As I sat and listened to an author last night re-cant stories and excerpts from several of his books and lectures, I was enthralled. How is it possible that for 90 minutes he was able to captivate over 500 people with his wit, his irony and at times his dark perspective on life? After all, they were just experiences similar to those that many of us have on a daily basis.
It quite simply was storytelling. This particular author was masterful and his skill set highlighted just how powerful a well-crafted story can be in building relationships in a more meaningful way. And given the amount of information, aka content, that hits us every day, it’s no surprise that storytelling is on the list of key marketing trends for 2019 and beyond.
Here’s the full list of 13 that should remain on our radar.
1. Storytelling will not only increase your brand favorability in your audience’s eyes, but it can also be up to 22 times more memorable than facts
Ask yourself: what do you want to be remembered for? What is the message you want to transmit to your audience, and what do you never want them to forget? Consider the emotion you want to evoke in your audience every time they interact with your brand. Your audience may forget what you say, but they will not forget how you made them feel (which is important because emotions drive purchases more than logic.)
via 3 Reasons Why Brand Storytelling Is The Future Of Marketing
2. Content marketing gets 3x more leads per dollar spent in comparison to paid search
According to a study by Kapost, in partnership with Eloqua, when $1000 dollars was invested separately into paid search and content marketing, paid search generated nine leads, while the ROI on content marketing was up to 31 leads.
When you consistently focus on content marketing over a couple of months, it gets to a point where you have up to hundreds of Google indexed blog posts, receiving massive amounts of traffic, and generating leads for you on autopilot without spending anything on paid search.
3. Content marketing costs 62% less than outbound marketing and generates 3x more leads than outbound marketing
Not only is content marketing cheaper than outbound marketing, where you send out promotional messages to your audience, but it also converts more because of the relationship between you and your buyers built via custom content.
Nothing as sweet as saving 62% cost off content marketing while generating a higher ROI.
4. Small businesses that maintain a blog generate 126% lead growth
The reason businesses that blog experience higher lead generation than those that don’t is because the blog posts act as a marketing vehicle that woos the passersby on Google to find the answers they need in your blog. These leads are already hot for conversion.
Having different blog posts that solve different problems expands the reach of a company’s brand, and provides an avenue to introduce their solution and increase email signups.
Blogging connects you with people in deeper and personal ways than plain advertising. It allows you to inject your unique personality into your content and build trust, a very important attribute to make sales nowadays.
5. Over 81% of marketers saw an increase in traffic when they invested 6 hours per week on social media marketing
81% of marketers got a steady boost in traffic when they spent 6 hours every week focusing on marketing and promoting their content on social media.
Success with social media marketing comes with mastering and dominating one social network, before moving on to the next. I recommend you start with Pinterest before moving to LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter.
6. 67% of the buyer’s journey is now done digitally
With a few clicks here and there, the buyer can read all about his desired product, reviews, pricing, how it works, FAQs, all without talking to a single sales rep.
So how can the content marketer position himself to take advantage of this? The hint is found in the next stat.
7. 35% of buyers prefer audio/visual content available on demand, 41% of buyers want interactive and visual content accessible on-demand, and 46% of buyers now gravitate to reading shorter content formats.
Nevertheless, shorter content won’t rank high on Google.
Here is what I advise you do.
Short-form sales pages should be sent to your email subscribers and followers only. Then you could create a long-form sales page with the aim of ranking high on Google.
The larger part of the article could be a 2000-word copywriting article explaining why your product solves the problem they have.
It’s important that the content in the short-form sales page you sent to your subscribers is located at the top of the 2000-word sales page so that buyers who prefer shorter content can make a decision right there without reading the rest of your sales page.
In this way, you’ve catered to your buyers who prefer short content, and at the same time, satisfied Google’s scroll depth ranking factor with long-form content.
As a smart marketer, using content as your promotional strategy will give you more dividends than traditional advertising.
8. A majority (97%) of buyers prefer prescriptive content
Content form like “How To..,” “5 Tips To…,” is known as prescriptive content because they provide an immediate solution to a problem. Prescriptive content was preferred by 97% of buyers.
Predictive content such as “The Future Of…,” came second in reader’s preference with 87%, followed by foundational content like “Tools and Blueprints,” which came at 85%
9. An average customer completes 57% of their purchase decision-making process before ever speaking to a salesperson
With the availability of reviews, case studies, engaging articles that explains what a product is all about, customers don’t need a salesperson to pitch anything to them anymore before deciding on what they want.
Brands should leverage the power of content marketing to do what a salesperson can’t achieve. Marketing with engaging content can lead a customer down the sales funnel until he/she is ready to make a purchase.
10. 53% of emails are now opened on mobile devices
The number of mobile users has overtaken desktop users in recent years. Optimizing every content on your website should now be done for mobile first, then desktop. Emails are not left out. More than half of emails are now opened on mobile phones.
Trends 2-10 via 51 Complete List Of Content Marketing Statistics For Smart Marketers | Bryan Grey
11. According to Comscore, nearly half of the searches on Google will be through voice search in 2020.
Smart speakers and smartphone functionality on iOs and Android phones have driven the use of voice to discover and consume content significantly. Alexa alone has over 45,000 skills and growing. The number of households in America that own a smart speaker is expected to increase from 13% to 55% by 2022 (Juniper).
Customers are using voice to discover, consume and act on information. To take advantage of this fast-moving trend, marketers need to research what questions buyers are asking and provide content in formats that are easy for voice search technologies to deliver.
12. According to eMarketer, 1.4 billion people interact with chatbots every year and using live chat means a 300% greater chance that customers will buy (AMA).
Artificial Intelligence is one of those trend items that has reappeared over the last several years and it’s safe to say AI will remain for many more. AI-driven machine learning systems are helping to make sense of vast stores of structured and unstructured data so marketers can provide more relevant, timely and personalized content. AI helps automate many redundant tasks like categorizing images and other content assets.
One area where AI is seeing a lot of traction is through the increased use of chatbots for everything from customer service to pre-sales engagement. In a study by Grand View Research, 45% of end users said they prefer to use Chatbots as a major means of communication in customer service. That’s a pretty compelling number considering the efficiencies and scale of chatbots over traditional customer support. Even better is the immediate assistance provided to customers.
13. 70% of consumers use three channels or more to research a purchase. Hence the emergence of “omnichannel marketing.”
“Omni,” means “all,” “of all things,” or “in all ways or places.” Simply put, an omnichannel marketing strategy means you create marketing touchpoints that work together on every available channel. At the very least, you create consistent touchpoints on all the channels your customers use.
Most businesses use social media, search, and email as marketing channels. Although social media is still the top digital marketing channel according to 81% of marketers according to a survey by Clutch, customers (especially consumers) aren’t just engaging with brands by commenting on Facebook posts.
Some channels you should investigate are:
- Ephemeral video (such as Facebook and Instagram stories)
- Podcasts
- Smartphone apps
- Live broadcasts
- Live Chat
- SMS
- PR and press releases
- Offline ads (they’re making a comeback)
- Direct mail (it’s also making a comeback)
- Offline events
- Chatbots and virtual assistants
All these channels can reinforce your existing marketing strategy – what you might call “traditional” digital marketing, at this point.
Trends 11-13 via 7 Digital Marketing Trends To Watch Out For In 2019
In Summary
Regardless of the trends you decide to act upon, it’s evident that much continues to change in the online space. And as marketers, we need to continually evaluate our strategies and sort through an extensive number of options. Just remember that we can’t be all things to everyone. Pick the trend that you’ve determined will drive the greatest ROI – either financially or qualitative and pursuit it with all you’ve got!