5 Disappearing Digital Marketing Trends that are on their way to Extinction
As we look ahead towards the changing landscape of social media and the internet, it’s clear that digital marketing is in for quite the overhaul. Numerous trends are on way to disappearing and here are just a few.
Long-form, “expert author” e-books
E-books are still a great marketing tool – they’re just going to have to be a little bit shorter. Every year, consuming content gets a little bit faster and a little more instant. To build authority, e-books have their limits. If you’re writing one today, making it short, informative, and to the point is recommended. The days of long-style e-books designed to generate leads is all but dead. Invest that time and effort in other places.
Say bye to an organic Facebook
Facebook’s organic reach has long been seeing diminishing returns. At this point, if you want to reach an audience on Facebook, you’re going to have to enact paid ads. There’s almost no way around it. Sadly, organic reach has come to its end. Even at the current 5-10% organic reach that some brands have today, we can expect it to fall even further in 2018.
Expecting optimized text to do all the work
Long blog posts with big paragraphs filled with keywords are only relevant if they are part of a larger strategy. As a brand’s only method of marketing though, it’s not enough. Beyond just optimizing the text, brands need to be focused on how to create engaging and unique content. Video and images are also more important than ever in building content marketing. This equates to a lot of work and investment that needs to be made in finding ways to optimize at every opportunity.
Doing away with marketing automation
Though some marketing automation is alright, relying on it isn’t. Automation in ads and emails may be seeing their final days as personalization continues to trend upwards. Brands will need to find ways to maintain that human touch to interactions. By implementing personalization, this does make a big impression. Consider adding a more personal touch, and make customers feel special.
Video Ads need to be reduced to under six seconds
The last point on this list of disappearing marketing trends has to do with video ads, which continue to be a growing source of marketing attention. YouTube’s pushing for shorter, more direct video ads in the face of audience disinterest in long-form video advertisements. As a brand, building a small series of six or seven second ads is the smartest approach to using video. In addition to YouTube, Facebook is considering ads of only six seconds in length or shorter. Be concise, practice your short-form, and see video reach whole new segments of the audience.
Much of digital marketing is built off of what’s trending in the marketplace and capitalizing on opportunities to organically reach audiences. As the industry moves more towards paid efforts, it’s important to take advantage, finding the most bang for your buck. In your marketing tool belt, always be thinking about new ways to reach the audience because, at some point, the window closes and when it does, the strategies that were once golden won’t work anymore.
If you’re engaged with any of these digital marketing strategies, know that time may be up. Investing in new ways to reach and build an audience will be key to surviving without these go-tos.
