The biggest trends of 2017 will help marketers engage consumers more directly by circumventing distractions and increasing their marketing reach. The content usually is useful, interesting and targeted to a specific audience -- all of which makes it one of the best platforms to launch any marketing campaign. Find your target influencer. These personalities present a world of possibilities for any marketer savvy enough to channel their power. When influencers are used effectively, they create natural ways to seduce a target audience. More than 1 billion people use YouTube on a regular basis, a number that has increased about 40 percent since March 2014. Influencers who are deft at this form of communication can help marketers organically integrate expiring social content into an overall strategy. To capture a distracted customer’s attention, marketers must reach him or her with personalized, relevant content. That makes them essential for any competitive marketer. Though some might see purpose-driven content marketing as the "kumbaya" of the marketing world, there's no denying its power to engage the audience at a higher level and drive them to participate.
At its core, marketing is a form of communicating with consumers in the hopes of selling them a product or service. However, it’s often a complicated dance of finding new and exciting ways to entice customers.
In this social-media-dominated world, the choreography is increasingly detail-oriented and high-tech. Yet it’s for this very reason that the most powerful messages remain human-centric.
The biggest trends of 2017 will help marketers engage consumers more directly by circumventing distractions and increasing their marketing reach. These tactics appeal to fundamental aspects of human nature. As such, they can help marketers create carefully coordinated campaigns and conversations where brands and consumers coalesce into a shared experience.
1. Go native or go home.
Joe Pulizzi, a self-proclaimed content-marketing evangelist, calls native advertising the “gateway drug” to content marketing. If you’re smart, you’ll jump on the native-marketing train: Spending on these ads will reach $7.9 billion this year and $21 billion by 2018. Native advertising is expected to expand across numerous online platforms.
Marketers love this form of paid media because it fits organically. Native advertising doesn’t disrupt the user experience, so users can’t differentiate between what is paid advertising and what is part of the site.
The content usually is useful, interesting and targeted to a specific audience — all of which makes it one of the best platforms to launch any marketing campaign.
2. Embrace content marketing.
Content marketing sometimes is confused with native marketing. Though the two often go hand in hand, content marketing is its own beast.
Native marketing is simply another way for marketers to distribute content. Content marketing is a strategic-marketing technique to create and distribute relevant information to attract a target audience. It’s not a paid-and-done transaction, like placing a native ad. Rather, it’s an ongoing process that’s best integrated into an overall marketing strategy.
It can serve as the cornerstone to nearly any marketing plan and works for all types of brands because everyone uses it differently. The key is to be consistent, staying in character for your brand. If that brand voice is clever, interesting or funny, your target audience can’t help but be engaged.
3. Find your target influencer.
We’re now in the midst of an influencer-marketing gold rush. While “influencers” always have been a leading element in marketing, they’re quickly becoming one of the most effective ways to reach customers and clients. That’s especially true on social media.
Influencer marketing gives brands the opportunity to create word-of-mouth buzz through personalities whom consumers already follow and admire. These personalities present a world of possibilities for any marketer savvy enough to channel their power. When influencers are used effectively, they create natural ways to seduce a target audience.
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