Content marketing will become even more important in 2019. The landscape of good content marketing campaigns is changing, and the nature of content creation is becoming a team effort. Visitors to a website, blog, or online shop increasingly desire interactive content, brands with an authentic and friendly face, and a better user experience.
Videos and podcasts will continue to provide brand experiences for users in 2019, and in some companies, chatbots and messenger marketing will soon take over the majority of customer support and, most importantly, customer loyalty. It will remain exciting!
One thing we can say for sure:
- Content marketing will become even more important (if not the most important!)
- Content creation and distribution will change radically
There’s a reason why many online marketing experts and consultants refer to content marketing as „the only remaining marketing,“ because it is authentic, useful, and perfectly suited for the internet generation. While few can doubt the effectiveness of content marketing, the channels, tactics, and tools marketers use to create and distribute content will continue to evolve in 2019 and beyond.
Content Marketing – The fact is: The content market will grow strongly and change!
Which content marketing trends should you pay attention to? How should you change your marketing strategy to keep up with these changes? In this article, we show you the top trends for content marketing for 2019!
Long-form content and the use of content clusters
Google and readers prefer it a bit longer: In 2019, the text area will primarily focus on so-called long-form content with over 2,000 words. The goal is to write holistically and offer the reader a well-structured text that delves deeply into the topic. Users want in-depth content with added value from trustworthy sources. These are more likely to be found in long-form content, which can only be created with significantly more research and time.
Providing „snippet content“ for micro-moments is becoming increasingly important, but that doesn’t mean you should forget about creating long-form content altogether. The combination is key here. Structure, paragraphs, headings, and not least the content must always be created with the user in mind: What possible questions might they have about a topic? It is best to answer these in the text before the user can even ask them.
First and foremost, longer-form content (e.g., articles over 1,000 words) is inherently intended for the most curious of your visitors, i.e., those most likely to engage with a topic and perceive you as a brand. It’s simple: The more interest a person has in your niche, your product, or your service, the more they want to learn about it and trust you (your site).
Pillar Pages: A pillar page is the foundation upon which a topic cluster is built. A pillar page covers all aspects of the topic on a single page. More detailed cluster blog posts, which refer to the pillar page, can report in more detail. Pillar pages largely deal with a specific topic, and cluster content should refer to a specific keyword related to that topic.
Basically, for every broad topic your brand covers, you want to create a single, standalone piece of content that covers the numerous subtopics under the main „umbrella“ topic. Then, for each of these subtopics, you want to create deeper „cluster content“ that links to these elements from the pillar content piece.
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(Also, as you create your cluster content, look for opportunities to link to the other cluster content pieces.)
The goal, therefore, is not to create just one fixed piece of content on a specific topic, but numerous elements that uncover all possible angles of the topic. In short: You want your website to become the preferred resource in your industry. Your target audience and Google’s algorithms will appreciate it.
Long Content, Pillar Pages, and More Content Better for Google?
On another level, Google’s newer algorithms tend to view longer-form content as more valuable. This increases the likelihood that such content will rank higher in search results. (This, of course, assumes that the content is of high quality in the first place – it’s difficult to precisely define what added value and quality mean here.)
Furthermore, Google’s algorithms place a high value on topic clusters, i.e., multiple long-form, valuable pieces of content revolving around a single topic. By creating content clusters, you essentially prove to Google that you don’t want to game the system by creating one or two keyword-stuffed pieces of content. You genuinely want to guide your audience with valuable information on the topic and feed them with added value. Of course, search phrases (long-tail keywords) remain crucial.
Your goal should be: How can I, as a content creator, best help the user? Then you simultaneously create perfect SEO texts and special SEO content, as search engines better understand a user’s search intentions and therefore prefer longer articles in the SERPs. It is also possible that Google will include a link in your snippet text that directly refers to the answer to a question. This is not the only reason why holistic and well-structured texts play a major role in 2019. Studies also show that longer articles are shared much more frequently on social networks.
The web finally boomed in 2018, before blog articles, social media posts, and short articles on multiple pages were found in a similar way. Content marketing companies and you as a site operator should not massively focus on fewer, but regular and longer texts with in-depth information.
But in 2019, we will also realize that content marketing is more than „just“ text. The trend is towards video content, podcasts, and chatbots.
Content Marketing Boosts B2B
Business2Business loves content marketing more than ever. Companies and service providers have known for years that content communication is particularly important in the B2B sector. With increasing digitalization, many business models are also changing in B2B. Services, solutions, and products are becoming less and less self-explanatory.
Companies are therefore focusing more and more on content marketing along the entire customer journey, from awareness building to the orientation phase and customer loyalty. Decision-makers are not only rational but are increasingly addressed emotionally. Content marketing, like no other discipline, offers the opportunity to convey relevant information and build trust.
Therefore, content marketing is increasingly becoming a strategic pillar of B2B communication.
To the B2B Content Marketing Study
Content Marketing is Becoming Increasingly Technological
Artificial intelligence, chatbots, robot-written texts, individualized content, programmatic advertising – all these buzzwords already accompanied us in 2018. Anyone who knows the curve and the speed at which all these technologies are developing knows that they will stay with us in 2019 and become even stronger.
Many brands will at least experiment with these technologies, certainly senselessly sinking one or two euros – and then hopefully creating new products that offer real added value to the user (keyword: „Customer Centricity“).
Brands Create More Super-Niche Content / Sub-Brands
As they say: „Start small and grow big.“ Regardless of the industry you are in, you need to create niche content if you want to be successful in 2018. For example, think about how Nerd Fitness focuses on a niche in the fitness industry – „nerds who want to get fit.“ Or Toggl, which recently launched a digital magazine about time management and work processes of successful digital creatives. You can go even deeper and still build a big business.
This is a natural consequence of market saturation and maturity. Marketers are creating more content than ever before. According to a survey by Kapost, 70% of marketers said they create more or „significantly more“ content than before.
This incredible amount of content production means that in order to stand out, you either:
- Create extremely in-depth or creative content (which is expensive and time-consuming)
- Drill down and create pillar pages and content for a smaller niche
In 2019, as more and more marketers compete for the same audience, we will see a shift towards super-niche content. Instead of writing about „social media marketing,“ you might also write about „social media marketing for bootstrapped startups.“
Continuing the trend: The combination of information, automation, and storytelling as a success factor
Storytelling is developing as a response to an ever-decreasing attention span. Story is a universal language. Through stories, people explain the world.
In other words: Anyone who masters the craft of storytelling gains a relevance advantage with the audience, achieves empathy and credibility. The media and channels, the devices and tools with which we tell stories are changing – the importance of stories will continue to increase.
The general information overload means that content is usually only perceived superficially. Accordingly, the brand behind it rarely reaches the consumer’s consciousness. With storytelling, you can win the hearts of your customers. People naturally love stories and retain them much more strongly than static information.
Webinars, Webcasts, and Live Video
Research shows the undeniable value of video marketing. A 2017 report by Animoto found that 64% of consumers make a purchase after watching a brand video on Facebook. Video will only continue to grow in importance. By 2021, video is expected to account for 82% of global internet traffic. Aberdeen’s study also found that marketers who use video grow their revenue 49% faster than those who do not.
Voice Search
Consumers are more excited than ever about their smart speakers. A 2017 report by NPR and Edison Research found that 42% of Americans called them „essential“ and their popularity is growing. This year’s version of the same report concluded that smart speakers are becoming a part of our daily lives and dramatically changing consumer behavior.
What does this mean for your 2019 marketing plan? There will likely be more online publications that use audio content to meet the demands of their followers. This also means that we may see new advertising platforms. As you enter 2019, your marketing plan should include efforts to adapt your company’s search engine optimization (SEO) strategy to respond to the demands of voice search.
Chatbots
In recent years, companies have increasingly opted for the use of chatbots to personalize and increase customer engagement. Grand View Research predicts that the chatbot industry will grow significantly as companies can significantly reduce operating costs. Improvements in machine learning technology and artificial intelligence mean that chatbot functions are becoming more adaptable and sympathetic to consumers.
A well-made chatbot can answer open questions and use NLP (Natural Language Processing) and machine learning to find the best answers to frequently asked questions. Chatbots also offer a standard of customer service – never impatient, always friendly. In addition, they can offer 24/7 customer service and store data for later use. As you enter 2019, you may want to consider the cost-effective benefits of chatbots as a marketing tool for your business.
Social Media
If you haven’t already entered the social media space, plan to integrate it into your marketing plan in the new year. If you are new to social media, you should start with Facebook. Data from the Pew Research Center confirmed that Facebook continues to dominate the social media space. Based on the numbers alone, this is a desirable platform for consumer engagement.
Depending on your clientele, you can also consider Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram. Data from We are Social’s annual Global Digital report shows that Instagram continues to show consistent growth. However, the largest increase in users was LinkedIn, achieving 145% user growth in 2018. Although LinkedIn still has some catching up to do, it is trending upwards and should not be overlooked in 2019. Regardless of who you want to reach, it is almost a guarantee that they will use some form of social media, so your content marketing plan should make optimal use of these platforms.
Remarketing Becomes the Engine of Lead Generation
In advertising, there’s something interesting happening: display is making a comeback, outperforming search growth. Remarketing – showing ads to people who have visited your website while they browse the internet – is booming. As data shows, more and more marketers are investing money in remarketing.
This increased spending is no coincidence – conversion rates actually increase when a customer sees an ad. Your CTRs may decrease over time, but users who click on your ad after seeing it multiple times convert twice as often.
For B2B marketers, remarketing is particularly important. As any sales veteran will tell you, it takes 6-8 touches to generate a viable lead. Remarketing is essentially a digital version of these multiple touches.
For 2019, we predict that remarketing will be the engine driving lead generation. Marketers will continue to spend money on remarketing platforms to better position their offering and acquire qualified leads and sales.
How do you leverage this trend?
Setting up a remarketing campaign is not very difficult if you have some customer data. For example, if you have an email list of people who clicked on an offer without making a purchase, you can create a custom Facebook audience to show them a discount coupon.
Similarly, you might have your own custom audience for people who have read 2 or more blog posts without signing up for a lead magnet.
If you already have user data, you can start a remarketing campaign with the following platforms:
- Google Ad Remarketing: Google’s remarketing solution that works within AdWords. All you need to do is add the remarketing tag to your website, create your ads, and set up your campaign. The only downside is that it is limited to the Google Display Network and does not offer retargeting options for Facebook.
- Facebook Remarketing: The concept is similar to Google Remarketing. However, there are some important differences in who you can retarget. Customer list, website traffic, app activities, and engagement on Facebook.
- AdRoll: AdRoll partners with Facebook, Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft, allowing you to reach the majority of your target audience. Like Google Remarketing, AdRoll handles all the technical details, from customer segmentation to geo-targeting and more.
- Retarget-Links: Here’s a new term you may not have heard before, Link Retargeting. Link Retargeting is a technology developed by RetargetLinks. How it works is simple; you create a short link, share it on social media, emails, or blog posts. Anyone who clicks on the link can see your ad banners. (Shout out to Sujan Patel, co-founder of Right Inbox, for introducing us to this technology.)
Measuring the Success of Content Marketing
The more professionally you conduct your content marketing, the more KPIs come into focus. Above all, a strategic approach cannot function without regular performance measurement. Of particular interest is:
- the deployment performance (quality of the channel),
- the content performance (quality of the content),
- Lead Management Performance (Quality of Sales Funnel)
- the revenue / ROI performance.
Target Audience Approach and Evaluation – Predictive Targeting
Targeting is and will remain a hot topic in the coming years, as it is becoming increasingly difficult to successfully promote and appropriately approach content. This applies in particular to niche markets where enormous waste has been accepted until now. Modern technologies now promise some exciting approaches for predictive targeting and predictive personalization.
As mentioned at the beginning, content is reused multiple times and prepared differently. This also includes:
- Ebooks (PDF downloads)
- Stories and Storytelling
- Short Facts and FAQs
- Podcasts
- Videos
- Live posts on social networks
Lassen Sie sich rund um Content Marketing beraten:
E-Mail: fi@vastcob.com
Florian Ibe
Photo by rawpixel on Unsplash
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