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Consider these three trends when creating your marketing plan this year
It is no secret that many businesses are facing hardships in 2023. Everywhere you look, you see prices rising, mass layoffs, and what seems like an overall economic downturn. The numbers certainly reflect this, being that global growth is projected to fall to 2.9 in 2023 (from 3.4 in 2022). Unfortunately, during times of financial crisis, one of the first areas that tend to see cuts is marketing.
This time, businesses are starting to see the flaw in their ways. After all, marketing dollars are an expense designed to increase earnings, so rather than cutting marketing entirely, they realize it might be best to take a different approach. Now, businesses are focusing on more self-sustaining efforts that reach the best possible audiences. This brings us to our first trend of the upcoming year:
Content marketing
The beauty of content marketing as a form of advertising is that it targets your ideal audience by nature. That is because, unlike some other forms of marketing, your audience is the focal point of your content marketing creation. Whether you want to create blog posts, infographics, videos, eBooks, or other types of content, what you create will be based on the set of people you want to capture and engage with. That makes content marketing a great go-to resource during times of economic hardship. While more traditional forms of marketing might feel like “hoping for the best,” the targeted nature of content marketing provides businesses an extra layer of security. Plus, the engagement levels and overall ROI are easy to track, so businesses don’t have to worry as much about overspending.
In terms of what kinds of content marketing will experience growth in popularity in 2023, short-form videos will continue to reign supreme. You probably know that users spend large chunks of time scrolling through reels and TikToks, but did you know that short-form video was actually the most popular and effective form of content in 2022? In fact, 30% of marketers plan to invest more in short-form video than any other type of social media strategy, so businesses would do well to hop on board if they don’t want their marketing efforts to fall behind.
Although TikTok is most likely the first platform to come to mind when you think of short-form videos, there are a variety of platforms on the market, including YouTube Shorts, Instagram, and Facebook Reels. An optimal time for most business-related videos is between 31 and 60 seconds. Don’t lose hope if your first few videos don’t go viral immediately. The beauty of short-form content is that it has the potential to reach a large audience, even if your following is small. However, it takes consistency to get there! Posting frequent short-form videos will allow your business to connect with your audience in a fun way.
Even as short-form content blows up in popularity, let’s not forget about the importance of long-form content! It is through these longer pieces that you can establish your business as an authority in your field and improve your SEO efforts. Posts with over 3000 words yield 77% more backlinks, which will improve your rankings on search engines. No matter what type of content you choose to prioritize, look through the lens of your target audience and work to serve them every step of the way.
Social media micro-influencers for smaller businesses
There have been a lot of rumors going around about the “death of the social media influencer.” While it might seem like these influencers are losing their power, the truth is that the power of influencer marketing is only projected to grow by 14.5% in the year 2023. While the industry is certainly not dying, it is evolving.
If you are a social media user, you might have noticed the overall shift towards more authentic content and away from “picture-perfect” content. This shift is echoing in every part of social media, including product promotion. Most users are still more likely to trust an influencer than a message from a brand directly.
However, in 2023, influencers will need to remember the reason why users trust them in the first place: they don’t want to feel like they are being targeted by advertisements. Instead, influencers will need to come from a place of spreading ideas and experiences rather than promoting products and services. For businesses, this means that you will see more success this year if you work with influencers who showcase your business’s value. It also means that the space is making room for smaller businesses who are willing to partner up with micro influencers. This can be an extremely powerful way to reach highly targeted local audiences that might be difficult to reach otherwise. It will also build brand awareness and higher credibility for your business.
Social media marketing
You might have guessed that social media marketing will continue to grow this year, but “social media” has become such a broad term. It can be confusing to understand what platforms are trending the most and how you can use them to benefit your business. When it comes to social media marketing for brands, the top contenders are still Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, and LinkedIn. The great thing about a lot of these platforms is that your content can be spread across them. This means less marketing dollars spent and greater brand cohesion. Let’s take a look at how these platforms compare:
Facebook and Instagram
Because Facebook and Instagram are both under the “meta” umbrella, they offer a lot of similar features when it comes to advertising for your business. For example, both offer paid and organic tools to marketers. Both platforms allow you to create sponsored posts, ad campaigns, and promotions, but Facebook has more customization when it comes to target audiences. Another key difference that Facebook offers is the ability to post more text-heavy content.
TikTok and YouTube
TikTok and YouTube are both video platforms, but that is about where the similarities end. TikTok is the best place to post short-form videos (see previous point), but these videos can also be shared on Instagram Reels. YouTube continues to grow in 2023 for brands who want to create high-quality video content for their audiences. YouTube gives your business the chance to show a more “human” side of your business and relate to your audience. Plus, your videos can boost your appearance in search results when you use titles and captions that align with your SEO strategy.
Did you know that Scorpion offers high quality video advertising services to help your business tell its story? Learn more today.
LinkedIn and Twitter
While LinkedIn and Twitter are different in terms of their user base, businesses can use both of these platforms to establish credibility through their words. Whether you are posting from a business page or a professional page of your own, both of these platforms are great places to showcase your expertise, engage with your followers, and start meaningful conversations. Twitter is one of the most effective social media channels for news distribution across a wide audience, whereas LinkedIn can draw in a niche audience. In fact, statistics show that LinkedIn users are more interested in your company than users on other platforms. LinkedIn is responsible for 64% of all redirects to a company’s website from a social media platform, so don’t count it out when planning your social media content calendar this year!
Extra tip: Don’t be afraid to edutain!
One of the biggest trends we are seeing take off across every platform this year is “edutainment.” This term was coined for content that is both educational and informative. The type of content that is taking off right now, such as SEO content and short-form video content, has created a sort of perfect storm for “edutainment” content. This trend is a great opportunity for businesses who are looking to break into the world of social media marketing. Tutorial videos and blog posts can be shared across various social platforms and bring in new audiences who truly need the expertise of your business.
Artificial intelligence
Artificial intelligence (AI) can be scary to a lot of people, but for businesses in marketing, it is nothing to be afraid of at all. In fact, some might even say it’s essential for businesses to use in order to gain unique insight into their customers’ preferences and behaviors. In simple terms, AI automates data collection and behavioral targeting to help businesses achieve their goals. It is one of the best ways to speed up your marketing agenda and improve your customers’ journey. It also sets the foundation for competitive product pricing, analyzes the effectiveness of your current brand messaging and partnerships, and can help you craft your overall marketing strategies. Some of the best AI tools you can use to grow your business in 2023 include:
Smartly.io makes split tests and A/B testing easy. The tool allows you to test ads across multiple platforms so that your team only launches the top-performing ads to your audience. It integrates with most of the major social media platforms mentioned above and allows you to compare all of your ads on a single dashboard.
Scorpion has launched a service called Ranking AI that is designed to use the power of AI to improve search engine rankings, generate leads for businesses, and drive more revenue. One unique feature of Ranking AI is that it is focused on your industry, unlike many other major platforms that are much more general. Ranking AI analyzes over 400,000 data points for every keyword that you want to rank for to create an industry-leading solution.
- Chatbots
Live chat tools will help your business provide customer support, answer questions, and resolve issues. This is one more way that you can utilize AI to improve your customers’ experience as well as your business’s success. Software like EBI.AI comes with advanced AI assistants that are self-improving and continuously evolving to meet your customer’s needs, whatever they might be. When you create a website with Scorpion, we will automate this process for you, which is just one of the many ways we will prioritize customer communication for your business.
Want to work with a team that is committed to staying on top of all the latest trends in marketing so that you don’t have to? That is what you will find with Scorpion. Learn more about all of our marketing capabilities and how we can help your business stay ahead of the curve this year.
