With the new year in full swing and the pandemic still with us, businesses everywhere are trying to determine which marketing efforts they should focus on to boost brand awareness, drive traffic, and generate leads. We asked the marketing professionals at Webfor and NW Media Collective to share their insights on what trends businesses should keep an eye on in 2022.
Trends To Watch For
Video Marketing
Short, dynamic videos are what capture the attention of busy consumers today. Abby Spyker, CEO at NW Media Collective shares, “The growth of TikTok, Instagram Reels, Facebook stories, and YouTube shorts is increasing demand for video content. Short-form videos (under 90 seconds) will dominate the online marketing space. If you do not currently have a video plan in place for your business, you are missing out on a huge opportunity to connect with customers.”
E-mail Marketing
It is easy to stay in touch with your customers about exciting new things that are happening by using e-mails. But they need to be done the right way. Bombarding their inbox with announcements that they don’t connect with could put you at risk of losing your audience. “E-mail marketing or text messaging tools like Mailchimp can be extremely effective at deepening the relationship with your customers,” says Jason Wright COO and Partner at Webfor. “These e-mails make sure you’re staying in touch and letting them know of anything new with your business.”
Digital Marketing
The pandemic likely re-shaped how you do business and how you’re reaching your client base. And while there was already a very strong trend of moving towards digital marketing, the pandemic fast-tracked this.
Wright said, “Major events like the pandemic can create large shifts in behavior. In this case, it led to an even larger number of people—many that may have chosen not to partake in digital communication—jumping in the deep end. This, along with businesses realizing that if they didn’t have a digital presence, they were going to become extinct, greatly accelerated this move. It’s just the beginning, though. There are more tectonic shifts (metaverse, NFT’s, artificial intelligence, or Web3, for example) to come that businesses can position themselves to take advantage of.”
Marketing Tips
Creating a strong marketing strategy for the new year is essential to ensuring your business stands out in a competitive space. Here are some tips to consider.
Keep the Customer Front and Center
Keeping your customer at the forefront of all marketing plans is what will determine if your efforts are successful or not. Wright says, “You should have an in-depth customer centric marketing strategy, where your customer is the ‘North Star’. When you understand your customer at the deepest level and how they use different channels and tools, then it’s not that hard to get the right message in front of them in the right places and at the right times.
Know How to Maximize Your Budget
Once you determine what your marketing budget is for the year, you will need to ensure you maximize every dollar. Spyker says that one of the best ways to do that is by finding out where your customers ‘hang out.’
She says, “Where your potential customers spend time online determines which platforms to use. Each platform will have a suite of supporting tools to help you optimize your campaigns. For example, if you get leads through your website, you’ll want to make sure you’re using Google Analytics to track where your users come from, how they navigate through your site, and what causes them to convert. Using Google Analytics data, you can optimize your customer’s journey and increase conversions while also lowering costs. Then, the best marketing strategies integrate all of your audience’s favorite online spaces.”
Ask the Professionals
Running a business often means relying on others that have different areas of expertise. Working with people that know the innerworkings of marketing is something that could benefit your company both in the short-term and long-term.
Wright recommends, “Whether you have a large internal marketing team or are a one person show, having a trusted partner that is there to ensure your strategy is successful is the best way to start the year strong. One new insight can totally change your business for the better.”
