Social Media ad spending will increase as businesses of all sizes figure out what the forerunners have known for a long time. Watch for increased competition for eyeballs in the social media sphere, driving either innovative approaches or clumsy, intrusive mistakes resulting in backlash. Those agencies who can ride this trend will come out ahead. The real winners will be the social media providers, unless they lose sight of their long-term goals and go for the quick buck. Internet marketing companies that can humanize their campaigns will also win big, if they can balance their message with respect for the purposes of social media- human to human interaction.
Of the 93% of B2B marketers who used content marketing this year, 42% showed some kind of measurable effectiveness.*
Follow the money. We believe that as search rankings veer from their usual moorings (PPC, SEO tweaks, back-linking) investment in great content will continue to ascend like a Sherpa up Mt. Everest.
This is where creative, imaginative internet marketing writers and media producers will thrive in their attempts to stand out in a general rising tide of content-heavy competition. Google's guidelines for rating search results are occasionally "leaked," revealing a bit of their criteria for ranking content; some recent ones are:
Yes, Google actually uses human "raters" that evaluate search returns as "Vital, Useful, Relevant, Slightly Relevant, or Off-topic."† There are still a few things that artificial intelligence can't do.
(Rumors of its demise have been greatly exaggerated)
As SEO gets more sophisticated, smaller businesses will revert to a sure-fire, under-control strategy: email. Smart marketers will add a twist, though. As long as high-quality content is being produced for online search purposes they will figure out how to leverage it for use in emailed form. Watch your inbox for offers of white papers and e-books in 2015. See our blog on high response emails.
Another side-effect of the popularity of Social Media, we're already seeing a trend toward "connecting" with audiences. Consider the old school sales strategies of pure one-size-fits-all persuasion streaming from our TV's radios and print media contrasted with the focus-group and conversation-driven messaging of today. So many long years of advertising-as-persuasion have inured us all to it. We're just tired of being convinced all the time.
Businesses have been given a great gift- being able to respond in public in real time to customers kudos or complaints! You better believe that winners are companies who listen and respond. A happy customer is one that feels listened to, even if their expectations aren't necessarily exceeded.
Our audiences have developed a healthy skepticism about banner ads. They usually get the same response as the person who fails to cough into their sleeve: "Great, now I'm probably gonna get whatever virus he's got." That will drive more of what's called Native Advertising, a form of content (again!) that is intended to be relevant and helpful to the consumer but without the usual trappings of a traditional ad. Think Hallmark TV specials- an ad for greeting cards with a TV drama attached. Or recipes that call for Brand X butter and Brand X milk. Embedded messages in articles, editorials, links, how-to videos and the like will mark the passing of animated click-bait banners.
What internet marketing trends do you see coming in the new year? We'd love to get your perspectives and insights. Keep on top of it all by checking in regularly with United WebWorks!
*Content Marketing Institute: B2B Content Marketing 2014
† http://searchengineland.com/interview-google-search-quality-rater-108702