A new year means new trends on the horizon, and it’s shaping up to be another year of mixing old and new marketing strategies. That’s exactly why we’re sharing our 2023 digital marketing trends list — so you have some ideas on where to focus your marketing budget for the coming year.
The digital marketing landscape is always evolving and competition for attention is fierce. Attention spans continue to become shorter — it’s estimated that the average web page visit is less than one minute, and in that time, the visitor will read less than 30% of what is written on the page.
That means your window to capture clients’ attention is small, so you need to make an impact if you’re going to be memorable.
As a business, you need to move with the times and while you aren’t going to throw out strategies that are working, you need to know what’s current so you can adjust as needed — knowledge is power!
Let’s take a look at 7 hot digital marketing trends in 2023 and see which ones you may want to incorporate into your marketing strategy.
#1. Interactive Content Marketing
Knowing that your marketing needs to make a split-second impression, it should be no surprise that interactive content marketing is a big marketing trend for 2023.
Interactive content marketing is exactly what it sounds like — a marketing activity that is designed for users to engage and interact with it.
This interactivity not only creates higher engagement but can also result in repeat engagement where the user returns more than once.
When someone is interacting with your content, they’re going to be more engaged, which in turn will increase the time they spend on your website or whatever platform they’ve found the content on.
Engaged audiences are return audiences, and engagement builds brand loyalty.
Some examples of interactive content marketing include: quizzes, interactive infographics, interactive maps, webinars, and videos.
#2. Virtual Reality
Virtual reality (VR) is everywhere, slowly being embedded into our lives in ways we often don’t notice, so no surprise that it’s included on our 2023 digital marketing trends list. When it comes to business, the adoption of virtual reality in ecommerce can increase conversion for online shoppers by 17%.
If you’re unfamiliar with virtual reality marketing, it’s the practice of incorporating virtual reality technology into marketing campaigns. Often referred to as immersive media, it includes both VR and augmented reality.
These immersive experiences capture attention and often offer a personalized experience — which is highly appealing to buyers. For example, a manufacturing company may offer the ability for a client to simulate what it’s like to be on the manufacturing line when their product is being created.
By increasing the engagement between users and products, virtual reality marketing creates tangible opportunities to “try before you buy”.
VR marketing isn’t just about the client experience, as it can greatly benefit the company offering it. If your business has a sales team, VR can be leveraged as a sales tool, creating demos and more, in turn reducing the workload for the team.
An example of virtual reality marketing: creating an interactive experience or app to simulate product use.
#3. Video Content
If you’ve ever wondered whether video content is a marketing trend that will fizzle out soon, the answer is a definitive no! It’s estimated that online videos have a global audience reach of 92%, with an estimated 244.4 million digital video viewers in the United States.
There are a multitude of reasons video content is hugely popular, starting with how it contributes to the overall marketing strategy.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) can often be improved via content, as search engines tend to prioritize video content in their rankings. Additionally, video content usually results in people staying on your page longer, which also improves SEO.
One of the biggest benefits to video content is the opportunity to be educational and informative in a format that is appealing to both audible and visual learners. In many cases, it’s easier to “show” someone how to do something or how something works versus “telling” them with words on the page.
Video content also allows for a great deal of flexibility with content creation. For example, with video you can
- Create both short and long form videos
- Film videos that stand on their own or ones that are part of a series
- Get creative and show a bit of brand personality.
The possibilities for video content are endless and any video content you create can be used in multiple ways. For example, longer videos can easily be turned into short-form content for LinkedIn or YouTube Shorts.
Examples of video content: Explainer or how-to videos, product demos, highlight reels, customer testimonials, customer Q&As, or behind-the-scenes with the team.
#4. Repurposing Content
This next one isn’t new, but it definitely makes our list of digital marketing trends for 2023.
If your business already has a lot of content, why not leverage that and save some time and money?
Think about the time and effort that goes into developing new content every month. Whether it’s videos, blog posts, white papers, or social media, you start from scratch each time. So, when repurposing content, you have a jumping-off point to scale up from without the extra steps of new content.
Taking existing content and repurposing it into something evergreen allows you to extend the life of your content and reach new audiences.
The reality is that different types of content attract different types of people. By repurposing your content, you can retarget a wider audience simply by diversifying how the content is presented. That also means you’re increasing your chance of a conversion.
Plus, repurposing content will tell search engines that it’s “new”, thus creating more opportunities to capitalize on SEO.
If you’re not sure where to start, look at your top-performing content pieces. For example, you could take one of your most popular blog posts and turn it into social media posts, videos, an email newsletter and more.
Example of repurposing content: Taking a whitepaper or e-book and creating multiple social media posts, a video series, email campaign, and a few shorter blog posts.
#5. Long-Form Content
No 2023 digital marketing trends list would be complete without talking about creating content, but the question people are asking is — what kind of content should they be focusing on?
The rise of social media made short-form content an ongoing marketing trend in the past several years, however, long-form content still has a place in your marketing strategy.
Short-form content is usually less than 1,000 words and can be consumed in about five minutes or less. Long-form content usually exceeds 2,000 words and is used to provide valuable and informative content.
It may seem that short-form content is everywhere thanks to social video and snackable content, but long-form content provides a greater opportunity to rank better in search engines.
If SEO is a priority, long-form content is a must as it takes longer to consume and can use more backlinks when creating long-form content, which increases trust with the search engine.
Customer education is a key aspect of many marketing strategies, and long-form content provides an opportunity to expand on topics that your audience finds informative. You have a chance to showcase the knowledge and skills your company can offer, and position your brand as an authority.
Best of all, long-form content can easily be repurposed into shorter content later!
Examples of long-form content include: e-books, blog posts, and whitepapers.
#6. Experiential Marketing
According to HubSpot, experiential marketing is ranked as one of the top five marketing strategies being used by companies. Why? Because it’s effective.
Experiential marketing is based on the premise of giving customers a memorable and interesting experience with your company. The goal is to create a connection between the person and your brand, giving them an opportunity to interact with your company in a way that traditional marketing may not offer. It helps build the credibility of your brand and allows you to showcase authenticity.
Not only is experiential marketing interactive and fun, providing your customers with a hands-on experience, but it’s also attention-grabbing — because you’re offering something a little different.
These experiences can be leveraged to create content and social media, making them easy to integrate into your overall marketing strategy. It can also provide useful analytics which can be later mined for data to help create even better experiences in the future.
Examples of experiential marketing include: Executive forums, lunch-and-learns, webinars, and trade shows.
#7. Human-Driven Storytelling
If you’re looking at which digital marketing trend can help create memorable and positive associations with your brand, look no further than human-driven storytelling.
Human-driven storytelling is a compelling and engaging strategy that relies on making a connection with the storyteller. It focuses on the human and emotional element instead of strictly relying on facts and figures — great for companies who feel challenged by being perceived as “dry” or “boring.”
In a world where everyone else is vying for the attention of your potential customers, human-driven storytelling is a way to stand out and get noticed. It showcases the personality of your brand and makes it more relatable.
A strong human-driven story includes a relatable protagonist, feels authentic, and connects the emotions of the reader to the story being told. Add in a few relevant facts or pieces of data to tie it all together, and you’ve got a great story.
Want to make it even more interesting? Leave the story on a cliff-hanger so everyone is wanting more and you can build off the last story.
Examples of human-driven storytelling include: a company origin story, customer profiles or case studies, and a story related to the values of your company.
Digital Marketing Trends 2023: Which Will You Adopt This Year?
As you can see from our 2023 digital marketing trends list, there are several options which you can integrate into your strategy — and these are just the ones we covered in this post.
Whichever ones you choose, having a solid plan in place is a must. Marketing works best when it’s fueled by an overarching strategy that fits in with the goals and priorities of your business, so even if you just try out one or two in the coming year, your marketing can make a bigger impact.
Looking for help nailing down your marketing plans and figuring out which digital marketing trends your company should adopt for 2023? Marketing2Connect would love to help.
Please contact us to get started.