By Mitch Carson

At the very basic, marketing is a form of communication to consumers with the aim of selling them a product or service. However, it can become a complicated game searching new and exciting ways of enticing customers. With the current advancement in digital technology, the marketing game is increasingly becoming detail-oriented and high-tech, and even more personalized and human-centric.

The marketing megatrends of 2017 will help marketers reach more consumers directly by circumventing distractions and personalizing the marketing messages. These techniques are very appealing and can help marketers create more targeted, effective and profitable marketing campaigns. Below are the top seven trends that are guaranteed to take marketing to a whole new level in 2017.

1. Personalization

Personalization in a marketing context simply means segregating your marketing content to appeal to different types of audience members based on their habits, preferences, etc. In the current world full of overwhelming information and not enough time to consume, personalizing marketing content can be a huge win for marketers seeking to earn the limited attention of their customers.

Collecting as much data from your customers as possible is one of the best ways to segregate your audience and offer them a customized experience. The simplest example is collecting information on their date of birth and sending them a personalized birthday message on the due date. Remember how you felt the last time your insurance company surprised you with a birthday message on your birthday?

2. Native Advertising

Customers, followers and viewers are getting smart to the tricks advertisers use. It’s therefore becoming harder to earn their trust and maintain their attention. Additionally, the diminishing penetration of many ads as a result of reduced organic reach on social media, ad blockers and the decline of banner ads will see the rise of native advertising in 2017.

For starters, native advertisement involves integrating your advertising message into content that already offers value to viewers and readers. This makes it less destructive and more effective. So instead of just blasting your potential customers with ads, look for ways to weave your product and service offerings into a larger, more valuable narrative.

3. Marketing Automation

Automation is increasingly becoming powerful and popular among marketers seeking to keep their business running past business hours. Automation uses tools, features and apps to put repetitive tasks on autopilot. Common automation tools include solutions for social media posting, email marketing, digital ads and SMS.

Many digital marketers agree that automation is very important to the overall success of a marketing campaign. Apart from easing some tasks and saving time, automation can be a great way of cutting down expenditure on some tasks that would have otherwise demanded for more labour to be accomplished.

4. More live video

Live videos are also becoming the favourite toy of the Internet. What started as a simple pilot project with Meerkat has now proven to be an effective and exciting form of engaging with the audience. Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube have all since jumped onto the bandwagon and released their own versions of live video as well.

Most of these networks are heavily promoting their live video offerings and it’s an approach that will clearly stand out in 2017 in this marketing industry that is already saturated with content.

5. Influencer marketing

There is nothing that makes social media marketing more effective like a lovable social media personality recommending your product or service to his or her followers and fans. The main reason influencer marketing is on the rise in because people tend to trust recommendations from personalities they see as thought leaders. The right market influencers establish trust and credibility through each social media mention, post or advertisement.

Influencers work with brands they genuinely believe in, and that trust and confidence is passed to their followers. Influencer marketing offers brands an opportunity to create a buzz through word of mouth using personalities that already have a following that follow and admire them. When influencers are carefully chosen and used effectively, they create a natural way to entice a target audience.

6. Chatbots

When you hear of chatbots, you may probably be thinking of some annoying pop ups on a website that looks like it was pulled straight from the early 80s. Well, a chatbot is quite a sophisticated technology. It’s a product of advanced programming and artificial intelligence that provides users with personalized responses, new updates and more.

Once enabled, chatboxes can answer customers’ queries with sensible and intensely analyzed but natural responses; think of them as your sales associate who never goes to sleep and is always ready with a prompt reply. If you can’t notice whether or not you are talking to chatbox, then it’s working as intended. iPhone has a very advanced chatbox called Siri and it uses voice recognition and deep-learning to respond accurately to users’ statements and questions.

7. Mobile marketing

Mobil marketing is currently the third most used marketing channel. There is however need for businesses to put more effort in optimizing conversions on mobile. Nonetheless, mobile marketing has a huge impact on search marketing with engines such as Google encouraging and rewarding business with mobile responsive websites. More and more business are forced to implement adaptive platforms in order to get a slice of this lowly explored channel.

As much as most conversions are still done on desktop, there are plenty of unexplored opportunities on mobile platforms that businesses are now looking to explore though a variety of mobile apps. The bottom line is to design a ‘responsive’, rather than a not responsive mobile’ website that will be able to seamlessly adapt to different platforms from desktops, tablets, and smartphones.

Conclusion

There you have it. Even though there are a few more promising marketing trends such as wearables and Internet of Things (IoT), the above seven are the major innovations to watch out for in 2017. For business owners and marketers, it’s important that you try out a combination of several of these trends and find out what balance works for you. If you are not utilizing at least three of the above named techniques, then your marketing strategy needs to be re-evaluated and brought to the 21st century. In the same breath, not all the above will work for your business. If need be, consider hiring a marketing strategist to hand-hold you through a few aspects of integrating modern marketing trends in your business.