5 Digital Marketing Trends to Dominate Your Competition in 2019

Web based advertising, generally referred to as digital marketing, changes like crazy from year to year. When you think about it, it was just over 20 years ago that Google didn’t even exist, and less than 10 years since Instagram was just a twinkle in Mike and Kevin’s eyes and yet today if you’re selling goods or services online these two platforms are your best friend.

In December last year I posted an article on three tips to make the internet work for you, but today I thought we would focus on online marketing trends and strategies. What worked for you a year ago won’t necessarily work for you this year or next. What got you this far won’t get you to where you need to be.

Leads you acquire, sales you get or the clients you draw in are the soul of your business, and it’s never a wise move to hedge your bets on one advertising channel and anticipate your profits to soar.

Your ability to build trust with your potential customers or clients is a major determining factor when persuading them that you’re the business to buy from. You need to convince them you are the right choice, the most relevant and the most reliable. This is exactly what these five digital marketing strategies can help you do!

 

1: Relevancy, relevancy, relevancy

For years you may have been collecting email addresses and adding them to a massive marketing list, and while that still has its place your customers are starting to unsubscribe. I know you’ve noticed this. But why? It’s not that you’re doing anything wrong with your email campaigns; it’s just they’re not relevant to them anymore.

In 2019, relevance is what is going to get you business. If you’re looking to expand and grow this year and generate more and more leads you are going to need to focus on building a greater level of intimacy and relevancy with your communications. Providing the right solution, to the right people, at the right time.

I know that sounds difficult and I’m not telling you it’s easy. But let’s consider a client of ours, Stella Beauty, who sell cruelty free beauty products through their WooCommerce store. How can we make sure that we get in front of the right people at the right time? Well firstly, don’t throw away your email list, let’s keep that handy and use it anyway. But consider the time of year, what beauty products are people likely to purchase during summer? Perhaps a waterproof mascara or water-resistant sunscreen. Brilliant, focus on those products, create a story or a narrative around them and put it out there to drive traffic specifically to those offerings.

2: People crave attention, give it to them

Think quickly about the term social media. We all know what it is, but do we understand it? Yes it’s a collection of different online services where we can make friends and talk with other people or share things that amuse us; but it’s also a tool for self-fulfillment, somewhere we go to feel good about ourselves and our lives by interacting with people or organisations which have similar beliefs and morals.

The key word there was “interacting”. As a business you should take the time to engage your audience on social media, get them involved with what you do. Ask them questions, ask for their opinion, even ask for their help with something. Interactions between your business and your customers will help solidify your name in their mind and they’ll remember you for it. So don’t just throw an image up on Facebook and think your job is done. Engage your audience. People are overwhelmed by the amount of information and messages that are just thrown in their face on the internet so you need to stick out. Do something that grabs their attention and gets them to interact with you in a positive way.

No longer can you just force your message out and push it to as many people as far and wide as you can. You have to get your message in front of the right people and let them push it to their friends and then their friends, all the time your name is being shown to more and more of the right people.

About the Author

Founder

I’ve always believed that each business is unique. Bringing this view to Mars Digital means we take the time to understand you and your business before going away, doing the research and coming back to you with our thought out recommendations and the reasoning behind them.

For me, it’s all about building a mutually beneficial partnership.

Our Work

Destination Orewa Beach
Destination Orewa Beach

Destination Orewa Beach

Comprehensive Care
Comprehensive Care

Comprehensive Care

Coast Residential
Coast Residential

Coast Residential

Cain Built
Cain Built

Cain Built

Daylite Skylights
Daylite Skylights

Daylite Skylights

3D Online
3D Online

3D Online

JC Project Consulting
JC Project Consulting

JC Project Consulting

Taxi Tax
Taxi Tax

Taxi Tax

Trident Electrical & Air Conditioning
Trident Electrical & Air Conditioning

Trident Electrical & Air Conditioning

Zakmir
Zakmir

Zakmir

Hibiscus Coast Panel Beaters
Hibiscus Coast Panel Beaters

Hibiscus Coast Panel Beaters

Stella Beauty
Stella Beauty

Stella Beauty

Osteo Clinic
Osteo Clinic

Osteo Clinic

3: Be everywhere

I touched on this at the beginning of the post, but you can’t hedge your bets in advertising. Just doing some digital marketing on Facebook doesn’t work, just doing SEO doesn’t work. Yes, don’t get me wrong, they help and you will get you a lead or two but if you can, be everywhere.

In marketing, there is something referred to as the Rule of 7, which states that a prospect needs to hear or see your message a minimum of seven times before taking action.

Again it isn’t about appearing everywhere for everything and to everyone, it’s about being in the right place at the right time and targeting the right people. The everyone, everywhere approach would just bankrupt your business, it’s costly and futile. What you need to do is target the same audience across multiple platforms, Google AdsSEO, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and so forth. That’s not to mention that not all your potential customers will be on every platform, so if you picked just one you might end up pigeonholing yourself and missing out on a huge number of potential customers.

So spread yourself out, be everywhere. This approach gives you credibility and helps build rapport. When your target market starts seeing your name more and more, they start to feel like they know you, like you and trust you.

4: Modernise your marketing funnel

You can’t fabricate a sense of urgency anymore. We’ve all experienced so many marketing ploys that put us through a step by step process and ultimately ask us to buy. Your potential customers have grown numb to your old tactics and they just don’t care anymore. And no, I’m not saying that a sale doesn’t work or that having “Only 2 left!” on your product page is going to make people scoff, I’m saying you need to personalise your long game marketing funnels. Turn them into an experience that builds trust.

It used to be that throwing up an indication of scarcity like “Only 2 left!” or countdown timers on sales would work, but your audience has become wise. They know you’ll get more stock, they know you’ll have another sale, perhaps even a better one. So it’s really down to you and engaging your customers the right way; getting the relevant message in front of them at the right time. Do this and you’ll break any sales records you have.

5: Concentrate on the long game

It used to be that your ad spend would lead to direct sales and that was how you would measure its success, but not any longer. More and more frequently we’re seeing businesses get the most out of their campaigns by focusing their promotion spend on brand awareness.

It’s not to say making new leads isn’t vital, obviously, it is quite the opposite. What I’m saying here is that there is a massive return on investment that is effectively invisible to your ad campaigns. If you’re an ecommerce store you can look at the lifetime value of a customer quite easily, but what is it worth to get another customer of the same value? This is what brand awareness campaigns focus on; creating lifetime customers.

It’s all about your business becoming the recognisable authority for a particular market or niche. Building trust and becoming that definitive expert. Brand awareness campaigns aim at spending say $100 for a customer that might spend $1000 every year. Whereas lead campaigns are about finding the quick sale, a customer willing to spend a one-off $70 for your $10 ad.

Conclusion

Its time to change your approach. Treat your customers and clients like individuals, and when you do, you’ll find they return your intimacy with loyalty beyond anything you can imagine.

If you need help putting this into action or don’t even know where to start, Mars Digital can help. Get in touch with us for your free consultation today.

 

Marketing out of this world