Trends in digital marketing for 2020: what you can’t miss

We start a new year, and not just any year. 2020 brings a new decade, and that means a turning point on trends and habits that we have as consumers.

Over the next 365 days big changes are coming in digital marketing, would you like to know them all to get ahead of them and start implementing them now? Then you can’t miss this post!

Trends in digital marketing for 2020

As I was saying, changes are coming in the habit of consumers. And, as you well know, any change in consumers affects us as a company. That is why I wanted to collect the trends in digital marketing for 2020 that you should know if you do not want to be left behind.

Changes in Google in 2020

Google is always in constant motion. It is not surprising to see how they are modifying their algorithms to try to always give the best answer and solution to user searches. One of the latest modifications that has caused the most stir was announced on October 25, 2019 under the name of BERT .

BERT is that it is the acronym for Bidirectional Encoder Representations from Transformers, the translation of which would be “Bidirectional Transformer Encoder Representations”.

Use Artificial Intelligence (AI) to analyze user queries and better rank the results that appear in SERPs. To do this, an analysis method is applied that allows contextualizing each query within a more natural environment. How is this accomplished? BERT is characterized by “bidirectionality”, a feature that allows you to analyze a sentence in two directions. To achieve this, the words that are found both to the left and to the right of a keyword are analyzed, in such a way that a better understanding of what a user wants to search for when entering that phrase in Google is achieved.

[FREE GUIDE] Know all the details about Google BERT: what it is, how it works, how it affects SEO and technical aspects

With this, Google tries to go one step further when it comes to relating to the user, offering them the result they are really looking for. To achieve this, the keyword itself loses a bit of strength in favor of naturalness and the contextualization of its use. In addition to this, BERT also stands out for the following:

• Zero-click results : it is important to keep in mind the searches that have 0 results (56.10% of the total searches on mobile and 34.85% of the total on desktop) to see how we can take advantage of this type of search to our advantage . It seems that the trend this new year is going towards that model; It is not always necessary to be clicked, that is, we may lose traffic but we gain visibility. Safari SEO Sydney suggest that one obvious example is the importance of the data structured here to be able to appear in these positions.

• Organic traffic : lately organic traffic has started to stagnate, making it increasingly difficult to position content for all the amount of content on the Internet on the same topic. Hence the importance of taking advantage of zero-click search results that we talked about in the previous point.

• SEO on SERP : the homepage of a brand is not the homepage of its website but what users find when they use the Google search engine to find that brand. Therefore, it is necessary to carry out actions focused on having a good image in the Google SERP and make SEO optimizations in that regard.

• Changes in user habits

  As I mentioned at the beginning of the post, the change in user habits will mark a large number of trends in digital marketing for 2020 that must be taken into account.

  Increased voice searches

  The first trend I’m talking about is the increase in voice searches. Although it is true that some time ago the first voice searches did not provide good data (90% of users expressed their disagreement with the result obtained), this situation has been changing in such a way that these failures have been refined to make Voice search is already a reality.

  Previously, the reason that voice searches did not work well came from the inability of search engines to correctly process the sound emitted by users, making the search incomprehensible.

  Now, the development of web pages has escalated to another level, in such a way that the vast majority of services successfully process speech requests, even those that show a defect or are processed by children.

  Given that these requests can now be carried out successfully, half of all searches are expected to be carried out directly by voice by 2020. According to PWC, 65% of users between the ages of 25 and 49 talk at least once a day with their mobile devices and smart speakers (such as Google Home or Alexa) to find solutions to their doubts or problems. If we continue with more data, OC&C Strategy Consultants expects that in 2022 the voice channel will be 40 billion dollars.

  No wonder all these data, since voice searches are much faster and more direct to formulate, so it is gaining relevance among all age groups.

  Of course, it is important to note that voice searches are different from traditional searches in search engines. A clear example would be that, in traditional searches, we use words that are sometimes unconnected, such as, for example, “best restaurant in Barcelona”. In voice searches, the phrase would be formulated with “What is the best restaurant in Barcelona?”

  Mobile payments and greater use of mobile in general

  Traffic is increasingly mobile, and not only does my experience say it analyzing our customers, but there is a large amount of data that corroborates the use of mobile compared to the use of computers. For example:

  • Almost all reports on email open rates claim that nearly 50% of openings are made from mobile devices, according to HubSpot .
  • Mobile users check their email three times more than users who do not have it linked to their mobile phone. In addition, 35% of professionals claim to see their emails directly from the mobile.

  These data lead us to an even more interesting one: according to Campaign Monitor, 52% of customers are less likely to commit to a company, as they have suffered a bad mobile experience.

  With all this, it is important that by 2020 we set, within our objectives, to work well on the mobile version of our web pages and the adaptation of images on social networks, as well as making mobile payments well located and signposted so as not to lose sales.

  Conversational Marketing Boom

  Another trend that has been going strong this 2020 is the rise of conversational marketing . Conversational marketing is understood as the conversations that take place between users and the company directly.

  To promote these conversations, the company can implement certain actions that encourage the user who visits your website to ask questions they have, thus creating a bond of trust between the company and the potential buyer. To achieve this, actions such as:

• Chatbots settings .
• Live chat facilities to be able to speak with a real person of the company.
• Link WhatsApp or Facebook Messenger to get a faster and smoother conversation.

Greater variety of channels

Companies should keep in mind that it is important to be in all the channels in which their target audience is located, so an omnichannel marketing strategy must be carried out .

That is why you have to analyze very well in which channels you must be present if you do not want to stay out of the game. My recommendation is that, first, you work on brand positioning in all channels before starting to carry out other types of actions. The reason is very simple: a strong and distinguished brand in each of the communication channels will make it much easier for other actions to have a higher success rate.

Greater importance of local results

Surely you have already heard that local positioning is gaining popularity among companies. Here are some reasons:

• 72% of consumers who did a local search visited a store within five kilometers (Wordstream).
• 82% of smartphone owners search “close to me” (Search Engine Land).
• Local searches lead 50% of mobile device users to visit stores in one day (Google). Source: HubSpot .

With these data, it is important that you work on your local positioning during this 2020 to take advantage of the high conversion rates presented by this type of search. Do not miss it!

Increased awareness

Users are saturated with the stimuli they receive every day, so, as a company, you have to be aware of this. Also, not everything goes online anymore. More and more platforms are fighting against those known as “fake news”, eliminating them or making their reach less, so it is important that any information you share is well founded.

On the other hand, users want more privacy on the internet, so they flee from what is most intrusive to them. If we add to this the disconnection in social networks that users want to carry out, it is important to rethink how to reach them in a more conscientious and non-intrusive way. Do we reflect on it?

News in digital marketing to consider

In addition to all the trends in digital marketing to keep in mind this 2020, there are certain new features that you have to consider to take full advantage of all the existing potential and meet the expectations of users. Take note!

WhatsApp Marketing

WhatsApp is a powerful communication tool that you may not be working in the most correct way. It gives us a lot of possibility when it comes to instant messaging. With it, you can incite conversation with users, as well as send valuable content.

Thanks to this tool, you will be able to get a more direct and personalized treatment with users, so that you obtain a warmer and more fruitful relationship that results in the maturation of a lead until the purchase phase.

If you are interested in learning more about how to get more out of WhatsApp to integrate it into your marketing strategy, I recommend that you read this post .

Extremely personalized campaigns

In order to stand out in 2020, it is important to give weight to content personalization in all possible formats . As I was saying, users receive a large amount of visual and communicative stimuli throughout the day, so it is necessary to stand out to try to get the user’s attention and memory. You already know how?

In addition to this, it must be borne in mind that users increasingly make more purchases through social channels . As demonstrated by the 2019 Annual Social Media study in Spain, 55% of users say they are looking for information about products or services on social media before making a purchase.

This trend is going to grow, so the ideal is to create publications that are known as “shoppable posts”. As you may well know, platforms such as Instagram or Facebook allow you to include products in their catalogs to actually make purchases from the same platform, something that helps improve the conversion rate. However, you can always keep making posts that redirect to your eCommerce. If this is the case that more compensates you, I recommend making short videos or publications with a well-worked image to capture more the user’s attention.

There is no future without automation

Automation in marketing is essential to improve productivity, but also to adapt communications to leads as much as possible in order to prioritize content personalization.

In addition, there is a lot of data that supports the investment in automation:

• Spending on marketing automation tools is expected to reach $ 25.1 billion annually in 2023 (Martech Today, 2018).
• Companies that automate lead management see a 10% or more increase in revenue within 6 to 9 months (Strategic IC, 2017).
• Companies that employ automation and maturation of leads obtain 50% more sales with a 33% lower cost than non-nourished prospects (Strategic IC, 2017).
• 79% of high-performing companies have been using marketing automation for three years (Venture Harbor, 2017).

More visual and interactive content

Content is still king, but the truth is that the type of content will be guided more towards the visual and interactive. Thanks to this, the video and podcast will continue to gain importance this year.

• Podcast

The podcast is booming. It is a content that is increasingly consumed by users, since its listening is very simple and does not require paying attention to the screen, which makes it a perfect content to be consumed while other activities are being carried out. So much so that 27% of men and 24% of women listened to podcasts in the last month.

According to HubSpot data, 17% of marketers plan to add podcasts to their marketing actions in the next 12 months. I leave you another of my articles at this link so that you know more details about how to integrate it into your strategy.

• Video

The part of the video continues to grow as it has done in previous years. Omnicor’s data claims that video content is 50 times more likely to generate organic search results than plain text , making it a great help in improving rankings.

In addition to improving rankings, including a video in a post increases organic traffic to search results by 157%, so all are benefits. If we add to all this that millennials prefer video content to written content, we can see how video will continue to be trends for several years.

Within the video, we must make a separate mention to video-advertising as it is an extra way to improve the results of advertising campaigns.

Strong incorporation of artificial intelligence

Despite the fact that today only 15% of companies are using artificial intelligence, the quota is expected to reach 31% of companies in the coming year. Artificial intelligence is named by PWC one of the eight essential technologies in business, since its utilities can help improve productivity and service.

As you can see, the trends in digital marketing seem to be focused on offering a better user experience and achieving personalization of the services and communications made.

Ultimately, the purpose of all of them is to break down the borders between companies and users to create more fruitful, lasting and warm relationships. Would you like to share with me your opinion on these trends? Write it in the comments section to follow the conversation!