.
The shared pieces of information contain new marketing trends and some we already know and might not be putting much effort on.
- BERT update and its implication to content writing
- Acquiring business intelligence solutions
- Optimising communication channels
- Use of Automation
- Personalisation
- Branding
Now that these salient points are discussed, what actions are you going to take to prepare your marketing strategies for 2020?
