What do you think drives this constant change in the industry of digital marketing ? How can you make sure that you’re always in the know of what’s happening so that you can be proactive instead of reactive? The survival of your brand or business depends on this.
I know this all seems too serious and you might be thinking “oh c’mon, really? Survival ? “
This is why I want to share with you a little story about how important it is for you and your business to hang on to this train of digital marketing that’s moving so fast.
Think of Airbnb. You have probably heard of it or may have even used the platform. Depending on your budget plans, Airbnb gives you the choice to either rent a room from someone or a whole flat with all the necessary amenities during your stay at a very affordable price. Their business model is based on connecting travellers with local hosts. Their digital marketing is built around content provided by users on their platform. Its social media campaigns on instagram, facebook and twitter are based on humor and holiday vibes. They make you want to travel.
Thanks to the covid-19 pandemic the travel and tourism industry was one of the industries that was hit hard. The company experienced 70% booking cancellations and a huge drop in its valuation. They acted almost as fast as the virus itself and ran a campaign that proved that they understood what their customers were feeling and provided a refund policy that gave the customers the power to cancel last minute and a full refund without being penalised. This gave people the reassurance to go ahead and make bookings After that Airbnb recorded 14,000 new hosts each month of 2020 with seven million listings globally and the company went public in December 2020.
Now that we understand the importance of communicating with your customers on a timely manner and connecting with them on an emotional level, here’s some digital marketing tips for you to follow this new year and stay ahead of the curve.
1. Embrace novel content
Doing articles and blogs for your websites alone don’t cut it anymore. Novel content is what you use to complement the conventional content of videos, articles, blogs etc. Recently a lot of businesses started to use engaging content that’s based around their product or service and also educates customers. This can be achieved by creating polls, contests, quizzes or even giveaways. It gives companies a chance to collect votes, interests and opinions from current and potential customers on a particular subject. The idea is to keep the engagement relevant to your business.
Expiring content is also another way to achieve engagement. This is a content that will remain on your website for a certain amount of time then disappears. It creates urgency and interest among your customers to interact with you.
2. Start optimizing for voice search
With products like Alexa and Google Home gaining popularity, people are using voice searches to find products and services. Currently half of the global searches use it and this is expected to grow in 2021. What this means is if you haven’t done it, start now to optimize for voices searches. Think about how you would ask Alexa to search for the nearest clinic to you. For example you would ask “Alexa what’s the closest clinic to me now ?” This is different from “Nearest clinic near me” on Google search. This is more like conversational than putting random words on Google and your SEO work needs to reflect that as well. Keep updating your Google My Business profile as well to optimize for voice search.
3. SEO is still super important
With Google enjoying 96% of global online searches, SEO is still very much relevant and will stay so in the foreseeable future. The algorithm is updated frequently and Google is now focusing on knowing the difference between intent and search. For example, when you search for “web design Yorkton” Google will display web design companies based in Yorkton while a search for “web design companies yorkton” will display Job openings from web design companies in Yorkton, because of this you need to keep in mind to segment queries that you want to rank for and make competitor analysis a frequent part of your SEO strategy.
4. Be generous
Don’t make all your campaigns about selling your products/services, people can see right through that. Be there to really help your customers out. Come with solutions to their problems for free. A good example of this is IKEA. Realizing how difficult it was for their customers to assemble furniture themselves, IKEA bought TaskRabbit to deliver one day and introduced experts to come and assemble the next day. This truly showcased their mission of “Making Lives Better” and gained them loyalty.
It’s important to keep an open mind when it comes to digital marketing, even if you’re provided with a written guideline. Nothing is set on a stone. Always keep track of what’s working and do more of that. Go back to the drawing board when a strategy is not working as expected and find ways to fix. Look for knowledge and educate yourself about the industry. Ask for help if it gets too overwhelming.
Keep in touch and let us if there’s anyway we can be of help.