5 Digital Marketing Trends You can Expect to See in 2019

The New Year is here! And with it comes a mixture of new digital marketing trends that are sure to take hold in the coming year.

Our digital marketing experts have been studying the developments of years past and looking at how people are now interacting with businesses. We’ve seen a number of new technologies emerge in the past year and many are finally making their way into the online marketing realm.

We thought we’d start 2019 off by looking at a variety of trends that are changing the way business owners and marketing professionals are approaching digital marketing strategies. Here’s what you can expect to see from digital marketers in 2019.

Video continues to grow in popularity every day. Pretty much every form of social media now utilizes video—Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest…the list goes on and on. With such a wide-ranging audience reach, video has the potential for some of your most powerful messaging.

The interesting trend with using video as a marketing tactic is that there are so many ways to use it. Sure, many companies are still making video advertisements for YouTube and the likes. But we’re also seeing more original video content in the form of sponsored content by social or industry “influencers,” live videos and short clips made for sharing via social media.

Video continues to grow every year for digital marketing and it seems that won’t change in 2019.

Have you ever noticed a digital ad pop up for something you just looked at online or were talking about to a friend? Almost any time you go on the internet, you will likely see personalized ads—advertisements that are geared toward your personal preferences and browsing habits. So when an ad for tennis shoes shows up right after you mentioned needing a new pair, it’s not Big Brother watching you—it’s actually AI.

From our phones to our in-home devices, artificial intelligence is now a part of our daily lives, whether we realize it or not. Within digital marketing, using AI is quickly becoming the norm for finding your target audience and gearing your ads toward the right crowd. Using AI to personalize ads is nothing new, and it looks like it will continue to grow in 2019.

On a similar note to a growing presence of AI, voice searching has rapidly become the norm. With voice assistants like Siri and Alexa, people are using these virtual searchers to find information quickly. It’s a faster (and lazier) way to find what you’re looking for without typing your question in a search engine.

However, this makes it harder for people to find your content because voice assistants only read off one answer—the top ranking one. Therefore, your content has to have a lot of voice search-based SEO measures in place to keep up with how rapidly search methods are changing.

It seems like every couple weeks the news is covering some major security breach that puts thousands—if not, millions—of users’ personal information at risk. In fact, small businesses saw a 25% increase in cyber attacks between 2011 and 2015. Although the threat isn’t quite as large for small businesses, you can still get hacked and run the risk of hurting your reputation in the process.

Because of these recent security scandals, we’re starting to see more businesses go out of their way to heighten security measures on their websites. Make sure you’re doing what you can to protect your customers’ information and be transparent about all the measures you’re taking. Your customers will have peace of mind knowing they can trust you with their information.

We already touched on the expansion of video in marketing tactics, so it should come as no surprise that other entertaining visual elements are making their way into marketing, too. Emojis, gifs and memes are all being used more and more by companies looking to appeal to a younger market, particularly on social media. Even adding an emoji to your email subject line can have significant impacts on click-through rates.

These visuals make it easier to stand out, which is exactly what you want in a world where there’s content everywhere you look. Plus, using emojis, gifs and memes make your business look more friendly and relatable, something that has increasing value for small businesses.

If you’re looking to change up your digital marketing strategy, these five tactics are a great place to start. You’ll notice more and more companies utilizing these trends in an effort to stand out against industry competition. And if you don’t want to be seen as “behind the times,” you might want to start incorporating these strategies into your own marketing efforts.