The Year 2020 has been a year of change both in the real and virtual world. The massive revolution in the Digital World was extraordinary. Some changes were positive and some negative. It was the time of new normal which seemed impossible before.
The year 2020 was the year of ‘Digital evolution’. Words like Work from Home, Webinars, COVID-19, Social distancing, Quarantine, etc, which we had never heard before became an integral part of our life. It became an essential keyword for digital marketing as customers demanded brands to be more emotionally appealing. It was the time of personalization and responsible marketing which we had never experienced before.
Some changes in the digital world were evident and for some, we had become the part even without knowing it. In this article, we will discuss the major changes and the ruling trends of the year 2020 which will continue to grow in the coming years too.
Changes in Digital World
New Trends of Digital Marketing:
We all saw a world of new normals and new behavioural changes. We began to see uncertainty before us and we were looking for buying things that seemed like a ‘need’ rather than a ‘want’. As a response to this highly changing environment, the digital marketing world made its own set of Products & Services like
- Social distancing Support
- Remote work Support
- Online Education
- Family time Support
- Entertainment and online products
- Necessity and medicinal products
If your brand’s products couldn’t fall in any of these lists, then your brand must have probably failed in the 2020 digital marketing world. Making the products & Services seems like a necessity was the secret market formula digital marketers found.
Increase in Digital Activities:
‘Meet your Customers where they are’ is the motto of now. Every small business had optimized their brands into one or the other Social media platforms where targeted audiences were engaged in. 3.80 billion people were engaged in one or the other social media platforms with a penetration of 49% in the year 2020. Social media is now growing to be the most user engaging platform in the digital world.
One in three users was engaged in creating and uploading videos in the lockdown period. The gross engagement rate in gaming and social media messaging services like Facebook, Messenger, and WhatsApp were huge during this period. As the theatres remained close, many became engaged and addicted to the streaming services like amazon prime and Netflix. Series like Money Heist, Family Man, The Sex Education, The Crown and films released through such OTT platforms were able to attract 18+million subscribers in the year 2020.
Customer Focused Marketing:
- Virtual Accessibility: Customers began demanding everything they have been getting in the real world to be accessible in the virtual world too. This was highly challenging for businesses. The adaptation to new channels in a short time was way beyond manageable for many small businesses.
- Emotionally Attaching and Updated Infos: Customers began expecting brands to be more humane and personalized. The brands that don’t use covid-19 keywords have probably failed to get recognition. The need for updating their whole information related to the pandemic became a necessary aspect.
- Offers and Deductions: People started expecting offers and deductions due to the lockdown. The offers and deduction were seen as the way of getting emotionally appealing to the customers.
E-Commerce Shift:
COVID-19 changed online shopping forever. The year 2020 saw an up stick in e-commerce sales. People began spending increased time online and there had been a massive use of social media. It was a time when Social media marketing saw an immense possibility in e-commerce.
The boom in Affiliate Marketers in Digital World shows the success of Social media marketing. The hiring of digital advisers for the e-commerce market increased as the period of uncertainty demanded experts in the Digital field to plan and launch advertising campaigns and successful strategies. The Ecommerce website saw an increase in website visits and conversion rate during the lockdown period. There was a rush for buying even groceries through eCommerce websites. With a combination of e-commerce and social media, companies have realized that the fusion of these could create wonders.
Visual e-commerce is the trend now with many e-commerce brands creating immersive and interactive content in the e-commerce social media handles.
Digital World Trends you can’t Ignore
If you continue to move with traditional methods and still ignore Darwinism in the Digital world then your brand is going to probably fail in this highly competitive digital world.
Here is the Top 6 Digital Marketing Trends:
- Content Marketing and Personalization:
People want marketing to be personal. We all want one to one real-time connection between the marketer and us. Everywhere we go, we need a feeling of being a part of anything we do even when we are buying a product. Conversational marketing does just that. It gives you an experience of higher engagement and loyalty from the website you are in with a feedback-driven model. No one likes generic advertising blasts now. Every company is challenged to create contents that give a highly personalized experience. The type of content you create, the useful links, and regularly updated information could drive a lot of organic traffic than using SEO. This is why many brands are focusing now on improving the content. Consistent, high-quality content can take your brand far ahead.
Video contents are capturing the interest of people. People not only see but also tend to share video content of brands. There is a huge shift to video content now.
- Influencer Marketing:
- Use of Artificial Intelligence:
If you believe it or not, 2020 was the year where everyone became a part of Artificial Intelligence, although you may not be aware of it. There is much reason why AI is better than normal humans because Artificial Intelligence can analyze a lot of information with accuracy and predict the future far beyond what human nature could grasp.
We are living in times of augmented reality and immersive technology. It has helped to enhance the consumer experience and to boost sales. The predictive analysis of Artificial Intelligence is finding the trends and future of the digital world.
Are you wondering whether you have used Artificial Intelligence?
We all are part of this revolution. The chatbots you can find on every e-commerce website is the by-product of AI. We cannot expect humans to be responding at this fast pace and many of the bots are doing well by responding to you more naturally than normal persons which are helping you well by giving you instant replies.
We already see the dominance of AI in every basic communication, product recommendation, and email and this can be seen as a huge starting point for the dominance of AI everywhere you go.
- Visual & Audio Searches:
- Programmatic Advertising:
- Keyword
- Time of day
- Location
- Social Messaging Apps:
Face-Paced Digital World Changes
At this time of uncertainty, a proactive approach is essential for understanding trends in the Digital World because the digital world is growing more than ever. The digital trends are changing and we have to be assuming trends. The time demanded things that were way beyond adapting. Both the real and virtual world changed rapidly and the need for overnight change was something too far to catch. The traditional marketers had to shift their marketing channels to the digital world. The ones already in the field of the digital world had to introduce something more effective that could make them more differentiated from others.
As it is said, it is not the fittest nor the most intelligent that survives, It is the most adaptable to change and these words have gained momentum in the historical year 2020. Let us learn from these new chapters and upgrade ourself for the new year.