Marketing Trend: Personalized Marketing

Consumers are not strangers to personalized content. People tend to love when they receive offers and content that really fit them and their needs. Think back to email marketing. As a consumer, you may receive emails that seem to know everything about what you are looking for from any number of stores. This is a big example of how personalized marketing can work, but there are also social media ads, banner ads, video ads and more, which can all be personalized to the consumer, either through data collection or extensive targeting.

The key to creating great personalization is having a strategy to create data-driven content. With the content you build using the data you have, your marketing options expand innumerably, and include personalized content.

Defining personalized marketing

Beyond email, personalized marketing may be something you are not familiar with as a consumer, but you will realize that you have been seeing it every day.

The Content Marketing Institute defines the concept of personalized content by saying the following: “content personalization is a strategy that exploits visitor or prospect data to deliver relevant content based on the interests and preferences of the target audience.” You can read more about the approach to content personalization here.

Want to learn more? These companies are doing personalized marketing right!

Amazon

Online retail giant Amazon’s product curation and product recommendations are not new features but are definitely some of the biggest examples of personalized marketing around right now. Each section on your Amazon homepage should harken back to not only your purchase history but also your browsing history and streaming history on Amazon Video.

Spotify

Recommendations for music, compiled playlists and the “Discover Weekly” feature are all built on a Spotify user’s “taste profile”. When you are listening to music, data is taken from each listening session to create stations that fit in with that profile.

Coca-Cola

As discussed in an earlier post about user-generated content, Coca Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign has remained a staple for the brand since it’s 2011 beginnings, and one reason why is because the personalization factor of finding your own name (especially with the correct spelling or if you have an unusual name) keeps consumers purchasing and engaging with the brand as they find their names.

Facebook

Facebook is already a personalized experience just based on the nature of how it is used, but the addition of “Friendship History Videos” and other personalized options for photos as well as the obvious page, event and friend suggestions make Facebook not only a great platform for individual personalization but also great for marketers looking to target a very specific audience.

Netflix

Netflix is an essential part of many households today, and their rating system is a great way to sort through the amount of content that is available to stream. When you see a show or movie on Netflix you’ll see a rating amount out of five stars. Contrary to normal reviews and ratings, the stars appear based on how Netflix’s algorithm believes you will rate the content based on your past activity.

Personalized content and marketing are a great way to reach your audience even further and perhaps you’ve even seen some other great examples. Share your experiences with personalized marketing in the comments section.

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Marketing Trend: Data Driven Content

Looking to make your marketing efforts a little more streamlined? Or just trying to create content that is easy to scale, right for your audience and optimized for search purposes? Data-driven content is the way to go. The biggest hurdle for most marketers is leaving the creative brain behind and getting into a quantitative mindset that allows you to look at your metrics and analyze how to improve those numbers and statistics.

It may sound scary, but using data can really improve your content, SEO and more. Try these tips and tricks from JBH: The Content Agency to get started!

If you still aren’t convinced that data is changing the way marketers think and execute their strategies, take a look at these examples that prove that data-driven marketing and content can work in any industry.

Fitness Tracking: Jawbone

Because fitness tracker Jawbone’s purpose is to collect data for consumer use, it makes sense that their marketing efforts are also highly data-driven. By collecting the data from their customers, the content that is produced is much more relevant to the lifestyles of the entire user base.

Music: Spotify

Spotify users see curated playlists and song suggestions based on their listening history, and via this post from 2013, it’s clear to see that Spotify doesn’t take their analytics lightly. Spotify also has a “Found Them First” feature, that lets you know if you were an early listener of emerging artists that are now big.

Home Search: Trulia, Zillow

Zillow and Trulia are two giants when it comes to online house hunting, but also when it comes to using data to improve customer experience. From amassing crime data to pricing and neighborhood demographics, the data compiled on these sites and individually compiled from users’ browsing sessions can help homebuyers find the perfect place.

Ridesharing: Uber

Ridesharing app Uber does the typical promotional posts and company updates but also uses the data they compile to create great human interest pieces, like this article. The data Uber uses to create content used for both societal and human nature research.

Data drives the world. How will you use it to create better content?  

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Marketing Trend: Expiring Content

Have you ever opened an email telling you that there is a “limited time only” sale, then went on to click that ad to shop even if you haven’t purchased anything from that store in years? Placing a hard and fast deadline on a sale or promotion is nothing new in marketing and sales, but with the growth of content marketing, there is now an influx of content only available for a limited time, otherwise known as “Expiring Content”.

One Day Only! Defining Expiring Content:

Moz.com defines expiring content  as “content on a website that is only relevant for a limited period of time.” The easiest examples of widespread expiring content are Snapchat and Instagram Stories. Posts expire 24 hours after being published. In a world where mobile marketing strategy is becoming more and more prevalent, expiring content is perfect for breaking through the clutter of too much available content.

Why use expiring content?

Exclusivity

If the idea of expiring content seems foolish, now is the time to reconsider. Psychologically, the human brain often desires things that are exclusive or rare. This is due to the Scarcity Principle, a psychological phenomenon that can cause consumers to purchase items or, in the case of expiring content, view posts because they are seen as more valuable because of limited availability.

Relevance

Using expiring content ensures that your content only exists for as long as it is relevant. With this mindset, you can post promotional materials, events, and contests and let the posts filter out on their own after the window of opportunity for your audience has passed.

Improved Social Reach

Snapchat and Instagram aren’t the only platforms where you can have expiring content. Facebook has a feature that allows you to set your posts to expire and you can set up blog posts on WordPress to phase out over time as well.  Some studies have shown that having expiring content can improve your social reach due to your own irrelevant older content phasing out to clear the pathways for new content to be seen.

With more proven benefits, improved reach and SEO, expiring content is making its mark on the marketing world. Will you try expiring content in your next marketing strategy?

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Tech Radar: What You Need to Know About Apple’s New iPhones

via Shutterstock

Apple made headlines with the announcement of the newest generation of iPhone, the iPhone 8, but also the addition of the game changer the iPhone X.  These are some of the key things to know about these high powered smartphones before they are released.

X is 10

Apple celebrates iPhone’s ten-year anniversary with the release of the iPhone X, which is pronounced as iPhone “ten”. At the event, Apple CEO Tim Cook says this is “the biggest leap forward since the original iPhone.”    

Shipping and Purchase Expectations

The iPhone 8 and 8 Plus will be available for pre-order today (September 15) and goes on sale on September 22. The 8 starts at $699 USD, and the 8 Plus starts at $799 USD.  The iPhone X is scheduled for a later release date, available for pre-order on October 27 with an expected sale date of November 3. The initial supply is rumored to be VERY limited, so be ready to pre-order. The iPhone X will have a starting price of $999, making it the most expensive iPhone yet released, but the specs of the phone are worth the price hike, according to this Business Insider post.

iPhone8 and iPhone 8 Plus Highlights

The iPhone 8 and 8 Plus are a beautifully designed smartphone that will host one of the most exciting releases Apple has promised, iOS 11. The 8 and 8 Plus are water and dust resistant, with an all glass design and Retina HD displays. The cameras have been improved for better color capture, as well as for image stabilization and more, so photos shot on iPhone become even more brilliant. Outstanding Augmented Reality capability and wireless charging round out some of the key features to try out if you purchase an iPhone8 or 8Plus. Learn about more features here.

iPhone X Highlights

One of the biggest draws of the iPhone X is the all new screen design. Taking away the borders of past models, the OLED screen on the X is a 5.8 inch Super Retina display that takes up the entire front of the phone, and no home button. With new features like Animoji’s (animated emoji), dust and water resistance, Face ID authentication, portrait mode selfies and added studio quality lighting effects added into the improved cameras, an efficient battery and a first for Apple: wireless charging capabilities. Learn more about the iPhone X’s features here.

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Tech Radar: Self-Driving Cars

Just like home automation, cars are getting smarter as well.  From Google to Tesla, Uber to Nissan, self-driving cars are becoming autonomous with the future as much as anything else. In fact, CES 2017 was full of companies showcasing their autonomous driving plans, with BMW announcing their plan for a fleet of fully autonomous vehicles to hit roads for testing before the end of the year.

But despite the excitement, the advent of these vehicles is marked by legal trouble, public distaste and distrust, and even location based prohibitions. This is what you need to know about self-driving cars and the future of transportation.

Tesla

Tesla is perhaps the self-driving technology with the most public knowledge due to some less than desirable past driving results. Tesla’s automation combined with the electric cars they create makes them a huge player in both the environmental and driverless car future. Run by an incredibly powerful computer, and enabling cameras, radars, sensors, and ultrasonics to provide the driverless experience, this car is equipped with a huge amount of groundbreaking technology. However their proclivity to bend traffic rules (mostly speed limits) has been the cause of headlines recently, and the fatal accident last June involving a self-driving Tesla and a semi truck was news for many weeks as the safety of driverless cars and the technology behind them was scrutinized.

Google’s WAYMO

Google has been working on automated driving for years, and now in its current inception, the internet giant’s movement is called Waymo. Google’s software and built-in-house hardware allow a completely driverless experience, with sensors that detect any possible obstacles and predict behavior, allowing the vehicle to execute the best navigation and defensive driving possible.  Road tests have put the Waymo enabled vehicles to the test going through complex situations and real driving conditions, even giving the cars the ability to react to any unexpected situations. Many experts have speculated that if Tesla’s cars utilized the same technology as Google’s cars, June’s accident between the semi and the autonomous car would not have happened.

Nissan

Japanese car manufacturer Nissan has announced that its autonomous vehicles should be out testing the roads in England come February. The cars are manufactured in Sunderland, so it is easy to see why the location is set as it is. Government clearance is still awaiting approval, but once the plan is approved, testing will begin. Equipped with radar, laser and camera systems the Nissan Intelligent Mobility Suite is aboard the company’s electric car (Nissan Leaf), putting this manufacturer in direct competition with Tesla.

The driverless car is still relatively new, but you can expect to see more of them as the year progresses and more companies jump on board. Rules and regulations will change, as will technology and the sheer amount of options open to those that are interested in automated driving technology. There’s no doubt that these cars could change the face of transportation for just about everybody, whether these advancements are good or bad remains to be seen.

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Marketing Trend: Interactive Content

Content marketing is the bread and butter of any marketing strategy today, but with a huge influx of content, audiences are getting overwhelmed, with the average adult coming to an average of about 8 hours of screen time a day.

For successful content marketing you must break through the clutter of too much content so you can reach your target audience, but how? The answer comes in a not-so-simple answer: multiple types of content. In a recent post about User Generated Content (UGC), you learned about one form of content you can add to your arsenal, interactive content will be yet another added.

Defining Interactive Content

Interactive content is a cut and dry name for this trend, as it is defined as any type of content that the audience can interact with. This can be in any number of ways, but the key is that it forces the audience to do more than simply look at the content. These are some examples of interactive content that you can use for upcoming marketing campaigns.

Quizzes

One look at Buzzfeed and it is clear that there is a difference between the way that this “jack of all trades” site functions and similar sites like Mashable and Upworthy. Buzzfeed’s content ranges from pop culture to serious political news, but one of the top categories they have become renowned for is quizzes. A quiz can be funny, serious, or even an advertisement for a line of products. See an example of this here.

Video

Video might be already the considered the most engaging form of content, but interactive video can put your video engagement on a different level. Think of interactive video as a “choose your own adventure” type of content. Check out this post for more about interactive video and other types of video to use in social media posts, and this post to see some examples of interactive videos for marketing.

Games

Gamification in marketing has taken off in the last few years with huge companies taking note of successful campaigns and releasing their own gamified campaigns to promote their products. From offering “free” services for social shares, to actually creating a game; for example, Chipotle did this with the memory game launched with their “A Love Story” short film advertisement for real, healthy ingredients.

Content is key, so how will you break through the noise? Share your favorite content marketing techniques in a comment, on Twitter or on Facebook.

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