8 Trends You Need to Be Using in Your Content Marketing

Content marketing trends are always changing. In today’s digital age, your marketing efforts must connect with your audience through a variety of methods. With greater access to data and knowledge of your buyers’ preferences, you have to be willing to adjust your content marketing strategies. It can be a little overwhelming to keep up with the latest in content marketing, so we have some ideas that may help.

Here are 8 content marketing trends you can try for the new year.

1. Stories

Stories are an emerging trend in visual storytelling. These images, or short videos, last 24 hours and then disappear into a set of saved archives. This feature is available on Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, and Google Images. Stories are a popular feature with young social media users. You can use stories to inform your audience about events, sales, sneak peeks, or any information you want to share.

2. Livestreams

Livestreams have changed the way brands interact with their audience. They are engaging and fun! Live content is an attention-getter and a great way to promote your brand and what you have to offer. Live video is perfect when your brand is out and about. Livestream from trade shows, special events, or any time you have something to share. It’s another way to attract new business and showcase your unique brand.

3. Community Building

The pandemic has led many businesses to expand their online presence. Building communities around the content you share is more important than ever. Building an online community involves putting your audience first. Provide customer-first content.

Some fun and easy ways to start engaging your audience and building an online community include:

Incorporating polls in your social media posts
Provide an avenue for user-generated content
Podcast discussions
Video content and testimonials
Q&A blog posts
Provide opportunities for feedback and questions

Look for ways to keep them interested and provide opportunities for community members to interact with each other.

4. Smart Distribution

You may have great content to share, but without proper promotion and distribution, it will fall flat. Repurposing content for multiple platforms doesn’t always work. Your social media followers may have different interests than your podcast audience. All of your content may not be suited for each platform you use. Rather than taking a blanket approach, think about your audience. Engage with them to understand what they’re looking for. Craft your content to match their needs and interests. You can make tweaks to repurpose content and get the most out of what you already have. The key is to know your audience and keep them engaged and coming back for more.

5. Value-Driven Content

There’s no shortage of content for users to see. They’re bombarded with it on a daily basis. That’s why you have to provide value and stand out among your competitors. Users are picky about what they choose to view or read. If they’ve seen it before, they won’t waste their time on your site. Your best chance for getting their attention and trust is through value-driven content. Think about your customers’ needs and how your products benefit their lives. If you focus too much on product promotion, you may lose them. Instead, provide relevant content that gently leads them to your product or service.

6. Hyper-Personalized Content

Personalization is one of many current content marketing trends that will continue to be popular in the future. As consumers become savvier, using their first names in your marketing efforts may not be enough. If you hope to keep their attention and drive sales forward, you must know what they want. Hyper-personalization uses AI technology to collect data from your visitors. You can learn about products they’re searching for, activity on your website, and what they’re buying. The more data you collect, the more personalized your content can be.

7. Diversified Content

If you only provide one type of content, users get bored. You have to think beyond basic content to meet the needs of today’s savvy consumers.

They expect you to catch and hold their attention. Make the most of what’s out there, including:

Galleries
Visual storytelling
Video content
Podcasts
Helpful blogs

This doesn’t mean you have to reinvent the wheel every day. Diversifying your content can be as simple as repurposing it to fit another media form. This works because most users have a preference for how they consume media. They may prefer audio, video, text, or podcasts. They naturally place themselves in a preferred group. That means they probably won’t see your content in another format. Even if they do, they won’t mind if you’ve added some new ideas or images and presented the information in a fresh way.

8. Niche Content

No matter your field, content saturation is a problem. When every company in your industry is publishing similar content, it’s easy to get lost in the fray. It becomes harder to increase your search rankings as well. To address this growing problem, brands are going niche to attract specific buyers. Finding your niche involves focusing on a particular product or service and building content around it. Instead of writing general content, narrow your focus. Make it compelling and relevant for the user.

Find the Best Content Marketing Trends

The last couple of years have been tough on businesses everywhere, yet content marketing has continued at remarkable growth. Being on top of the latest content marketing trends will help you compete in the ever-changing digital landscape.

We’d love to help you up your digital marketing game through trade show publications, social media management, email marketing, managed SEO, and more!