Marketing professionals concocting digital marketing recipes early enough have time to experiment. Leave it too late and results might be far from impressive. In 2016, traditional marketing ideas are being reinvented with innovative technology to appeal to the tastes of digital appetites. These new trends are changing the future of marketing.
Think of digital marketing in 2016 as a blended soup, bubbling away and occasionally threatening to boil over; a marketing broth of complex flavors as different digital ingredients are added.
Digital is the default
Remember when some forward-thinking marketing managers added digital on as an extra strategy? Those days are going, going, nearly gone! From 2016, marketing departments need to be thinking digitally from the start with full online campaigns. Digital is no longer an after-thought but a catalyst and strategizing influencer.
In 2014 the average digital marketing spend was 25% of company budgets. The forecast for the next five years is for that figure to rise to 75%. (AdWeek)
PESO is a go-to marketing framework
Ever-evolving and flexible, successful campaigns today are less about linear marketing and more about having fingers in many digital pies. Paid Media, Earned Media, Shared Media and Owned Media combine as PESO; individual elements which integrate and overlap to create a framework for customizing marketing strategies.
PESO enables marketing departments to rethink content, as well as content distribution, customer reach and ultimately engagement and conversions, all within a multi-faceted marketing approach.
Marketing is mobile
One strange statement oft quoted online is that mobile phone ownership is higher than the number of people who own a toothbrush. Whether true or not, the fact remains that the world has gone mobile, with smartphones leading the way.
Mobile phone penetration in Thailand, for example, is estimated to be 147% and is the second largest smartphone market in the ASEAN region. According to the IDC Thailand Mobile Content Market Study 2015, active users in Thailand have reached 24 million, equal to around 37% of the population.
Mobile ad spending in the US is expected to reach close to 29% of total media ad spending by 2019, nearly 70% of digital marketing budgets. (eMarketer)
Digital distribution opens up new avenues
With Content Discovery changing the way markets access news and the advent of Native Advertising, content channels are multiplying, widening and delving deeper. This not only affects how targeted markets are reached but also transforms the content itself. Add onto this the growing e-commerce sector and even more routes appear. This stretches the skill-set of traditional marketing departments who now need to embrace tech expertize, the key to marketing success in the digital world.
If content is king, then in 2016 the kingdom just got a whole lot bigger, with greater demands on royal staff and more opportunities to reach more subjects.
Social media is big business
Once upon a time Facebook was for chatting to friends and LinkedIn was for those who wanted to connect professionally. However, with users increasingly connecting with companies via the social media site, the businesses tools available on Facebook are increasing. This means marketing departments engaging with social media wholeheartedly. In Thailand, some 22 million users access social media sites every day, and the country is estimated to have 34 million Facebook sign-ups.
Globally, over 70% of internet users are active on social media, with over 70% accessing sites via their smartphones.
Social media is not niche. Recently, Twitter and Google formed a stronger relationship with Tweets now appearing in Google Search. Meanwhile, Google + provides an increasingly important platform for sponsored marketing – Paid Media, while Pinterest, YouTube and Instagram reveal that a picture really can paint a thousand words.
Video speaks marketing volumes
Video ads are already playing automatically on Facebook and Google is testing out in-SERP video advertising, with video ads appearing in its search results. Video content and marketing is set to explode in 2016 and beyond.
Internet video traffic is estimated to reach 80% by 2019, an increase of 64% from 2014. (Cisco Visual Networking Index)
The marketing developments in 2016 are more than future trends. Instead, they are game changers and PR professionals need to at least understand the rules of the game before they begin.
To discover ways in which we can help grow your business in the new digital landscape, call Vivaldi today on (+66) 02612 2253 x104, or visit www.vivaldipr.com
