18 Digital Marketing Tips for 2018 & Beyond | Graydient Creative
“If the logo falls off, will you still know it’s ours?”
Graydient Creative recently attended the Digital Summit in Chicago to listen to amazing speakers from leading brands in the technology industry share their expertise on digital marketing best practices, latest trends, and strategy. We learned A LOT, took some time to collect our thoughts, and now we want to pass this knowledge along to you! Here are some of the key takeaways you will need to know if you want your brand to survive in 2018 and beyond:
1. Strategy Matters
Social – You don’t need to be on every platform to be successful, focus on the ones that matter to your brand.
Content – Know your mission, then find the data to support your purpose; not the other way around. Sell to their hearts and market to their heads
Video – YouTube is well on its way of surpassing Facebook for incoming traffic. Length and fancy equipment doesn’t matter – start where you are.
2. Take Risks – Expose Yourself
Think of the most insane and out of the box ideas and write them down and bring it back until you’re just beyond comfortable. It won’t always work, but when it does, it is worth it
Take it from Plum Organics and their Do Your Partner Campaign..we’ll let you use your imagination for what this could be about..
3. It’s More About the Story, Less About the Telling
People remember a story more than stats. Don’t just tell them, SHOW them. Better yet, make them feel a part of it all.
4. Content Takes Time
Content is not just a campaign, tactic, or strategy; it’s an investment, culture, and a way of life.
5. Content Will Keep Paying for Itself
Do it once and modulate. Repackage and reuse larger pieces into smaller bite sized chunks across relevant channels.
6. Mobile Ads are Going Unseen
DID YOU KNOW: 64% of mobile ads are not viewable. Let that sink in… how will your ads reach your mobile audiences?
7. Mobile Metrics Matter Differently to Brick and Mortar
The key to mobile is not necessarily to drive purchases online, but to drive traffic to your store. Make sure you’re measuring the appropriate metrics based on your goals.
8. Location, Location, Location
Knowing the location of your users is powerful, but don’t geo-fence ads just around your store. Think about when and where people are waiting and bored, like airports, banks, restaurants, etc.
9. Hyper Gratitude is Not Hyperbole
When it comes to social (and IRL – in real life), surprise, delight, and thank your followers, customers, and clients. Then thank them again.
10. It Doesn’t Have to be Perfect, Just Consistent
Think about the biggest brands you know – they’re not always THE BEST at what they do, they’re just the best at setting (and meeting) expectations.
11. Know Your Audience, Not Just Externally
We’re all busy. Consider not only what people want to know but how. Exploratory vs. Explanatory. Raw vs. Refined. You get the picture.
12. Blog or Die
Brands that blog receive 55% more traffic & 80% more leads than brands that don’t. Blogging provides more content for Google spiders to crawl.
13. Eliminate Chart Junk in SEO
You don’t need four different 3-dimensional pie charts with 25 colors, and labels, and a background full of gridlines. Focus on quick wins and the less is more mentality.
14. Social Spend is a Necessity
If you don’t have a paid advertising budget, your brand will not survive. Period.
15. Voice and Image Search are the Future
Focus on long tail search terms and image search, rather than just keywords.People are no longer learning by memorizing, they are learning by accessibility.
16. Personalized Content will Now be Predictive Content
Emails will no longer simply say “Hi Cassandra, [insert a block of content sent to 150 other subscribers.] Content will now be based on the subscriber’s past purchases and what you think they would like to buy next.
17. David Shing is the Man
David Shing has really awesome hair and curses like a sailor. His presentation was cohesive with just the right amount of in-your-face punchlines, which made it one of the most memorable presentations of the conference.
18. Interested in learning more about all things tech first hand? Digital Summit will be coming soon to a city near you. Check out their website to get your all access pass to all things digital.
Thanks for reading our 2018 brand survival guide! If you enjoyed this blog post, tweet us your comments @WeAreGraydient!
An interesting topic to read! Greatly helped me to master few concepts on digital marketing strategy. Longing to read similar posts!