As 2013 is a fresh and new year, we can’t help but anticipate how different technologies, strategies, and social expectations will shape the marketing landscape. Based on what we’ve seen trending over the past year and where we see marketing moving, here are 10 major predictions of how the 2013 marketing landscape will look:
1) Big Data has landed! Now, more than ever, deep and extensive data analytics will become even more important in forming strategies and messaging.
2) Besides using data to form strategies, marketers will begin to depend on detailed data to develop more relevant and personalized communications with their target audience.
3) Marketing will continue to become more and more complex as marketers segment more and more and customize for smaller niches.
4) Marketing Automation tools will become more important in lead generation and lead nurturing efforts. Marketers will continue to “map the experience” so that customers have the most personal experience possible.
5) Marketing via social media will become a bigger part of marketing strategies. Concrete best practices will be developed as social media companies roll out more tools to measure the ROI of social media marketing.
6) Outbound marketing will see a resurgence as marketers realize that too much emphasis on inbound marketing is not as effective as a more balanced approach of outbound and inbound efforts.
7) Mobile marketing and mobile optimized sites and apps will continue to grow and evolve. Those without a mobile strategy will fall behind their competitors.
8) Brand integrity will become more and more important as social influencers will become more aggressive at outing companies that don’t live up to their brand message. Brand and actual customer experience must be the same.
9) Marketers will become more and more innovative in the way that they will try to get customers’ attention by leveraging new innovative ways to use old and new media. Some of these will be very successful, others may backfire.
10) The development of quality, relative content will become pervasive as more and more companies will become sources of information for their customers as they research products and services. Those with the best information will win.
As customer experiences and expectations constantly change, it’s important to remember that marketing strategies and tactics must evolve with them.
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gofranklingo
Interesting predictions. Can you elaborate more on point #9? Specifically, what are some of the “new innovative ways” you mention?
Michael Bland
Thanks for your comment. Here’s what I meant for point #9:
In terms of old media, it is amazing how innovation is still alive and well. Where this is most obvious is how old media is used in conjunction with new media. Here’s a good example: Direct mail marketers have long used personalized landing pages (PURLs) to personalize a prospect’s experience. Taking it a step further, they have recently started embedding something called a “Google Remarketing Code” into their landing pages. As a customer moves on to other websites, Google then displays advertising that reinforces the message of the direct mail piece and PURL, thus increasing the likelihood that the prospect will buy. (For more information about Google Remarketing, go to http://www.google.com/ads/innovations/remarketing.html. I think that this blend of old and new media will continue to evolve to provide new and interesting opportunities for marketers.
In terms of new media, there are many recent examples of companies using innovative ways to communicate with their customers and prospects. Nowhere is this more obvious than in social media. Here is an interesting article on how Starbucks, Pepsi and Nike have tried new things with social media: money.cnn.com/galleries/2012/fortune/1205/gallery.500-social-media.fortune/index.html
Of course, in an environment where companies experiment and push the envelope, there is the possibility that things could backfire. There has been and will continue to be a lot of talk about privacy. As marketers uncover more and more about their prospects and customers, how they use this information can become a potentially slippery slope.