Influential 2018 Marketing Trends

A Look Ahead: 2018

Here are some of the marketing trends expected to be among the most influential in the coming year:

• Video is still one of the top ways to engage customers and prospects. Facebook and Instagram are vital here . . . and for longer-form video, YouTube and branded microsites rule. Think cross-platform as consumers switch among devices.
• Influencer marketing will be even more important in 2018, with marketers working with multiple influencers to extend reach, reinforce messages, gain better targeting, create new associations.
• Apps are in the spotlight--both branded apps and in-app advertising. Retailers in particular are using apps to help consumers make better buying decisions.
• Content marketing for B2B (and B2C) will be more targeted, more integrated with other marketing activities, and held accountable for achieving results. Again, think cross-platform and multimedia, as consumers access content via multiple devices and media.
• Mobile marketing (such as geofencing) will increase in importance, given the maturity of the smartphone market and the popularity of mobile devices.
• More transparency than ever before will be demanded by consumers and by marketers. This means better information about supply chains, about audience characteristics, about products, about privacy policies, and about results.

Geolocation and Target Marketing

Geolocation is a fascinating tool to consider for your marketing plan. Remember Pokemon Go, and all the marketing hoopla associated with firms that leveraged it? That brief craze brought geolocation into the public eye. Even though the fad has faded, there are many marketing possibilities for geolocation, as smartphone-toting customers go to work, go to school, go on vacation, go shopping, or are simply on the go.

Privacy concerns need to be addressed, of course. Still, by defining the audience, the offer, and the objective, marketers can test and refine their use of geolocation to attract new customers and encourage repeat purchasing.

• Target customers in or near your location. Through geofencing, you can define an area within which you will communicate incentives to visit your venue or buy a particular offering. Coca-Cola sends messages to shoppers' phones while customers are inside Albertsons supermarkets, for instance, directing them to promotional deals in the soft-drink aisle. 
• Have something to say. This is sales promotion territory--meaning the marketing should convey a sense of urgency, such as a limited-time offer. American Eagle Outfitters identifies shoppers entering the mall parking lot and communicates about new products and other news, boosting foot traffic.
• Make location count. Starbucks uses geolocation to transmit the customer's mobile order to the nearest convenient location via the ordering app. Customers like the speed and convenience. Starbucks likes the efficiency. Win-win all the way around.

Social Media Marketing Down Under

A social media agency in Australia has just published its report showing the Facebook Australian brand accounts with the most fans and the Facebook Australian brand accounts with the most engagement.

Counting fans, the winners are shown above. In terms of engagement (shares, comments, etc.), the winners are shown below, a mixture of tourism, products, media, and shared-interest pages:

1. Australia 242,380
2. Babyology 79,543
3. Fifi and Jules 71,163
4. B105 67,660
5. 9 News 66,847
6. Sunrise 65,301
7. 2Day FM 55,378
8. Fox FM 49,142
9. Black Milk Clothing 45,750
10. Hungry Jack’s 40,082

According to Nielsen, Australians are adopting social media quite enthusiastically, with 70% of all Australians using some form of social media (mainly Facebook). According to Galaxy Research, the top two apps used by Australians traveling abroad are Google Maps and -- Facebook.

At the same time, the majority of people surveyed by the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner said they were concerned about online tracking by marketers. Many had chosen to stop doing business with marketers due to privacy concerns.

Given the popularity of social media, what's a marketer to do? First, clearly and prominently explain what information is being collected and how it will be used. Also emphasize security. But don't lose the fun and sociability of social media along the way, which is why people are flocking to Facebook and other sites in the first place.

Mystery Shoppers Go Mobile

Mystery shoppers act as "eyes" and "ears" for management, visiting stores, restaurants, and other businesses to check on service, look at displays, and answer other questions without revealing their mission. I've been on both sides of mystery shopping--as a retail manager receiving feedback and as a mystery shopper myself, visiting stores to buy something, return it, report on the general condition of the store, and so on.

Today, mystery shopping has gone mobile. Mobee (app shown above) is a Boston-based mystery shopping service that has a Yelp-like role in providing instant feedback. Businesses can use it to see how their customers are being treated, how certain branded products are being sold in stores, or for competitive intelligence. "We collect data from customers at your stores, analyze it, and package it into insights that improve your business," says Mobee's web site. At any one time, about 500 "missions" (requests for mystery shopping) are active, many for fast-food franchised restaurants. Mobee's mobile users earn gift cards for answering questions as they visit the outlets being shopped.

Rewardable takes a similar approach in the Connecticut area. Customers open the app when they're near or at a store, see what "tasks" are available, and then click to answer a few questions as mystery shoppers. The company recently completed mystery shopping for a food company interested in checking that its promoted products were on an end cap and visible throughout the sale dates at Stop & Shop supermarket stores.

Mystery shopping is important all over the planet. In Asia, Shopbust is a mystery shopping app with consumers participating in Indonesia, the Philippines, and Singapore. Participants receive payments via PayPal. Of course Shopbust is social, with both Twitter and Facebook activity.

King.com's Freemium Strategy

The mobile/FB game Candy Crush Saga is exhibit one in making freemium pricing pay off. Freemium is a pricing technique in which customers get the basic offering for free with the option of paying for upgrades or additional functionality. Most apps are freemium-priced, and many mobile games.

The UK game company King.com is targeting women in the age group of 25 to 55 for Candy Crush, although others outside that demographic play, as well. You start by downloading the free version to see if you like it . . . and once you gain proficiency, you might want to pay a little for extra elements that will help you reach higher levels. The game itself is fun and deceptively easy, and the payments are small. 

This "sweet" game is played far and wide--about 600 million times every day, on iPhones or Android phones or Facebook. Nearly three-quarters of Candy Crush players use the free version. That means fewer than 30% pay to play--but those small payments add up.  Candy Crush reportedly earns King.com about half a million pounds ($750,000) every day. The profit margin is extremely healthy, needless to say.

Not everyone admires freemium pricing. Some people raise concerns about the effect on usage of more traditional digital games that must be purchased to be played. They also wonder whether game marketers are tweaking games to improve the odds that players will pay up. "Coercive monetization" is the term one economist applies to freemium pricing.

Yet the high-profile success of some app marketers makes a compelling case for investigating whether freemium can be used for other goods and services.

Apps Gaining Ground

Nielsen reports that U.S. consumers are downloading more apps than ever before and using them for more minutes per day. Half of the country now owns a smartphone . . . and on that smartphone, they have an average of 41 apps this year, compared with 32 apps last year. Nielsen's study names these as the top five apps: Facebook, YouTube, Google Play (entertainment app), Google Search, and Gmail.

TechCrunch points out that Apple has more than 25 billion app downloads at this point, and Google apps reached the 15 billion download mark this month.

Meanwhile, with Facebook at the top of the app list, its upcoming IPO has sparked much discussion about how the social media giant can wring revenues from its popularity. Some industry observers see FB earning millions of dollars from mobile marketing in the near future. Other news reports question whether FB can leverage its app dominance for profitability. First, let's see how the IPO does on day 1 and then on day 2.

Does Your App Measure Up?

So many apps, so little time. Does your app measure up as a marketing add-on?

1. An app must deliver user value. Your app must be more than a one-time gimmick to retain the user's attention and be allowed to take up space on an electronic device. Think about the problem it will help users solve, the convenience it will offer, the time or money it will save users. Will your app help users compare products, check prices, save time, replace a phone call or a personal visit? Will it help users achieve a personal or professional goal? Of course apps must also be attractive, professional, and even entertaining, not just functional.
2. An app must add value to your marketing. Don't jump on the app bandwagon just because everyone else is doing it. An app must help you achieve your marketing objectives, if only in some small way. Or it must help reduce/remove barriers to achieving your objectives. Your app should not create a lot of extra work for you and your staff, or increase costs without a corresponding increase in sales or customer relationships. The bottom line is that an app isn't right for you if it doesn't bring your business some benefits.
3. Know what you want to achieve. Are you trying to boost traffic to your retail web site? Promote a specific offering? Increase referral business? Also define the ways in which you'll measure progress toward your objectives and how often you plan to check progress with appropriate metrics. Otherwise, your app will be a tactic in search of a strategy.

Small businesses are starting to leverage apps for marketing advantage. A recent WSJ article mentioned a Honda dealer in Ohio that offers an app for users to view photos and videos of cars for sale and to make service appointments. An app offered by the Founding Farmers restaurant in Washington, D.C., lets users reserve tables or book a party. These are only a few examples of apps that measure up.