Advertising Trends To Watch in 2018

We are well into the last quarter of 2017 and you should already have an idea of how well you have met your goals for this year. While you are wrapping things up these last few months of the year, it is a good time to start thinking about what is happening next year. Let’s take a look at some of the advertising trends for 2018.

7 Advertising Trends that Will Be Hot in 2018

Integrated Advertising

Stand back and take a look at your current advertising. Are you leveraging multiple media sources to provide your target audience with a memorable experience? If not, now is the time to rethink your advertising approach.

Integrated advertising takes all media forms and creates a singular approach. Think TV and radio spots, print media, search engine and social media ads, and any other type of advertising. Every piece of advertising is in sync with every other including In-Bound advertising.

Niche Marketing

Niches are created by finding the needs, wants and requirements of a well-defined segment of people, who others are not addressing, then fulfilling the demand with goods and services.

The demand for niche marketing is growing because the number of businesses entering the digital marketplace is accelerating while the number of consumers remains fairly steady. This trend is going to become increasingly important going forward. What’s your niche and how best can you accommodate your consumer or business?

Mobile Marketing Geofencing

Advertisers can use GPS and RFID technology to set a physical boundary. If a mobile device enters or exists this boundary, the advertiser can send out a notification, email or text message. This hyper-local marketing allows businesses of all sorts to send out advertisements to consumers walking down the sidewalk near their store or office. Imagine walking the streets of Vegas when you get an alert on your phone that says, “look up and save 30% off your meal at Diablo’s Cantina”. That is what I was served in 2015.

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Social Advertising

The first part of 2017 saw a rapid increase in social media advertising spend. Social media channels like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter are providing new opportunities for user interaction, which is making advertising more attractive for companies of all sorts. Business is recognizing that social media offers ways to reach consumers that more conventional digital marketing cannot. Today, you can buy Facebook around zipcodes. What are you waiting for?

Ephemeral Content

Let’s turn the convention thoughts on digital marketing content on its head. Ephemeral content is doing just that. This type of content comes and goes very quickly, usually within 24 hours. It is perceived as more authentic, creates the FOMO (fear of missing out), and it grabs the consumer’s attention for a short time. Consumers believe that this content should be checked more often because it will be gone by the next day.

Chatbots

One of the advertising trends businesses are adopting quickly is the chatbot. A chatbot is program which engages a consumer in a text conversation, using natural language and business rules to provide requested information. It’s the reason TIVO can have one on one conversations about their products and help guide you through the purchasing cycle.

In-Store Retail Advertising

A consumer is walking through a retail store and gets an alert on his or her phone. It is a promotional offer or discount from the store. This type of in-store retail advertising is another form of hyper-local advertising. Walgreens has embraced this technology for the last two years. It drives store visits and can up-sale items for impulse buys. This form of advertising is a force that captures eyeballs and delivers content that could increase your sales if used properly.

2018 looks to be an exciting year in the world of marketing and advertising. Each year, technology pushes its way more and more into the world of marketing. If you haven’t embraced where marketing is heading, your company may not be around in the next three years. Think about how Amazon is delivering FOOD within ½ hour to your door, or Walmart not only delivering but putting away in your kitchen…did you think this would happen? Do you see the value of Tesla and having a driver-less car? Were taxis ready for UBER or LYFT? Was Blockbuster ready for NETFLIX or REDBOX? How about the postal service that didn’t work on Sundays, to be delivering Amazon products on a day where all the vehicles are available. The Echo could just change your life moving forward and why isn’t your product already being said by Alexia? Technology is a force.

The trends in 2018 are powerful. Isn’t it time to start using them?