The holidays are filled with marketers making predictions for the new year. We can’t help ourselves, we’re like months to a flame. Maybe it’s the thrill of realizing you were right or the unquenchable urge to help businesses improve their strategic marketing planning, but marketers love their trend predictions. Seeing these posts crop up during December and January are as predictable as Santa riding in on his sleigh.
Here are our predictions for the coming year:
Here are our predictions for the coming year:
The Year of Vision
2020 will definitively be the year of vision. It easily lends itself to marketing eyeglasses, contacts, sunglasses, optometrists’ offices, and elective eye surgery procedures. Any of these retailers or professional service providers have likely already invested heavily in online marketing services for the coming year. Those that haven’t, need to get planning immediately! Vision challenged consumers (like myself) can testify that marketing for eye doctors and eyeglasses marketing is already in full swing.
However, sight-related references won’t simply be limited to these types of relevant businesses. Sight-related puns and references will likely be made ad nauseum. If this gets annoying, just close your eyes and hope for the year to go by quickly. (See what we did there? 😉)
Greater Focus on Written Content
Written content has always been key, but it will become even more of a differentiator both online and offline.
Product packaging, website homepages, online product descriptions, and the like will continue to be the best ways to tell the brand’s story. These content opportunities will be more effectively utilized and optimized by brands that have previously overlooked them or used stock text in these applications.
This is especially true for handcrafted items. Quality craftsmanship is making a big comeback, which is making written content for branded storytelling even more important. The resurgence of handmaking products rather than machining them is driving content needs in a very palpable way. Emphasizing the care that has gone into crafting an individual product is crucial for selling consumers on the premium pricing that accompanies handmade goods.
Additionally, continuous engagement across customer service channels requires extensive content creation as well. Recycling old content and piggybacking on other people’s social efforts will no longer suffice as a social strategy. The best brands will differentiate themselves by leaning on unique, engaging content that aligns brand objectives across all channels.
“Mobile Best Practices” Disappear
Smartphone usage is now dominating across most activity categories and will soon become the default platform for everything from researching and shopping to reading and checking email. As a result, “mobile best practices” won’t be separated out in the near future. Soon, they’ll just be considered best practices. The days of planning for mobile devices as a component of search engine strategy are coming to an end because mobile is now becoming the key force driving strategic decision-making.
Video Content Remains Strong
2020 will usher in another year of video-centric engagement. Video usage has now penetrated every demographic group imaginable and promises to continue to unite consumers visually through shared needs and experiences. Non-profit marketing, in particular, will continue to lean heavily on video content to promote charitable causes.
Consumers of all ages, genders, races, religions, and educational backgrounds across the world continue to watch and share video content. Video content is so prevalent that private support of influential video content producers is soaring and is poised to continue this growth pattern in the coming year.
Check out our previous New Year themed posts while you get ready to ring in 2020:
The Ultimate New Year Ecommerce Checklist
How to Motivate Employees in the New Year
A Real World Approach to Small Business Goal Setting for the New Year
This New Year Resolve to Stop Being Afraid of Asking
Online Marketing Resolutions
Kate Pierce is the owner of LionShark Digital Marketing LLC, a West Michigan internet marketing company. Her areas of expertise include Paid Search, Search Engine Optimization, Business Blogging and Web Copywriting. She lives in the Grand Rapids area with her husband and two children and enjoys cooking, watching sports, and spending time together as a family. Like a true digital marketing expert (i.e. geek), she loves talking about current marketing trends… so don’t say you weren’t warned!
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