Future Developments in Digital Marketing

by Rahimah Sultan

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The concept of marketing began with the Gutenberg printing press.

Magazines came into being by the 18^th century. Soon after came advertisements and billboards, followed by radio and television ads.

Then came digital marketing in the 1990s. The industry rapidly expanded to monumental proportions within two decades.

We were at major crossroads regarding the future of digital marketing in 2018.

Today we think we’re on track then everything takes a sudden turn and we have to figure out future developments in digital marketing.

By 2028 the strategies and practices we apply today will seem very far away.


So what will digital marketing look like in 10 years?


Mobile Content

Mobile will continue to be important.

In a very short period, smartphones have changed the way we communicate and the way we get information. Google searches occur more frequently on mobile devices than on desktops.

Recently, digital marketers have focused on mobile optimization because users won’t click away if a website is compatible with smartphone devices. The longer users stay on websites, the better those sites will rank on search engines. Websites will have more reason to go mobile because of Google’s mobile-first index.

To provide desktop users with the best and most relevant search results, Google has indexed websites as if they were doing so from a desktop.

Websites that aren’t already mobile-compatible are now taking the largest hit and will continue to do so. Although there’s responsive design that’s made it easier to create the same site for both PCs and mobile devices, websites that aren’t already mobile-compatible are now taking the largest hit.

Mobile content will become more of an element. As it’s hard to say exactly how content creation will change over the next few years, SEO keywords may start to turn more toward mobile searching. Long-form content could start to fall by the wayside as mobile content takes precedence. Digital marketers are already gearing their content more towards smartphone audiences.

Voice Search

The concept of voice searching has gained momentum and will continue. Millions use intelligent devices like Amazon’s Alexa and Google Assistant. Our cars and smartphones already permit us to make voice searches on the go.

Video Marketing

Video marketing isn’t going away anytime soon. As people are doing more browsing on mobile devices, they want to interact more with the content they see.

Live video streaming is ramping up and although it might seem it’s reserved for social media, you should still publish video content for websites.

Quality Long-form Content

Although the future of digital marketing appears to have no room for long-form content, digital marketers will be solving the secrets to voice and mobile search as well as producing videos.

People still want meaningful accurate information. The way they’re able to find it might be changing so digital marketers will have to adapt to those changes.

There will be all the more reason to create better and stronger blog articles, web page content, e-mails, etc., as anytime a consumer tries to find long-form content it’s nevertheless an opportunity to market to them.

Digital Marketing Tools and AI

These kinds of tools can measure link quality and help websites filter out broken links. They’re already more advanced and becoming more so.  In 5-10 years from now, they’ll likely be even better at focusing on quality links.

In the future digital marketing tools may also be able to tell us more about our audiences. Then digital marketers will be able to improve SEO metrics and tactics.

Marketers will be better able to analyze their audiences and that will not only increase productivity but also improve user experience. Chatbots and custom product recommendations are growing big in e-commerce.

In short, long-form content does have a place in the future of digital marketing, and research tools and AI will improve the way we engage with customers online.

Social Media

As social media consumption is ever-evolving, the kinds of content you need to draw users will keep changing.

People seem to look at videos much longer than static pieces of content on social media platforms, such as Instagram and Facebook, and are more willing to make a purchase once they’ve seen videos of products in action.

The power of visual content will continue to grow over the next several years. Therefore, as a modern-day marketer, it’s important that you continuously restructure your digital marketing plan to keep it adaptable to the content consumption changes ahead.

Another major prediction is that reaching your followers on Facebook organically will be nearly impossible.

According to Facebook, there is so much content published on this platform each day it’s becoming a lot choosier about what it places on users’ feeds. This social media giant is all about making sure any content that appears on a user’s feed is as relevant to them as possible.

It’s obvious that Facebook is increasingly becoming a paid advertising and marketing platform and you’ll see this even more.

Dark social, which is traffic on the Web that you can’t track through a Web analytics program, will rise. For example, it’s essentially the private sharing that takes place when people share a link to content through a mobile messaging app. Research shows that the majority of content shared online comes from dark social.

To make the most of dark social, you should include “share” buttons on the social media platforms you use. If your buttons are highly visible, your content may be shared more.

Pinterest has been shifting its focus away from offering inspiration to promoting action.

Many businesses view LinkedIn’s video ads as an effective and compelling way to reach their audiences.

It’s predicted that YouTube will remain a huge digital marketing player in the near future and will be used for generating leads.

As people are becoming more concerned about who has access to their data, social media platforms are tightening up their data sharing policies. So, persona-based marketers are now dealing with how to get around that. Although social media advertising isn’t dying, from here on out there will be more restrictions on how companies get user data.

As platforms seek to improve consumer privacy, one of the largest changes will be to how we track advertising through third-party cookies. However, this doesn’t mean that first-party cookies won’t still be applied to track interactions with your site, so no need to panic.

To stay updated on the latest changes from Google you can use their Privacy Sandbox News.

It explains the latest changes are that from January 4, 2024, they will begin testing a new feature that limits cross-site tracking by restricting website access to third-party cookies by default. (Tracking Protection). They’ll roll this out to 1% of Chrome users globally, a key milestone in their Privacy Sandbox initiative to phase out third-party cookies for everyone in the second half of 2024.


How do you succeed in today’s digital marketing world?


To stand out in the marketing field, you should do more than simply broadcasting as most people do. Most people are broadcasting on channels. If you don’t take the time to search and discover new information and respond to users with these tools, all you’re doing is advertising like you would in a newspaper. You absolutely must engage with your audience and learn from them.

You must understand the time and money it takes to use various marketing channels.

Do the research needed to learn where your target customers spend time and consume content.

Before launching a marketing strategy establish a buyer persona. Use buyer priorities for developing and researching an appropriate keyword strategy. This will help you with choosing proper social media marketing channels.

The cost to acquire new clients and prospects is rising so it’s in your best interest to improve all actions your clients perform and have automated follow-ups of their interactions with you.

You should take a totally different approach with the people who have visited your website, and were maybe going to purchase your product, than you would with those who have never displayed interest in your offering.

Using retargeting techniques, you can show your messages in the right order and at the proper time and get more bang for your buck long-term.

It’s more important than ever before to stay on top of industry changes and trends as they will change how you relate to your audience.

It’s very difficult to predict the future developments in digital marketing long-term, but keeping your eye on current trends will help you avoid being caught off guard later.


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