When the medium of marketing is becoming Digital from traditional, Content has become the essence of branding and lead generation. Content marketing strategy is adopted by several brands to advertise themselves.

Content marketing is creating valuable and relevant content to attract the audience and switch them into customers. With the new technology and trends coming, the needs of your audience are constantly changing, and to need to keep up with that you need to create and distribute effective and engaging content.

Here are 9 emerging content marketing trends:

1.Video and Live-Streaming

Thanks to youtube and Instagram Reels, which have become popular video and live-streaming platforms, and are going to grow in the coming years. The present consumer increasingly wants video content from their favorite brands as it shows how a brand works and how authentic they are. When it comes to Digital Marketing, video is an important content marketing strategy because it keeps the audience engaged. The Video does very well on several different platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and even on your business websites. Live-streaming video is the new trend, it connects with customers directly and enables two-way communication with the business. To conduct live-streaming video you can go live from Facebook or Instagram and organize live Q&A sessions with the audience, live events, live streaming of presentation, announcements, and, behind-the-scenes-glimpses to engage with your audience. Live streaming videos will increase your engagement rate on social media and you will also receive real-time feedback from your audience. So if you want to engage with your audience through content, use video, and live streaming content marketing strategy to show your audience that your brand is more than a name.

2. User-Generated-Content

User-generated content is that content that is created and published by unpaid contributors also called fans who promote a brand rather than brand promoting itself. User-generated content can be any content such as blogs, website pages, images, social media posts, and testimonials. For user-generated-content, you need to determine what motivates your audience to share your content and how you can engage customers to create user-generated content. User-generated content not only engages consumers but also allows you to value your loyal customers. For example, when Coca Cola company launched the” Share a Coke “campaign, it encouraged users to search out a coke with their name on it so as to share it on social media. People shared images with coke providing free viral content marketing for the brand.

3. Voice Search

Thanks to Apple Siri and Amazon Alexa, voice search technology is going to drive content marketing. It is expected that all web searches will be conducted by voice in the coming years.

To utilize the voice search trend:

• Optimize voice search using long-tail keywords in titles and ask questions like what, who, when, where, who, and how when doing voice search. These are commonly used words. For example, when talking to a voice assistant, people will not say only ‘content marketing’. Instead, they will form a question ‘what is content marketing’ as if they are talking to a human. Make your content natural and conversational sounding.
• Secondly, by looking into the voice queries, you will get even more insight into the type of information and content your audience is looking for. This will not only tailor your existing content for voice-SEO but also inform your future content-creation initiatives.

Smart devices have taken hold of the marketplace, so it only makes sense to make most of this with content marketing.

4. Podcast

In recent years Podcasts have become a very popular content marketing trend. Podcasts are very informative and can be listened to while walking, driving, and walking on treadmills. Podcasts can be about any topic or industry: entertainment, history, sports, books, business industries, technology, or about current happening’s in the industry.  Creating a podcast content haphazardly is not going to be effective. Make your podcasts as effective as you do the rest of your content marketing efforts. Try to focus on one topic this can help your brand establish its credibility within your field of expertise.

5. Use of visuals

From entertainment to communication, people are moving towards the visual medium.  Visual content marketing is trending as it improves the content experience and gives an innovative view of the content. Visuals not only make your content prettier but also make it informative. Facebook, Instagram, youtube are the most popular platforms to share visual content.  Create and share interesting graphics that will attract your audience.

6. Data-Driven Content

Everything in business is data-driven today, whether it is to execute a ‘big idea’ in an effective way or to personalize content.  Data + technology + great storytelling is a powerful content creation strategy that is taking brands into new territory with relevance, personalization, and creativity. To take advantage of this trend, review your analytics, and identify the content that your audience engages with most and create more of that type of content. 

7. Augmented-Reality Visuals

Snapchat offers users a ton of Augmented Reality filters and lens to create fun visual content like a puppy dog nose, ears, or a pretty flower crown on top of their head. These filters are all possible via augmented reality. Even Snapchat also allows you to create your own branded filters and lenses and helps to promote your business to social media users.

8. Personalized Content

Every customer wants to feel special and that’s where personalized content strategy comes in. As each and every customer wants and needs are different, the content marketing technique used to lure them must be different.  But now personalized content has gone on the next level that is known as dynamic content.  Dynamic content refers to web content that changes based on the user’s demographics, behaviors, preferences, and interests. The goal of delivering personalized content is not just to deliver content to your customers, but to deliver the accurate content that will get them to take further steps in their own buyer’s journey.

9. Topic Focused Content

Google’s algorithms now look at more than just the quality of a single page while ranking. Creating various posts about one certain topic that falls under a single umbrella is a new content marketing strategy. It shows that your brand is an expert in the respective field and will help build brand awareness and improves your credibility too.

Content marketing is one of the most effective marketing strategies, that allows businesses to connect with their customers and form long-lasting relationships with them. Now that you are aware of these important content marketing trends, you can start implementing them into your content marketing strategy.

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