SEO

A drastic change has been observed in the last few years. While digital marketing strategies evolved. As 2024 is approaching, the digital marketers started picking up the right place to get ready for new strategic updates. You can no longer ignore these digital marketing trends.

This high-tech digital marketing era considers artificial intelligence, machine learning, social media automation, marketing automation, programmatic advertising, and a lot more.

So, let’s discuss 10 key digital marketing trends you should watch out for going into 2024:

Search Engine Optimization Trends to Focus on

SEO is the foremost part of digital marketing and yet remains a mystery for digital marketers as one can’t get enough of it. Just when you think you’ve made the right strategy for your SEO, Google updates the algorithm. Such situations demand that you consider a few ground rules to prepare yourself for the upcoming trends.

Google shopping, which was a free service earlier, is now a paid feature since Google began commercializing its searches and results. The top search engine spots were organic. Now again, it’s paid. Unaware of this transition, Google’s audience continues to stick to the top results.

You have to be extremely agile in picking up the plan to stay ahead of the competition.

Do you know what’s coming up? 

Google receives over 63,000 searches per second on any given day. That’s the average figure of how many people use Google a day, which translates to at least 2 trillion searches per year, 3.8 million searches per minute, 228 million searches per hour, and 5.6 billion searches per day.

Google updates its algorithm almost every day without any prior announcement or notice. This makes it very difficult for digital marketers to cope up with the fluctuating (can consider using dynamic in place of fluctuating) SEO updates. Google enhances its search results every now and then. ML-based pattern analysis probes the search queries to answer in a particular manner.

Have you noticed that if you look something up on Google in the form of a question, it throws up a featured snippet? In the same manner, it gives a precise list of tools if you look for a list. It uses featured snippets to enhance its results if you try to pull up specific names or stats.

Those days are long gone when you would optimize the sites for keywords and make necessary arrangements to tailor the page according to those keywords. The smart, AI-powered search engine now analyses the website with respect to the nature of particular search terms and organizes the search results to provide the most relevant information on SERP.

Some major digital marketing trends you should be ready for in 2024

#1 Blockchain in Search Engine Advertising

#2 Artificial Intelligence in Customer Engagement

#3 Machine Learning in Digital Marketing Strategy 

#4 Augmented Reality (AR) / Virtual Reality (VR) Advertising 

#5 Visual Search or QR Code Technology

#6 Security Compliance to Protect Customer Data

#7 Predictive Analytics & Multi-channel Attribution

#8 Omni-channel Marketing

#9 Mobile-first Indexing

#10 Video optimization for SERP

So, Let’s discuss each of the trends in detail.

#1 Blockchain in Search Engine Advertising

Isn’t it amazing that advertisers can directly connect with publishers to advertise the brand and pay them fairly? Yes, it could happen with blockchain technology. Blockchain evolving the way people were doing advertisements lately.

In programmatic advertising, blockchain going to play a major role in the next quarter. Big firms are already working, making it happen. A lot of blockchain developers are implementing applications and blocks to increase the efficiency of payment systems in advertising and Book Publishing Services.

Source: singlegrain.com

Blockchain brings transparency, reduces the extra cost or commission to the platform, and increases profits through search engine marketing or advertising.

Source: economictimes

#2 Artificial Intelligence in Customer Engagement

AI-powered tools will be supporting customer engagement with the help of virtual assistants, automated calls, customer feedback analysis, and audience behavior analysis, helping customers provide the required information for a better customer experience.

AI tools are automating campaigns based on past trends and helping digital marketers make the right decisions. Generating helpful customer insights and giving the right support is the value AI tools bring to an organization.

AI bots – Chatbots going to take place instead of human interaction with the customer for each and every query.

AI Analytics – Analyzing the customer data and making the insights to help marketers in campaign planning and strategy.

#3 Machine Learning in Digital Marketing Strategy 

The days are gone when digital marketers were sitting and analyzing a huge collection of data and reports to develop the right marketing strategy. Now, machine learning brings a change in analysis and reporting. ML-powered tools will help with generating the right insights based on the customer’s data and testing new strategies to define the failure or success of any campaign. Some major areas where ML playing a big role:

• Better search engine results – Question answers, featured snippets, lists, videos, etc.
• Lead scoring – Analyzing the consumer touch-points and assessing the lead quality
• Data analysis and reporting – Campaign recommendation based on the data
• Trends analysis – Analysis of the past data and generating insights for decision-making.
• Natural language processing – Sentiment analysis
• Content personalization & recommendation – Syndicating the right content to the right audience for better engagement.
• Customer servicing – Studies indicate that 57% of major executives believe this is the area where machine learning can be most beneficial.

Source: digimarcon

Even different marketing & advertising platforms already started exploring the opportunities to implement machine learning on their channels. Like Google searches are now smarter and more accurate; the search engine now understands the nature of the query and gives the desired results for better engagement. ML-powered engines are now working on their algorithms to provide better data and insights.

#4 Augmented Reality (AR) / Virtual Reality (VR) Advertising

If you have recently noticing 3d advertisements are going viral on the internet, and advertisers are enjoying the attention to these new advertising strategies.

Recently Coca-Cola came up with the augmented reality campaign. In this campaign, they used animated AR stories for branding

#5 Visual Search or QR Code Technology

By using visual recognition technology and smart image processing market players like Google Lens, Pinterest, Snapchat Filters, and Samsung’s Bixby Vision, brought a huge transformation in the traditional way of digital marketing.

Visual searches are very common these days, but now the bigger challenge is how you will leverage this technology to build your brand and drive traffic to your website. Now even your camera could work as a search bar for your search queries.

Now companies using this technology to leverage their paid campaigns and website traffic. Like Google image search, Bing visual searches are driving huge traffic to the sites by using image recognition technology.

#6 Security Compliance to Protect Customer Data

GDPR, CCPA, and other security compliance are making online data safe and secure to use. Now marketers can’t misuse the audience data for black hat digital marketing techniques. They can’t capture the behavioral data without consent.

The regulatory authorities are now taking more precautionary actions and initiatives to secure the data available online. Now you can’t just buy and sell the customer data without their concern. A lot of compliance is coming the way of digital marketers.

#7 Predictive Analytics & Multi-channel Attribution

Predictive analytics and multi-channel attribution platforms are gaining popularity and will continue to do so in 2024 too. These concepts are based on data mining and machine learning to help marketers make decisions, and predict future events based on the data.

Source: Revuze

The predictive analytics platform helps you prove ROI and improve results. Tools like TrackMaven, Adobe marketing cloud, and TapClicks help you track the conversion from various channels, and help you understand cross-channel attribution.  These tools can increase customer retention rates by 10-15%.

Marketing attribution software that shows the impact of every customer interaction that the business participates in.

#8 Omni-channel Marketing

Omni-channel marketing is not new, but it’s still an area where digital marketers are figuring out ways to utilize Omni-channel marketing. A customer wants to connect with a brand on various channels, everyone is not everywhere, but every potential consumer is available on some digital platforms.

Omni-channel marketing allows you to explore those platforms where you can engage your audience, and give them a delightful brand experience, and you can retain the customers by being in touch with them.

According to the ClickZ survey –

Source: clickz.com

Customer retention rates: 90% higher for omnichannel vs single-channel

#9 Mobile-first Indexing:

Even before checking the desktop version of your website, Google first inspects the mobile version of your website even before checking its desktop version. By doing so, it gives preference to the sites that have a higher mobile speed test score. You can test your website here: https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/

How frequently do you run the mobile-friendly test or mobile page speed test on your website?

Google does not penalize your site if it’s not mobile-friendly, but if you check your website’s analytics, you will find that more than 50% of visitors land on your website through a mobile device. If your site is not mobile-friendly, your ranking will be lower than your competitors.

Making a light version of your website, which loads in a fraction of a second, could bring a lot more traffic to your website. It enhances the customers’ experience when on the site.

Who does it impact the most?

People make searches for local businesses using their mobile devices most of the time. For eg.,- if you are offering home-décor or plumbing services or are running a café in the area, you are most likely to get impacted by not having a mobile-friendly business website. But it’s a good idea for all business owners to make their sites mobile-friendly.

Make sure you follow these guidelines while making your website mobile friendly:

• The buttons should be bigger and clean – It will help users to click on the right call-to-action
• The image should be compressed. You can use tiny png or jpg files, which reduce the image size by 80-85%. It reduces the load time too. Squoosh is a tool you can use for this.

#10 Video optimization for SERP

Google’s smart AI pattern analysis and natural language processing system analyses the videos to find the right fit for video searches. Adding the right structured markup when uploading a video on your webpage helps Google understand the most relevant video content to display in the search results.

The title must be descriptive and relevant to what exactly the video contains. Adding a transcript with the video, providing major highlights covered in the video, etc., helps viewers understand the nature and relevance of the video. However, Google’s text-matching algorithm is capable of extracting insights from the video itself, so it’s better to provide well-prepared information to Google.

Conclusion: Are you prepared for digital marketing in 2024?

Your strategy should be continuously updated in accordance with the changing market trends. You can’t win without having the right digital marketing strategy on your plate. Search engine optimization is a major player that gets you more business through digital marketing in the long run.

AI, ML, and Blockchain technologies are transforming the traditional way of digital marketing. Being updated with the latest tools and platforms to leverage your digital marketing strategy would be the right choice. Exploring the different aspects of digital marketing by experimenting with each platform will help you stay ahead of the competition.

• Need help with your SEO!

If we think through the popularity of Facebook and its connection to human beings, it is easy to conclude that Facebook ads have a considerable role to play in the world of digital marketing. While many marketers are running a successful ad campaign on Facebook, some are tired of spending countless money without little or no success.

It starts with an idea, converted into a thoughtful campaign, with unique images, great content, and added value. But sooner or later the campaign fails and even after various trials there’s no sign of success. As a result, a feeling of disappointment starts creeping in.  

However, Facebook ads are beneficial for ecommerce virtual assistant. And what if I told you that you could create a successful Facebook ad by following the tips mentioned in this blog post. Especially if you have just started and you are keen on reaching a maximum no of audiences. 

In this blog post, I will explain some tips that will help you run a successful ad campaign on Facebook. Especially if you are in the e-commerce business. Let’s begin.

Write a Powerful Ad Copy

Let me start by quoting the words of Joseph Sugarman. He once said that “all the elements in an advertisement are primarily designed to do one thing and one thing only: get you to read the first sentence of the copy.” This is very true of the nature of an advertisement.

The opening line of the copy will make or mar your ad campaign. This also means that your copy has to be convincing. Every word that you write should capture the attention of the reader. You can start with a promise or give a reliable solution to the problem. After all, people click on an ad because it is helping them find a solution to their problem. As far Facebook Ads’ importance is concerned for eCommerce brands, it goes like this the way a professional courier service is important for post-purchase customer experience, Facebook Ads is important for pre-purchase customer experience with the brand. 

So, don’t stuff in keywords and think your ad will do wonders. People will only click on an ad if they find it meaningful and powerful at the same time. Another way to write a brilliant Facebook ad copy is through emotional triggers. The reason for using emotions is simple. People are often driven by emotions over logic. They will click on your ad because somehow it managed to arouse the feeling of surprise, fear, joy, or tears. Therefore, you have to write an ad copy that serves the aforementioned purpose.

Let us put this into perspective, imagine you were creating a copy to trigger a specific emotion in audiences. What will you do? A straightforward way is to provide the audience with something they cannot ignore. Like giving an irresistible offer, a brilliant deal, including the fear of being left out or representing figures they cannot ignore.

Although it might take you some time to come up with a fresh idea, once you do, the ad will definitely help you boost sales.

Use GIFs in Facebook Ads 

A few years ago, Facebook started allowing the use of GIFs on Facebook Ads. There is no doubt that GIFs are eye-catching, and they perform much better than a simple image. With the help of the GIPHY feature provided by Facebook, you can create a GIF that lasts up to ten seconds. This is perfect because the attention span of people is concise, and it is complicated to capture someone’s attention instantly.

So, when you use this feature to create a GIF, make sure you first fix the start and endpoints for your GIF with the help of sliders. And then use the time-fields to adjust the length of the GIF. In addition to this, while making a GIF, you have to be careful about the transition. It cannot be abrupt, so ensure that you see the GIF again and again to build a smooth transition. You can also include a call to action at the end of the content by using the caption feature made available by Facebook.

Not only this but according to Facebook, shorter videos get complete views compared to longer videos. So, anyone who is capable of thinking logically will definitely incline towards what is trending, and GIFs definitely rank no one on this list. This is why the next step is to use this feature to create maximum engagement.

Showcase several products with multi-product advertisements

Just like using the same old strategy never works for marketers, nor will it work in the case of Facebook ads. There are so many features that Facebook provides you to make your ads more attractive. One of the highlights is displaying several products with the help of a single campaign. This campaign can be successful because of the following reasons:

The more you give to your audience, the happier they will be. Multi-product advertisements serve the same purpose. You can boost the conversion rate by showcasing more products. This also means that you are providing your customers with several choices. Instead, the customer will likely click on the ad to see the different types of products you in store for them.

More vitally, several marketers are of the view that this type of ad works better than several other ads. This feature, if used to its best potential, can help any business owner gain profit.

According to a study, many companies witnessed a 300% increase in their click-through rates only because they used the multi-products feature in their Facebook ad campaign. Also, an adobe study revealed that the increase in click-through rates for several brands was due to these ads. It skyrocketed straight from 50% to 300%.

In addition to this, marketers who are using this strategy to run their ad campaigns have seen a 35% surge in the CPC (Cost Per Click) rate. It is solely due to the fact that people are engaging more in multi-product advertisements over others. Now, give some food to your thought and experiment with this ad feature, which can be really helpful for e-commerce businesses.

Build a FB retargeting campaign

There is one thing that I noticed a few years ago. After adding a few products to the cart, I used to leave the website and then abandon the cart entirely. In fact, this happens most eCommerce businesses these days. Potential customers add products to the cart and then leave without buying anything. This is evident when all the order data is exported and some say not having advanced shipping rules can be the cause of it.

Not only this but these customers also never come back to repurchase the products. A few might, but the rest of them will leave the cart until they come back again to buy a different product altogether. However, this means that most e-commerce businesses are losing an opportunity to increase the conversion rate.

So, in such cases, you have to think about a way to get those customers back. If not all, but at least half of them. This is exactly where you can use the magic of Facebook ads for e-commerce by using a retargeting campaign.

In other words, by using a retargeting campaign, you are inviting customers who are interested in your product. This technique also works best as a reminder. As soon as the ad appears on the screen, he or she will be reminded of the product left in the cart.

Thus, make a list of those products that people often leave in the cart and then run a retargeting campaign. You can use offers, coupons, and discounts and invite the potential customer to buy the products at a lesser price — a win-win situation for both you and the customer.

Think of Facebook ads as a long term investment 

Most people tend to ignore the fact that Facebook ads are not short-term investments. They want quick results, and when that doesn’t happen, most people just give the idea of running a Facebook ad campaign. However, long-term planning is essential because you are not looking at opportunities that come with Facebook ads.

Let me give you an example. In order to make quick and big bucks, you created a campaign for a $30 product. The campaign was intriguing and captured the attention of many customers, but you had to spend $60 to obtain the customer. If anyone reads this, they will think that this is not good for eCommerce services. First, because you are spending an extra $30 on a single customer, second, you are not earning any profit after that is the whole point of running a business gaining profit.

But think again and ask yourself. Is generating profit the only aim of a business? In my personal opinion, the answer is no because customer lifetime value matters a lot these days. And, especially if you want to stay at the forefront in the long run. In such a case, even if you lost $30, you earned one customer, and a customer’s value is more than the loss you might have faced. Also, in the long run, you will have that customer buying several other products from you. So, the situation may sound a bit dicey, but if you build your campaign around this strategy, you will be able to attract a lot of potential customers.

Utilize video advertisements

Videos are here to stay for a long-long time. The power of video has been recently found, but nowadays, everyone is using it to boost their website traffic. So, why not use the same videos in Facebook ads as well. In fact, did you know that Facebook prioritizes video content? If not, now you do, and you should definitely use videos to build your next Facebook campaign for e-commerce advertisements.

This also means that you can now build an ad that has more chances of ending up in a news feed. Also, videos have the potential to create engagement, and they are lively. People are more likely to stop and watch a video than pictures of products. Statistics show that most Facebook users watch a video and hence the reason why Facebook gives more preference to video ads.

Interestingly, Facebook has an ingenious way to show video ads. As soon as one lands on a video ad, it starts playing instantly. In turn, it catches the attention of the user, and as an e-commerce business owner, that is what you need. This is why using videos as a platform to create Facebook ads is a great idea. Even you can do the same, but make sure that you create a smart campaign first.

Your videos should be appropriately formatted, and they should be related to your business. Try and engage the customers by triggering emotions, as mentioned at the beginning of the blog. This will also allow you to create video content that is less promoting and more value-driven.

Stop creating sales posts all the time

It is pretty easy to understand that e-commerce businesses are all about selling products. However, it is not mandatory to create product selling ads all the time. If you posted a product ad yesterday, try something different today. You can make a campaign to give away products and ask your customers to tag their friends on the same.

These types of ads come as a refresher and people don’t get tired of seeing the same old product selling ads. You can also play a game with your customers or ask them a question. This way, you will also increase the chances of creating better engagement.

It is also vital to note that people stay away from repeated advertisements. But if anything new appears on their news feed, they will definitely give it a try. This is to say that sometimes you can post something creative and informational and provide value to your customers.

You can post a business event and convey the information to your customers in a creative way. For example, if you are a clothing brand, tell them about a fashion show you are about to organize. The collection that you will bring out and what new pieces you have introduced this time. Altogether this campaign will not be dull, and you will not be selling your clothes directly.

Don’t leave the previous posts unattended 

It is understandable that your previous ad posts have not worked wonders for you. But ignoring them is not a wise decision and neither it is easy to make a new campaign every time. You can learn from past failures and reorganize the need to change your strategy. However, you will never be sure of the success of a newly created campaign. And it is wise to stay cautious of the road not taken. In other words, it is okay to boost existing posts.

This is one of the old but useful ways to use Facebook ads for e-commerce. So, how will you go about it? First and foremost, look at the posts that have higher user engagement and then put that post in the forefront again. This way, you will stay safe from facing the failure of running an entirely new campaign. Although it is not necessary that a new campaign might fail, it’s better to be safe than sorry.

Using this feature, you can select a post. Next, use it to promote among people who have already liked the post and who will see it for the first time. This way, you will serve a large no. of audiences. And the chances are you will be able to perform as well as you showed earlier.

Create impressive ad offers 

This is actually an obvious step, and every e-commerce business should abide by it. In fact, Facebook is not the only platform for giving offers. I am sure you use several other platforms to make an offer or tell your customers about discount coupons. But then again, you should also use Facebook ads to drive more sales.

People love offers, and I have personally seen malls filled with people during the sale season. While informing people through Facebook ads might seem a good idea, also ensure that you use this platform to its utmost potential. Who knows, if your campaign receives success, you might end up gaining several customers.

So, start by creating an ad that talks about a discount offer. But be creative as hell and include the necessary details. You just have to make sure that you offer the discount you promised in your ad. Because false promises might give you temporary profit, but in the long run, you will lose a chain of loyal customers.

In addition to this, adding offers to Facebook is really simple. Facebook comes with an offer feature. You can click on the function and make your own campaign. Don’t forget to mention the timeline, what kind of products you are offering, and a solid opening headline.

After a customer clicks on your ad, they should be able to get a coupon code, which they will use while making the final purchase. Now, another advantage of using this campaign is that you can analyze the no. of people who used the offer.

This way, you have the opportunity to improvise and offer more discounts in the near future. And it is also an excellent way to convince people to come and buy from you.

It’s now your turn to create a Facebook ad 

Now that you know what you can do to boost sales of your e-commerce business, create your own campaign right away and ensure that you follow the above-mentioned points carefully. I know for some, it might take some time to achieve the desired results. But if you do everything right and do not give up easily, you will start heading on the path of success and profit. Also make sure you are using the right tools like keyword search tool, CPM calculator, and analytics to get the most out of your Facebook ads.

Lead Generation Services 4 Your Business

It may seem to a novice that the marketing of a mobile application consists of buying traffic and a couple of reviews in specialized editions. Then the app gets to the top, the traffic flows like water, and the owner counts the revenue. But in reality, it is much more complicated. In this article, I will briefly describe all the main stages of mobile promotion – I will conduct a course on a young fighter, and 43 checked-up marketing tips on mobile development.

1. Use cross-promotion in related categories

Mobile applications will benefit from multi-brand promotions with a similar target audience. During the promotion, projects become equal partners, which are united by common advertising budgets or goals.

2. Replace “Run Soon” with “Add to Waiting List”

Often developers first launch an application only for one operating system and then develop it for another. When you see the “Soon Launch” button, you may forget about your application by the time of the presentation. Try to add the entry form to the waiting list for iOS to the landing page when launching the application, for example, on Android. By the time the app is launched on iOS, you will have a lead database.

3. Make a preliminary PR using competitor analysis

PR is one of the tools of the preliminary stage of promotion. Do research on who and what articles have been published about your competitors. Then send a comparative analysis of your product and competitors to these publications and/or journalists and show them your chips. You may be interested in the editorial team and get involved at an early stage of the application launch.

4. Run a domino effect

Make sure that at least one known edition reviews your application. Then use the publication to get more free reviews.

5. Get at least five reviews

Collect at least five ratings to rate the updated version of the application. The cost of engaging the user is reduced when the application has high ratings. How to get these grades? To run each version with a five-star rating, call your family. Seriously – ask friends and family to try the app and leave a review.

6. Get a feature in the app stores

Featuring is getting into the collection of the best apps from AppStore or Google Play. Networking is a reliable way to promote the product in the list of recommended applications from the store. Participate in industry-specific events and network with industry experts. LinkedIn and cold emails can work too.

7. Implement the latest app store requirements to get into the recommendations

Maintain a good working relationship with your category manager on AppStore and Google Play. And be sure to be interested in the plans and technologies of platform development. This way, you will know which features and chips of the application should be paid attention to in the first place. So, you will be able to get a better chance to get into the recommended ones.

8. Use mutual advertising to promote the application

If you’re starting from scratch and with a minimal budget, do it creatively and talk to everyone you know. Find out whether it is possible to work on barter – you advertise the partners’ application, and they respectively promote yours. If you have compiled a database of first users, find out what they like in your application and maximize this feature.

9. Use communities like Product Hunt and Hacker News

If there is a problem, then there are users who discuss it. You may find that these issues have been addressed by users on StackOverflow and Hacker News, for example. In addition, if one of the opinion leaders gets involved in the discussion of your product on Product Hunt, it will attract the attention of others, and you will be able to count on a certain number of views and new users. Find your customers’ communities, communicate with them more, and feel free to attract users from forums and blogs.

10. Before launching the product, test the application in one region

If your application is not geo-referenced, try testing it on a smaller market. For example, U.S. startups often present products first for Australia or New Zealand. Soft launch – bringing a product to a limited segment with no advertising costs, so you can learn how users react. In addition to the information received from the soft lunch, you will still be able to get the feature on the market. So, the launch will be smooth and will help to improve the product.

11. Run video ads

The video works very well. And bids for static ads are significantly different from bids on video ads for Facebook or Instagram.

12. Implement SEO for applications

Search engines are a powerful market research tool. Along with ASO, still consider SEO. Even if you don’t have a website, optimize your landing page. ASO (App Store Optimization) – optimization of mobile applications to increase the position of the application in the ranking of stores on key requests, as well as the growth of organic installations after viewing the application page. There are many ASO Tools on the market that can help you improve your App ranking.

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13. Find Mobile Moments

Mobile Moments – actions or events that are more successful in a mobile application than in a desktop version of the product.

14. Give users more useful information before downloading

One of the main tricks is to increase the amount of useful information. For example, the user wants to find a good restaurant and chooses which restaurant guide to download. An advantage will be given to an application that is convenient on a smartphone. Will provide more content (photos, reviews, and so on).

15. Do not wind up the application settings

Many developers spend millions on paid installations, but they are useless users – they will go away. You just throw away the money. Many developers lose users precisely on registrations.

16. Train users to work with the application from the moment of registration

Most apps try to make the registration process as painless as possible. This is a bad idea. You will spend more attention than you will get from the user. It is better to consider registration as a learning process. Don’t stop at just explaining how your product works: tell your customers how to use the application right away.

17. Work on application performance

The moment of attention is the most important part when working with a mobile app. If it takes a few seconds to download, people will go to another application.

• Recommended metrics for tracking
• App crash rate – hold it below 2% and reduce it as the application is improved
• API latency – focus on about 1 second when loading
• End-to-end application latency – focus on about 1 second at boot time

18. Fill in the user data beforehand

The conversion grows when you fill in the user name or address on Twitter in advance.

19. Think of convenient navigation for the user in the application

Imagine that as long as the user is in your application, he or she travels extensively. Make this time as pleasant as possible from start to finish. Do not pursue the user immediately, trying to return him back to the application, and do not bomb with alerts. Instead, wait for a few hours and remind them of their latest activities in the app, so you can increase your chances of getting back.

20. Personalize the app for the user

It’s incredibly important to create the right model of user behavior in the application. If you don’t make the right first impression and give the user what he or she is looking for, he or she will close the application immediately and is unlikely to reopen it. With the help of deep links, you can personalize your first experience of using your application and automatically apply the necessary advertising offers. For example, welcome new users by name and unobtrusively lead them to the content they came for.

21. Correct user behavior in the application

The first steps in the appendix are really crucial. Don’t think that all your users behave the same way. Instead, study their actions in the application. Some will be quite familiar with the application, while others will not know what to expect after the application is loaded. Do not ask users to provide all data at once. First, allow time to get used to the product, and to test it in different situations.

22. Use the soft launch to promote

65% of users forget about the application on the second day after downloading and 95% – during the first week. Users who have become acquainted with the product through the demo version are three times more likely to buy a paid version. Take advantage of the fact: let the user try out all the premium features of the app before purchasing it. To do this, generate a short-term promotional code or time limit the demo version.

23. Communicate with users in the app

App developers often miss the dialogue between users and developers – especially when the first 100 or 1000 people downloaded the application. And this is the most appropriate time to build a community. Users aren’t likely to post to you on Twitter and Facebook: switching between channels is a great distraction. As long as the users are in the app, it’s easier to start a conversation with them. In the beginning, their community is you. So take the initiative and change communication strategies over time. Talk to your users before they come to the choir with bad reviews.

24. Decline the demo mode during registration

Users give their data without any problems and make little effort to register. But for this, they want to use a fully functional application at a real cost. Therefore, offering them a demo version at the time of registration is not worth it.

25. The key to success is to retain users for the first three days

The importance of the early days after the download cannot be overestimated. Applications win or lose the battle for the user at this stage. Then, both top-end applications and not-so, follow along the same path. But if you were able to keep a high percentage of user retention in the first three days after downloading, then the application’s popularity growth is 131 times higher.

26. Immediately after downloading the app, send educational pop-up notifications

Push notifications are an effective learning tool. Within the first week after downloading the app, send notifications to the user with quick tips on how to use the product.

27. Focus on user retention, not on attracting new users

Don’t be aggressive until you’ve figured out how to keep your customers interested. Otherwise, you run the risk of discouraging loyal users of the product: it is unlikely that a person will come back if once they are already disappointed in the application.

28. Don’t forget to send inflammatory emails

E-mail is an active communication channel (especially for applications). Just remind customers of promotions, events, changes, or new content. And if you personalize your emails, it’s great.

29. Use email newsletters as an MVP tool

If you are not an eCommerce company that makes a profit on every conversion, it is difficult to justify the cost of expensive tools. One of the easiest ways to do A/B testing is to use MVP email.

30. Get quality users

The most important thing for games at an early stage is the quality of users and community building. Once you have a critical mass of clients, start focusing on virality and targeting your target audience.

31. Personalize pop-up notifications

Make each individual notification personal – it concerns either the user’s published content or recommended content based on previously posted material. Be careful with the general notices you send to thousands of users. Make sure that each notification is based on user data. View each notification as an experiment and measure whether it helps to retain users or simply wastes their time.

32. Don’t be afraid to use push-notifications

Email and pop-up notifications are the best channels for interaction. You shouldn’t be too keen on push notifications, but you don’t have to say no. Most users love notifications, and those who can’t stand them will turn them off. Experiment and track the results.

33. Use geographic alerts

If you need to bring a user from the application offline (restaurant, shop, office, etc.), geo notifications will be a great help. Notifications will remind the customer of the product if they are nearby. Of course, the marketer needs to learn how to set up GPS and performance properly, but it’s worth it.

34. Involve users with features

The application is effective if people cannot imagine their day without it. Implement features so that users want to return to the app again and again. For example, set obstacles or goals (something like a game). But don’t overdo it – tons of features are usually harmful.

35. Run a simple A/B test

First of all, learn how to test ideas quickly. To simply manage A/B testing, find a balance of resources or time constraints. Real-time tests are just one way to check.

• You can also test the efficiency
• Types of content
• Types of personalization
• Email or push-notifications
• Communicate with the user

36. Use different virality

Viral content – content that makes the user want to repost it and share it with other users. Most companies face so-called harmful virality when asking users to bring friends and get a discount.

But there are other types:

Users on their own initiative advise their friends on the application; demonstrate virality – loyal users, share content from your application or the application itself.

37. Find out how users share your application

For example, when users share application screenshots, the conversion is much higher than the “Share” button. Learn how people can best discuss your application and use these ways to move forward.

38. Give users the content they want to share

It’s not so much about your application’s sharing as it is about the content that users have seen/heard/read/created inside the app. Remember, for example, Snapchat. Think about the motivations of the customers and tie them to the uniqueness of the product.

39. Focus on text messages, not sharing

Text messages have the highest conversion rate. Even though the number of sharings on Facebook is above, the actual conversion of text invitations to install the application is much higher.

40. Give users what they love to share

Growth through invitations (e.g. custom promo code) shows who exactly attracted new users. To maximize conversion from invitations to registered users, personalize landing pages and application behavior.

41. Create content that can be easily shared outside the application

It can be a blog, a YouTube channel with user-generated content, or just a video on your website.

42. Create virality loops

The virality loop is the user’s path from the first visit to the site to the invitation of new users, which increases the involvement of existing users.

• Circular virality is created by
• Registered users who send invitations
• New users who come to the application by invitation

Sharp bursts of virality in channels happen when the opinion leader shares content – this leads to interesting effects of attracting and retaining users.

43. Best recommendations on virality

Unfortunately, there is no universal recipe for promotion, but there are a number of tools that really work. Use all possible ways of advertising, analyze, and optimize the results obtained.

Sometimes minor changes to a marketing campaign can lead the application to success:

• Users like gifts more than discounts
• Reward new users first
• Set up a one-click screening – make it easy to share your product

Are you looking to improve your brand’s Instagram presence with more interesting and engaging content? That’s a good decision because the platform is constantly evolving, and posting quality pictures or videos of your products or services may not help you stand out from the pack.

Why? Because the number of active Instagram business profiles has skyrocketed in a relatively short period of time. The data provided by Statista.com suggests that there were 8 million of them in March of 2017, but by the end of the year, the number increased to 25 million! 

Source: Statista

Clearly, if you want to be successful on Instagram, you have to be aware of the latest trends in social media content marketing, integrate them into your existing strategy, and add improvements constantly. Since the competition is getting more and more extreme, doing so could be your way of differentiating your brand from others and keeping your leads and customers engaged.

So, let’s examine content marketing tactics that your brand has to employ to get the most out of Instagram campaigns.

Use shopping tags and stickers

Social media and Instagram, in particular, play a huge role in increasing brand engagement and sales because many people go there to look for products and services. Just listen to this:

• 96 percent of U.S. fashion brands have business profiles on Instagram
• 50 percent of Instagram users say they research products on social media
• Brand engagement on Instagram is much greater than on other popular platforms; in fact, it’s 54 times higher than Pinterest and 10 times higher than Facebook
• 72 percent of Instagram users say they made a fashion-, beauty-, or style-related purchase after seeing a product on Instagram

Without a doubt, connecting with prospects and customers on Instagram will be one of the most influential factors that define the success of brands on social media. This means that your brand should also use the shopping features of the platform to help your followers with product research and increase sales.

That shopping feature is called “shopping tags” and they can be added to both images and stories. For example, if someone taps a product sticker in your story or a product tag in one of your posts, they’ll land on the landing page for that product where they’ll get the information they need.

Image Credit: Instagram

Takeaways:

• Add direct commerce options such as product tags and stickers to your Instagram content marketing strategy to allow customers to buy from you there.
• Make professional, quality photos and video content to showcase your products and services
• Drive visitors to your website to begin their shopping experience with call-to-action (CTA) buttons like “Subscribe,” “Browse Collection,” and “Learn More.”

Creating a  brand is all about creating a high standard of value to the consumer choice. You cannot build authentic relationships with your consumers until you pay attention to their choice.

Create vertical videos

This next trend is a big surprise for many people because, well, it used to be a bad thing. For example, just a few years ago, if you shot a vertical video on your smartphone and shared it with your friends on social media, you’d get some comments telling you to turn your camera around to get a better view.

Now, however, things have changed. Instagram users are increasingly warming up to vertical video, and one of the main reasons for that is the popularity of Instagram stories, most of which are essentially vertical videos.

Men and women of Instagram have made them super cool and extremely shareable. That’s why you should add vertical videos to your video content marketing strategy to produce videos that your followers would readily like, share, and comment on.

One of the brands that do a great job with vertical videos is Tastemade. Check out their Instagram feed, and you’ll see that it delivers well-edited vertical videos longer than 30 seconds and is not using horizontal video.

Image Credit: Tastemade/Instagram

Many experts in online trends and businesses also see vertical video as a great way to connect with followers and improve their viewing experience. For example, Salah Zalatino, head of product and tech at Forces, said the following about vertical videos in a recent interview with Digiday.com:

“I see vertical video as the future of mobile video. We have seen 15 to 25 percent higher click-to-play on vertical video. We are currently reformatting some of our videos into vertical videos.”

Here are some ideas for you to take advantage of this medium:

• Use the “unfolding story” technique. One of the main reasons why people love vertical videos is that often they show some planned events they cannot visit. For example, you can film the best moments of live events, thus creating suspense and interest, which is something many people want. In fact, 45 percent of live video audiences say they would agree to pay for live, exclusive, on-demand video.
• Record behind-the-scenes content. This is a particularly intimate way to introduce your followers to your brand and products, which you should definitely use.
• Create useful and interesting content. You know your target audience very well, so use their interests and content needs to give you some ideas for future videos; for example, these could be tips, quick how-to guides, interesting events around the industry/niche, and just funny videos.

 Use IGTV for branding

Instagram TV (IGTV) was launched earlier, and it quickly became a sensation. Not only it allowed brands and users to upload hour-long videos, but it also opened a new, exciting way for businesses to engage in branding.

Before this amazing feature was released, businesses on Instagram had only one-minute videos and even shorter stories to add to their profiles. IGTV was a logical step in enhancing the platform’s video-related features that presented new opportunities for businesses.

Credit: Instagram

Here are some ways in which your business can use IGTV to improve your video content marketing next year.

• How-to videos. These are incredibly popular on all social media platforms right now, so you can also win your share of the market by creating tutorials. Since IGTV now allows longer videos, you have more time to explain things in more detail and; therefore, be more helpful to customers.
• Documentary/Behind the scenes. These two styles are similar because they both enable your followers to take a look at what a typical day at your business’ office looks like. You can even film a day in your personal or professional life to demonstrate what values you stand up for and what you do to make sure that your customers get great service.
• Significant events. This could be a celebration of a birthday, an announcement of a contest, a presentation, a conference, etc.

For example, one of the world’s best cooks and an owner of many restaurants across the globe Gordon Ramsay uploads videos of him playing in a charity game of soccer, which is a major hobby of his.

Source: Gordon Ramsay’s Instagram

This way, Ramsay keeps his followers engaged and interested in his personal brand. Besides, it’s a great way for him to share other interests besides cooking.

Use micro-influencers to promote content

Images and videos by celebrities promoting products and services aren’t a new thing to Instagram, but in 2018 more and more brands are choosing to go with a different kind of influencer called micro-influencers. These are ordinary people who have built significant social media followership but still have far fewer subscribers than their million-plus peers (between 10,000 and 100,000).  Suggestion by Andrew Thompson for Content Marketing Strategies That You Won’t Like to Miss.

Although their audience size may be modest compared to other influencers, their impact is profound. In fact, they could be key to your digital marketing success. And since micro-influencers prefer Instagram to post content and engage followers (in fact, 80 percent of them say they use this platform – take a look below), chances are you’ll find a lot of them working in your industry or niche.

Source: Bloglovin’ Global Influencer Survey

Here are the reasons why your brand should be using micro-influencers on Instagram.

They are more cost-effective than macro-influencers

According to the aforementioned Blogloving Global Influencer Survey, most micro-influencers charge less than \$250 per post, which makes them much more affordable than macro-influencers who charge a lot more.

Source: Bloglovin’ Global Influencer Survey

 They can help to build authentic relationships with followers

Many followers of micro-influencers consider them friends, and we know how important personal recommendations are for influencing buying decisions (in fact, consumers can be five times more influenced by recommendations from family and friends than celebrities). With celebrity influencers, however, things are different, especially when their post is added with #ad.

They can help to create engaging content

Micro-influencers can do wonders for your social media content marketing because they are great at creating awesome, relatable content that their followers love. Many of them produce quality images and videos, so you won’t compromise the quality of your marketing here as well.

A good example of a well-known brand that was not afraid to use micro-influencers for a content marketing campaign from the beginning is Sperry, a footwear company. In 2016, the brand started working with over 100 micro-influencers on Instagram and asked them to develop visual content for their official accounts.

Sperry conducted research and found Instagram users who were sharing cool-looking photos of Sperry products in action, and invited them to make more content. The results were great. For example, here’s a post from the official Instagram page of Sperry that was created by a user with the nickname Ourlifewithporter. As you can see in the comments section, the brand thanks the user for being their fan. The image also is very cute!

Source: Instagram

They allow to tap into a niche audience

As it was mentioned above, micro-influencers have a small audience that shares a certain passion or an interest. This audience chooses to follow a micro-influencer instead of a macro-influencer because they perceive them as more genuine and authentic (besides, macro-influencers are much more likely to be involved in paid marketing campaigns even with brands they don’t use). Therefore, they trust micro-influencers more when it comes to product recommendations.

• How to increase Instagram followers

Since micro-influencers typically operate in a certain niche, cooperating with one is a great idea if you’re working in the same niche because their audience has an interest in it.

Important considerations for making your cooperation with a micro-influencer successful

• Define your goals. Micro-influencers cannot help you with everything, so keep their limits in mind. For example, they can help you generate more leads, increase traffic, and improve sales, but their impact is typically limited to one niche.
• Carefully study the audience of a micro-influencer you’re considering for cooperation. For example, you can check their geographic locations, gender, type of posts they like and comment on, etc.
• Define whether a micro-influencer would be interested in cooperating with your brand. As it was briefly mentioned above, micro-influencers prefer to work with brands whose products they really love, so check if that influencer has an interest in similar products by checking his or her feed.
• Define how engaged a micro-influencers audience is. Engagement is one of the critical metrics here, obviously. Review posts made by an influencer and see what kind of response they get (likes, comments, etc.). If the engagement is low, chances are that your campaign with that influence won’t be successful.
• Does an influencer’s style match your brand’s style? This is also important because if a brand and an influencer are a mismatch, people will notice that pretty quickly.

Monetize your content with the Amazon Influencer Program

With the Amazon Influencer program in 2021, influencers can create their own storefronts to publish lists of products they endorse, are sponsored by, or have purchased and want to recommend. This way, they can help brands sell on Amazon and get small commissions for it. All you need is to make a purchase using the link on their page. This is a great start for anyone who wants to organize items on Amazon.

These influencer pages can also be customized, although designs are limited for the Amazon Influencer program. At the very least, influencers can group products into any type of category. We expect Amazon to make more and more customizations available as these pages drive more traffic to the Amazon marketplace.

An influencer with a passion for weapons could increase his turnover with Amazon products for the top 10 Best AR Sling adjustable strap with Swivel Hook for Hunting. Basically, an influencer who is active and has a significant following on YouTube, can recommend products and be rewarded for it. Anyone can join the Amazon Influencer program with an eligible YouTube account. Once qualified, they can create their own page on Amazon with a custom URL, then share products for immediate purchase, all in one place.

Wrapping up

Content marketing is a great way to improve your brand’s Instagram presence, increase the number of leads, and, of course, improve sales. Content remains king in digital marketing, so it’s safe to assume that brands will continue to produce more content to engage online audiences.

In this article, I’ve given you the latest trends in Instagram content marketing that will define the success of brands, as well as strategies needed to ensure that your brand follows them. Being updated about all new trends is critical in digital marketing, especially in ever-changing social media marketing.

Hopefully, this information will help you to stay ahead of your competitors and increase the relevance of your brand on Instagram. Remember, it all starts with a commitment to keep up with the needs of your target audience resembled in these latest trends. If you do that and adopt the best practices, your brand’s Instagram account will be super popular.

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