Successful Marketing Strategies for the Post-Digital Age

Today we’re going to take a look at some of the latest developments in digital marketing so that you can make the most out of the new marketing trends in 2018.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Big Data will continue as buzzwords during the coming year but only the marketers who know how to use it (and their companies) will get the real benefit.

Digital is now a part of marketing strategies in all sectors as the industries that were previously reluctant to do digital have come to their senses and seen the benefits it has to offer.

While we’ve experienced many changes in recent years, from mass-media centric, the one-to-many approach, to data-driven, one-to-one tactics – the Post-Digital age is upon us in which success will be measured by marketing’s ability to adapt to one-to-moment marketing.

Pre-digital marketing used mass media in a one-to-many approach, then came digital marketing which is data driven, enabling one-to-one personalisation as a powerful method of getting the message across.  With technological progress speeding up progress and leading to rapid change, we’re now in the post-digital stage which means on-to-moment marketing is upon us, offering an even more potent method of engaging with potential customers in order to secure a share of the market.

Working in channel silos does not ensure consistent delivery of the right message to the right person at the right time and in the right place.  This is critical to success so working in channel silos is no longer acceptable for digital marketers.

Audience behaviour will need to drive all multi-channel planning and optimisation decisions so that at any given point, they can show the message most likely to provide the most persuasive step towards conversion.  This means that digital budgets will need to be channel-independent and marketers will need to be more agile than ever before.

One-to-moment marketing involves using mobile marketing to create content that matters to consumers based on the context of their moment.  Muscling in on the micro-moments when consumers are using their mobile devices to make choices on what to buy, where to go and things to do.

We’ve already seen examples of this with Amazon’s Alexa, an intrusive little witch who sits in homes around the world – she’s sitting there seemingly waiting for instructions from the user whilst also listening to what’s going on so that the right interaction can happen at the right time for each individual user.

Google Assistant is a smart search feature that enables users to ask open-ended questions to get intelligent results, refining results by building on the conversation.  Google Assistant is all about context and provides answers that change based on the user’s changing context.

Most people nowadays spend most of their time in close proximity to their smartphone.  This is especially true of younger generations, many of whom barely put their phones down and spend most of their time clutching it in their hand, whatever they are doing.  Indeed, it’s quite common to see groups of young people in social situations holding phones and communicating simultaneously IRL (in real life) and digitally!

This is a perfect opportunity for brands to present content during those moments that will help people to decide where to go and what to do, instead of hitting them with an intrusive ad that is likely to be ignored because they are so busy with online and offline conversations.  Instead, marketing professionals need to embed themselves into every moment with a suggestion that’s too good to miss.

This is a clear shift back towards offline experiences and getting back in touch with the real world whilst still engaging online.  The key to success with this is in-person events, delivering a seamless integration between our online and offline worlds for a totally holistic experience.  It offers us a more complete lifestyle that is enabled and enriched by technology, instead of being engulfed by it and, for younger generations, this is a logical development while it’s a great opportunity for marketers.

This is where Events come into the equation.  In-person events have proved effective for many organisations of all sizes, delivering opportunities to reaffirm existing relationships and gain a detailed understanding of customers’ needs through product and marketing events.  By creating contextual content, in-person events allow marketers to provide a personalised experience which gives the company a much more “human” feel, however large the organisation, enabling enterprise brand to embed themselves within their customers’ natural behaviours and delivery contextual content that will take advantage of every moment.

Event Automation enables marketers to collect the vital data on micro-moments (buying signals and event intelligence) to gain new insight into your customer and begin to anticipate their needs.  Event Automation is dependent upon mobile which is just one of the many channels that comprise the post-digital experience of in-person events, which is a multi-channel discipline.  By leveraging every marketing channel, events allow a holistic engagement with prospects and customers, providing the context that makes micro-moments possible.

Because events provide the context for moments and the opportunity to succeed in those moments, Event Automation can be integrated with Marketing Automation to provide the content that matters to your customer at exactly the right time, when they are likely to be most receptive to the message.  This results in companies becoming “first responders” during these critical, intent-driven moments, resulting in powerful customer loyalty.  Providing the right content at the right time via Event Automation empowers marketers to deliver on the brand promise which increases engagement and builds brand trust and brand loyalty.

Here at Emarkable, we know that most business owners have enough on their hands running their business.  Becoming an expert marketing professional in an ever-changing landscape may seem like an overwhelming ambition.  Our expert team of marketing professionals have the up-to-date knowledge and experience necessary to advise you on this aspect of your marketing activity.  Why not get in touch now and let one of our expert team members help to put your business on the road to success in the post-digital marketing age.

Richard Coen

With over 21 years of experience in Digital Marketing, 31 years in sales and 25 years in business development, Richard assists companies to develop key growth strategies on a local or international basis. He can assist marketers to achieve balance in their approach to key areas affected by the growth in digital marketing.