Based on the digital marketing trends article that we developed last year, 2018 has been the year of rising augmented reality, video content, voice search and influencer marketing... And now that 2019 is around the corner, you may ask yourself “what will the next year have for me?”

To help you determine where the trajectory is heading over in 2019 , we’ve listed out 10 digital marketing trends that you can take advantage of to improve your marketing strategy and meet a desired outcome.

1. Voice Search

Voice search is undoubtedly rising in popularity. By 2020, 50% of all queries will be voice-based according to Comscore.

There are mainly two types of voice search: Those that are implemented by smart speakers such as Amazon’s Alexa, Apple Homepod, Google Home and Microsoft’s Cortana which give searchers immediate voice answers to their questions and those that are installed in desktops, and smartphones such as Siri and Google Assistant which display written search results.

Top brands are thinking how to deliver their promises using voice-enabled devices because they are affordable and offer greater capabilities than ever before while more visitors are using voice search to interact with these brands.

Businesses should also focus their outreach efforts on using voice engine optimization. Marketers must use a more natural language SEO to create content accordingly. This requires them to think what their target audience may use in their voice queries as well as focus on long-tail keywords because searchers are likely to be more specific when asking a question. For instance, in one question, a shopper may request information about time, price, location and other details which sound heavy for written search queries.

As a result, marketers can leverage these opportunities to deliver more targeted, specific content which leads to increase their click-through rates.

2. CHATBOTS

Chatbots have been rising in the few recent years and still persists in 2019. According to Grand view Research, 45% of end users prefer to use Chatbots as a major means of communication in customer service.

Chatbots play a critical role in improving the customer experience and allow marketers to better engage with their audience - without really doing much. They offer real-time assistance to the user, dedicated support and a proactive interactions where they ask questions to understand the real problem.

For instance, a visitor landing on a website is contacted via chatbot and asked to request assistance or get more information about the product. If he selects the first option, he will be referred to a representative for help and if he chooses the second option, he will be asked a series of automated questions or redirected to their blog or FAQ page.

Another rising trend is Whatsapp Business Messaging, which has become one of the most used messaging apps worldwide according to Statista. Besides, it’s no longer restricted to personal usage; businesses are using the application on a daily basis for their daily activities.

Messaging traffic is expected to double by 2019. This is driven by over the top messaging Over-The-Top or OTT apps, going up from 31 trillion messages in 2014 to over 100 trillions by 2019 globally.

3. Micro-Moments-following back

As more users are processing their online activities using their smartphones, marketers continue to leverage micro-moments to attract their audience’s attention and fulfill their instant decisions.

Whenever a customer searches for something, looks for a nearby store, wants to finalize a task or makes a purchase, marketers can take advantage of these types of micro-moments to create targeted content and advertising.

In order for marketers to succeed in using micro-moments, they should understand the basic practices of each one. Let’s take for instance the “I-want-to-go-moments”. Brick and mortar stores can take advantage of such a moment by capitalizing on “near me” searches, which have grown 2X between 2016 and 2017 according to Google. This requires storefronts to optimize their locations on their websites or apps. Furthermore, they can go even beyond that by creating ads for their store’s location or popular products to improve their visibility in search engines and reach their customers at the appropriate time.

4. Augmented Reality ads and Virtual Reality Marketing

Augmented reality ads is one of the major applications that are now used by some marketers. It’s a way to bring static or unreal environments into a more realistic experience, something that would integrate the "offer" with the "reality" of the buyer.

Michael Kors is a successful example of augmented reality ads. They created an ad on Facebook asking their users to try and purchase their sunglasses.
 

Aside AR ads, many businesses have been using augmented and virtual reality marketing for the purpose of creating brand awareness.

For example, IKEA and loreal managed to improve their customer experience with virtual reality by allowing them to visualize their products before buying them. Nivea, Starbucks and Volkswagen are other examples of big brands who succeeded in augmented reality.

This trend which is not new, is one of the most highlighted trends for 2019. According to Statista, AR and VR market size worldwide are expected to reach $209.2 billion in only 4 years.

5. Social media video traffic

Thanks to Facebook, Instagram and Youtube, live content is the fastest growing segment of internet video traffic due to the remarkable waves in the recent 3 years.

Live streaming content is effective because it’s free, takes a short time to produce while it offers a real-time user engagement, and viewers use your content based on your time not theirs.

Moreover, it has the ability to generate greater impressions than posts published in the newsfeed, especially if users choose to post them to their stories.

Live streaming content allows marketers to engage with their leads in a quickest way possible, improve their relationship with followers, reach a broader audience and boost their social channels traffic.

6. AI and Machine Learning

With global leaders like Amazon, Microsoft and Google extending their resources in AI and machine learning, this trend is not going away anytime soon.

AI allows marketers to anticipate future probable patterns of their customers based on collected data.

With this data, marketers can then determine how to better engage with their active buyers using different channels such as direct mail, sales outreach, or digital advertising.

Several industries like food and beverage, ecommerce, life science and healthcare have started using AI. For instance, many food retailers use big data to determine the best delivery times of their products. This is done by gathering data from different sources such as the weather, road traffic and temperature... Furthermore, big data can help determine the effect of all these factors on food quality.

In the ecommerce industry, 86% of customers say that personalization is an important role in their buying decisions. Ecommerce companies use big data to predict their shoppers demographics and behaviors in order to create a more personalized experiences such as sending customized discounts or re-engagement emails.

According to technology experts, AI and machine learning are expected to penetrate various new areas in 2019 affecting jobs like banking, finance, accounting and even intellectual jobs such as teaching.

7.  Email Marketing (Engagement -based)

As email marketing is getting smarter, marketers have started to care more about sending emails to subscribers who are active on their lists. For instance, if a contact highly engages with your emails, he should be regularly nurtured with content and updates about your company until he converts into a loyal customer. On the other hand, if a subscriber hasn’t opened an email for a certain period of time, he will be considered as a dormant contact and will no longer receive additional emails.

But to send the right email to the right segment, marketers need to identify all their leads behaviors. If the platforms they are using have limitations to classify their audience into different segments based on their behaviors, they can integrate their tools with other applications that allow them to do that. After all data is determined and different segments are created according to defined criteria, marketers will be able to target their leads more effectively with behavioral-based emails.

To reinforce a more personalized manifestation of sending engagement-based emails, an obvious direction is resurfacing again: plain text emails. This sends those engagement-based emails in a more individualized and hand-crafted way to the targeted user, which gives a more personalized aspect to the communicated piece. Moreover, because HTML style emails containing detailed graphics may increase the potential for spam, marketers are considering plain texts as alternative ways to minimize this problem.  Besides, plain text emails address the need of the user and improve the engagement rate.

8.  Profiling

Offered by companies that collect and manage complex data for millions of leads and businesses, data enrichment has become more and more important. Marketers use data enrichment to reveal more details about their leads and personalize their approach when attempting to contact them. The great advantages of data enrichment is that it removes any wrong or inaccurate information that companies might have about a specific lead such as his email, phone number or street address.

These retrieved data are then used to obtain other missing data. For instance, if you have an email of a particular lead, the data enrichment process will fill in his name, phone number, street address, his job position and household situation.

The final step is the optimization process. With the different data enrichment tools available, these data are used to create useful insights. Marketers should draw actionable conclusions in order to send each of their leads, an account-based email that specifically addresses his needs which in turn boosts the potential to convert him throughout the funnel.

9.  Browser Push Notifications

Push notifications are moving into the realm of web browser technology and are one of the most popular web development trends for 2019.

Companies use browser push notifications to reach their leads more effectively and communicate with their audience in a more powerful way.

Another major role such notifications play is retaining customers and improving conversion rates. Ecommerce companies for example, use browser push to retarget their shoppers who abandoned their shopping carts and entice them to complete their purchases.

10. Content Personalization

As one size doesn’t fit all and customers want more relevancy, the need for a personalized approach in marketing is becoming more critical than ever. Although delivering the right content to the right audience at the right time is tricky, it will add a big value to your content marketing strategy because it plays a major role in boosting your users engagement rates.

Personalizing or customizing content for audience relies on visitors data in order to deliver relevant content. It consists of showing dynamic landing pages based on specific criteria such as geographic, demographic or behavioral attributes with highly targeted call to actions for the purpose of converting them more effectively.

For instance, Groupon asks visitors to confirm their locations once they land on their site in order to deliver accurate, geo-targeted offerings.

In the ecommerce industry, personalized content has a good impact on consumers; according to econsultancy, 44% of users who have a personalized shopping experience are likely to become repeated buyers.

Although this trend has been a common practice in the recent years, it’s expected to rise in importance in 2019 with an estimate to be worth more than $400B by 2021.

Key Takeaways

• Marketers are keen on taking more intelligent decisions based on past knowledge in order to deliver more personalized campaigns to their target audience. This can be done with the help of AI and big data which are two of the most highlighted trends in 2019.

• Voice search, AR, VR and smarter chats are new communication channels that were highlighted in 2018 and will continue to increase in importance in the next year.

• A more effective email marketing is based on communicating with active contacts as they are the most eligible and easiest leads to move down the funnel. This avoids wasting time on dormants as well. In addition, lead profiling is key for an effective account-based marketing.

• Browser push notifications play a major role in retargeting abandoned visitors and increase conversions.

• Personalizing content boosts the engagement rates and has a significant positive effect on the buyers’ shopping experience.

"LOCAL SEO'  www.bestopseoae.com

What Is Local SEO?

The Basics Of Local SEO

How Does Local SEO Impact Your Business?

• Local SEO helps potential customers discover your business. A lot of local searches originate from non-locals who are searching for a business like yours, and with local SEO done right, your business can capture that audience.
• Local SEO provides potential customers the information that they want, when they want it. For example, if your restaurant has free WiFi or is pet-friendly, displaying that information as part of your local SEO will attract customers who are looking for just that.
• Even if your business does not have a website, local SEO helps your business stand out in local searches, and helps drive more traffic through online leads.
• As mentioned earlier, 61% of people who performed a local search ended up calling the business. Local search optimization provides potential customers the power to take this action, and this in turn provides your business with a qualified lead that you can convert.
• Local SEO helps drive people’s decisions in favor of your business. The more data they have about your business, the more trustworthy you are in their eyes. This lays a strong foundation upon which you can build a mutually beneficial customer relationship.

DIGITAL MARKETING ENGINEER

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)  : Vertical Search optimization (VSO) 






 SEO is not just about trying to rank on Google anymore. Search behaviors are changing, and new content opportunities arrive constantly. We need to evolve our strategies to make the most of this set of circumstances. The industry is reaching a point now where deep learning allows search engines to understand both content and context with accuracy levels we could barely have imagined just a few years ago. 

 This does not mean we can simply publish content and expect search engines to do the rest for us, however. Each vertical brings with it a new set of consumer demands, and search engines still rely on contextual signals to filter through their vast index of content. 


Whether spoken, typed or tapped, search queries are the medium through which consumers discover information and make decisions. 

 Search is all around us; it is embedded into smartphone devices and is the fulcrum of artificial intelligence (AI)-powered digital assistants. As search engines develop in sophistication, this relationship with consumers will only strengthen over time. 

 Moreover, recent research shows that mobile now accounts for as much as 57 percent of total search traffic. Search has become more powerful, dynamic and fragmented. 



What is a vertical search engine?

 Put simply, a vertical search engine focuses on one specific industry or type of content. 

 Common examples would include a travel search engine like Kayak, real estate site Trulia, or the image-based interface of Pinterest. 

 The term “vertical” applies to both the indexation and serving of content, which is neatly organized by category. Product searches may take place on Amazon (research shows this to be the most common starting point for product searches), or a consumer may go to a site like Indeed to look for a new job. 
 These slimmer indices of content have the benefit of a pure focus on one area of activity or business, which can facilitate faster, more accurate results for users. 

 Google’s universal search, which indexes and ranks image results alongside video and local listings, is an aggregation of verticals into what appears to be a more conventional, horizontal search engine. Recent moves into the jobs market, along with a revamped flights search engine, show Google’s ambitions to develop specific new technologies to gain market share in profitable verticals. 
 For marketers with one specific type of product or service to sell, the lure of vertical search can be clear, too. They can meet their audience when their search intent is overt and can focus their energies on a platform that they know will deliver results. 
 This is not a new phenomenon, however. 

 Before marketers assess where to place their emphasis, it is worth assessing just how significantly vertical search is changing the landscape. 
 Google also indexes content hosted on vertical search engines, so it is possible to see social media and video results (from Twitter and YouTube, for example) within Google results. There can be no doubt that Google is observing changes in users’ behavior and wants to maintain their attention before they start their searches elsewhere. 

Behaviour of  vertical  and Horizonal search changing the search landscape in social platforms?(Social media marketing)



 Both of these platforms are improving their paid search offering at a rapid rate, which is again a sign of their increasing prominence in the search landscape. 
 Digital assistants do not typically show a conventional set of search listings, but rather source the most authoritative answer from one database. 

 We are therefore witnessing a lot of fragmentation across searcher behavior, which both plays into the hands of vertical search engines and creates new opportunities for Google to bolt on services to its already mammoth search offering. Brands are faced with a challenging set of decisions 
 Apple’s Siri now defaults to Google rather than Bing when it cannot provide a quick answer, but the growth of Amazon’s Echo devices provides a clear threat to Google’s hegemony. 

 The first point for marketers to consider is the nature of consumer behavior on the relevant vertical search engines for their brand. Consumer demands and expectations will differ based on the search engine, and they will have started their query there for specific reasons. 
 The competition for consumer attention spans grows ever fiercer, and search engine optimization (SEO in dubai) is no longer just about getting Google right. Google itself is more complex than ever before, and marketers could also conceivably focus their attention on vertical search engines rather than the global search giant. 

How can I make the most of vertical search optimization (VSO)?
 This leads into the types of content brands should create in response to those expectations. 

 On Pinterest, it is essential to develop a clear brand aesthetic across all images that makes them instantly identifiable, both by search engines and users. Attention must also be paid to the contextual signals this vertical search engine uses, such as the boards each image is pinned to. Those contextual signals may differ by search engine, so it is important to understand how its information retrieval technology works across other platforms, such as Amazon, Etsy or Kayak. 
 In the case of Pinterest, the most obvious first impression is that it is an overtly visual search engine, driven by the power of the image. Pinterest also refers to its position as a “discovery engine,” as its users are typically open to new ideas and do not have a specific product in mind when they search. 
 This has direct implications for a marketing strategy. Taking content from a brand’s website and simply adding it to the company Pinterest profile will reap suboptimal results. 
 Nonetheless, while the mechanisms that drive each search engine may differ significantly, their underlying purpose is always the same. It is up to marketers to understand their audience, create the right content, then use each vertical search engine to engage with their consumers. 

 Adapt your content for each search engine. The audience may consist largely of the same people, but their expectations will be different based on the social network or search engine they are using. 

 As a result, there are some best practices we can apply for any vertical search optimization campaign: 

 Research your audience behaviors across different search engines. 
 Maintain a cohesive brand presence across all major social networks. 
 Use structured data and Open Graph tags to help search engines locate and understand your content. 
 Assess behaviors across your websites and mobile apps; focus on unblocking any challenges users have in accessing content. 
 Master the foundational elements of site experience that will benefit performance on any search engine, such as page load speed 
 Use specific integrations with vertical search engines that can allow your website content to be served within their results. 
Summary




 As we Bestopseoae Seo in Dubai, we need to look at the skills that are common to horizontal and vertical search, optimize our site experience and ensure that our content can be served to our audience, across any search engine or social network. Digital marketing & Content Marketing remains at the core of any successful SEO campaign. We are trying our best effor to do in a whithat way to digitilize Seo in Dubai 

Digital Marketing