In this past year, the whole world was faced with the abrupt suspension of day-to-day events due to the global pandemic. The pandemic further emphasized how important it is to be part of the digital world to pursue growth. Under pressure, many companies had to learn to adjust to this new environment.
However, digital marketers are not unfamiliar with change as being in a fast-paced environment such as the digital marketing industry means you need to constantly adapt to new trends as well as ever-changing user expectations and buying habits.
In 2021 we have seen some noticeable trends that came with the emergence of new technologies and small technical updates that have had a huge impact in the digital marketing world. Nevertheless, as a digital marketer, you are expected to stay on top of the ball with the latest trends and predictions.
As the world’s economy is slowly recovering from a global pandemic, marketers now have a little extra money to splurge on the next best thing. But in what areas should you be investing in to prepare yourself for the new year?
Let’s take a look into the trends and predictions for 2022 to help you invest your money in areas that will guarantee your post-pandemic success!
2022 Trends And Predictions
Here are a few trends we are expecting to change the digital marketing industry in 2022:
Featured Snippets
Featured snippets are small paragraphs from web pages that are placed at the top of search results to help quickly and effortlessly answer users’ questions.
Search engines refer to these snippets as position zero and are considered a “no-click” or “zero-click” search. In recent studies, Forbes has found that more than half of the searches conducted on Google never end up leaving the search engine results page.
With the snippets, users no longer need to leave the search engine results page to get the information they need. Moreover, search experts are predicting that the percentage of zero-click searches will only continue to rise in 2022.
Zero-click searches can massively impact the organic traffic to business websites and content, but, there are ways in which you can use zero-click searches to your advantage.
One of the benefits of having your content being featured as a snippet on Google is that users automatically perceive your content as being valuable. The key to using featured snippets to your advantage is to ensure that you provide enough information to entice the user to click through to your website. Make your snippets a little longer so some of the information is cut off, leaving users wanting to know more.
A big focus in 2022 should be put towards adjusting your feature snippets to encourage users to further engage with your content. Features snippets are known as meta descriptions when you are working on the SEO of your blog. Make sure that your meta descriptions of your featured snippets are longer than 160 characters.
Mobile Website
As more and more people use their smartphones to interact with the digital world, taking a mobile-first website approach is crucial.
In 2021 it was estimated that 54.8% of the global online traffic was generated from mobile devices. What this means is that companies need to ensure that their websites are completely mobile responsive.
A mobile-first approach looks at mapping out the design elements and features of your website for mobile users first, before focusing on a bigger screen. Mobile websites need to have less text-heavy content and contain friendly navigation.
Here are some benefits of using a mobile-first approach:
- Helps increase user experience
- Helps increase search engine ranking
- Increases sales and conversion rates
- Helps integrate voice-activated search and visual search
Mobile marketing has been a buzz term for a long time now as technology continues to evolve and users continue to expand their interactions with smartphones. In 2022, ensure to put a large focus into your mobile website to better improve user experience.
Shopping Posts
Shopping Posts allow e-commerce brands to link specific products to an uploaded image. Social media users want to be able to buy what they see, with as little friction as possible.
Using shopping posts means users don’t have to navigate out of their social media channel to finish the purchase. This makes it an extremely useful tool for e-commerce brands that have high social media following and engagement.
Just in 2021, Instagram alone recorded 130 million users per month engaging with Shopping Posts. This is a huge platform for e-commerce brands that work with social influencers and creators to leverage the opportunity to promote and sell products at a larger scale.
If you are an e-commerce brand, consider adding Shopping Posts to your social media strategy!
Visual Search
Visual search gives users information on the image or item that was uploaded to the search feature. This form of search uses artificial intelligence (AI) to further understand the context and item to return a list of related results.
As an example, a person might want to learn more about the Eifel Tower. They take a picture of the Eifel Tower and upload it to the search. The results will show information related to the history of the Eifel Tower, how it was built, opening hours, ticket prices, and more.
Harnessing the power of visual search can help increase your revenue by 30% as millennials claim to prefer visual search over other search options.
In 2022 a big focus in your marketing strategy should be towards adding high-quality images to your website. Make sure to SEO your images correctly by using targeted keywords. Images should include a descriptive file name as well as a keyword-rich alt tag.
Start Your Prep for 2022 Early…
Now that you have a better idea of what trends to expect for 2022, you can spend some time prepping your new marketing strategies to ensure you are optimized for success.
To learn more about the different aspects of digital marketing and digital marketing reporting visit our blog!
