Posts Tagged: Trends

Mary Meeker’s Internet Trends 2016

I’ve mentioned venture capitalist Mary Meeker before and now it’s time again. Her annual presentation covering internet growth, digital trends and marketing was released the other day and here is what I’m taking with me:

  1. Go global. Start looking wider than your closest markets. China and India are growing bigger and bigger each year. For example, China’s internet trends look better than the US, while internet giants around the world continue to grow more powerful. Become familiar with their platforms and user behaviour not to miss out.
  2. Use Facebook advertising. Facebook posted 59% growth over 2014-2015 – that’s a lot. Hyper-targeting apparently works since it allows you to spend your money on target groups that are likely to buy.
  3. Generation Z. The biggest difference between Generation Z and the Millenials in their preferred shopping experience is the shift from comprehensiveness to ease. Focus on brand values instead of price competitiveness.
  4. Don’t deny ad blockers. Ad-blockers is still on the rise. Instead of working around them, make sure to provide the users with the best possible onsite experience with quality content. Think entertaining, not intruding.
  5. Visual mediums continue to grow. Video viewership is exploding, for example Snapchat has more monthly minutes per visitor compared to any social medium besides Facebook. Why? Because photos still have the highest engagement. Good news for platforms like Snapchat, Facebook and Instagram. Users are both shopping and selling through image based mediums.
  6. Mobile advertising is still low-hanging-fruit. Advertisers still spend way too much money on print media and TV ads and not enough on digital marketing – especially mobile ads. Do it right from the start and you will have an advantage before bigger actors shift their media budgets.

 

Here’s the full PDF. What do you think?

Should you do video marketing?

Think with Google recently posted the article New Data Shows Online Video Ads Drive Consideration, Favorability, Purchase Intent, and Sales. We’ve already seen motion as a medium in the rise and growth of Periscope, Facebook Live Video, Instagram Video and Vine. Not to mention YouTube continuous growth – with a ROI that is higher than on TV in various categories. In the article, Google shares data from two recent studies that shows just how much YouTube can move the needle on brand metrics across the consumer journey—from consideration and favourability to purchase intent and sales.

According to a survey conducted by Nielsen, 64% of marketers plan to increase their focus on video content. Brands and marketers have reason to embrace video, not only because it allows them to have a stronger connection with their audience, it’s also proven to have higher engagement. In other words – in 2016, video needs to become a bigger part of every company’s content and marketing strategy. Now’s that time to start thinking about reallocating your digital marketing budgets.

So should you do video marketing? The answer is probably yes.

E-commerce Marketing

Speaking of digital trends, I just came across this e-commerce marketing guide from Veeqo. They’ve summarized eight strategies for paid online channels for 2016 that you can use for your online business. Some may work perfect for you, other won’t – take a little time to think what’s relevant for you and make it count.

Read the post What are the best marketing options in 2016 and what can I do? here!

 

Digital trends for 2016

This year has not started out strong blog wise for, but I though I’d post a few thoughts on what’s ahead for 2016. In short, we will see much more money invested in digital marketing. That means all areas: Search, Mobile, Social, Display and Video. This is just a few areas that I think will be most important. Brief, but important –  the ones that have the biggest impact on your online business. Now’s the time to think about how this can integrated into the digital marketing strategies, instead of doing it halfway through 2016.

Mobile’s continued dominance over desktop
The dominance of mobile traffic is now a fact. In 2016, we’ll see a continued strong growth in mobile use (which Mary Meeker’s pointed our in the annual mobile trends round-up). To no surprise, the use of mobile marketing will continue to be one of key trends to follow in 2016.

Creating personalized content
The only way to make consumers engage and interact with your content is solution based personalization. Making this effort, you can expect an increase of sales, higher interaction (time spent on page) and more happy customers. The key is that you take the time to research your consumers’ needs. This may well begin by drawing out buyer profiles and knowing consumer demographics, and behavioral preferences. One size does not fit all.

Understanding micro targeting
Targeting niche audience sizes and making use of data led advertising tools bringing in more effective results from campaigns. Targeting has evolved a lot in 2015, so it comes as no surprise that businesses are making targeting strategies more elaborately than ever. Speaking of personalization, I mean.

Being global, not local
You competition is no longer just local. Most online businesses sell their goods world-wide just a click away. You need to optimize for your key markets, find your customers where they are and look for new, innovative solutions to satisfy their needs. Wherever they are. 2016 is not the year to think small because no one else is.

Paying for Social
We might still think that our personal, social networks are just that – personal. But this is no longer the case. Brands and companies is already treating Facebook and Twitter like the great paid channels that they have evolved into, finding their customers where they interact with each other and share their personal interest and preferences. Targeting them has never been easier – “social” will now become an even larger piece of the bought digital budget.

Increasing digital marketing budgets
Over the past few years online marketing has grown more and more competitive, a trend that will continue in 2016. Companies are expected to spend $10 billion more on all areas of digital marketing than they did in 2015.

The Swedish People and The Internet

The Swedes and the internet is a yearly report that documents how Swedish people use the internet and how it affects their lives. As a Swede, it’s really interesting to read and you can view the English summary here. Will post my own thoughts and reflections as soon as I’ve gotten through it!

Trend Report: Three Internet Trends

Every year, Mary Meeker writes about the trends that will be meaningful for the internet in the year to come and it’s the ultimate internet tech bible filled with stats. So half the year’s gone, but the report was released the other day. As of now, almost 40% of the world are now on the internet and the top companies are platforms (hello Apple and Google). If you have the time you can read the report cover to cover – no, not literally but in a PDF but if you don’t, here are some of the few most important notes that I drew from it.

1. Advertisement will go mobile. The mobile friendly algorithm will not only rank your page, but ads will also need to be optimized for mobile users: adaptive ads, multiple scrollable images and in store access based on gps.

2. User generated content is exploding even more. Companies need to meet their customers by using untraditional marketing methods and platforms that include content created by the actual consumer. Less sales and more engagement is the key. A majority of the customers still wants to hear about products through actual people with actual experience.

3. The user gets more and more demanding (pun intended) – we order food online, book Airbnb housing and watch Netflix on a daily basis. Everything’s just a few clicks away and we want it on demand and/or on the go. We must be accessible exactly when the user wants us to be. Not reaching out? Try and find new ways to do so.