As the content marketing sphere continues to evolve rapidly, it makes sense to take a look at past trends to identify the future trends and patterns that can help guide your strategy.

And also not to forget that we live on the edge of that evolution, where the key to success is keeping up with the current trends!

The content marketing field is maturing, and marketers need to make sure that their strategies and content campaigns are in sync with the latest trends. What's trendy today may go outdated next year, as trends keep emerging every year.

Above all, one thing you should keep in mind is that good content is good content. Your content should resonate with your targeted customers to make sure you stand out in the crowd.

So, let's dive in to explore which content marketing trend is going to dominate this realm.

Let's start

Top Content Marketing Trends

Content marketing to ensure business profitability

Post the year 2020, a lot of companies have recognised the importance and benefits of incorporating content marketing as an integral part of their marketing strategies.

Source: Freepik

It has transformed into a clear-cut business game plan, with certain measurable metrics to determine the success of their efforts, in terms of profitability, ROI, growth, etc.

An increasingly greater number of CMOs are thinking of content as something that offers metrics like customer retention, pipeline contribution, etc.

Content quality, Originality, and Personalisation would be crucial

When you think of creating content, what pops up in your mind? Writing a blog, creating a white paper, or a viral video related to your brand offerings?

In the current scenario, content marketing is about creating interesting and attractive content people want to engage. You have to move away from talking about your products and services and start creating meaningful content people feel like watching, reading, or listening to.

Google has updated its ranking factors to give more relevant results to its users. Now you can't just simply stuff your content with keywords. This is not going to help you anymore going forward.

Source: Moz

To understand more about creating quality content, follow what big brands are doing in the content marketing field.

Apple is spending $1 billion on original content. PepsiCo has opened a new content creation studio in NYC.

Google is purchasing original content from various media companies and brands to fill their content gaps.

Facebook is also investing a lot of capital in getting original videos.

Why are they doing this?

They are focusing on original and quality content.

Forget about sponsored posts, traditional ads, and branded emails as they are no longer effective today like they were earlier.

If you are not creating interesting and useful content in 2021, you are going to fall flat.

Also, Hyper-Personalization of content is the next most important trend you need to pay attention to. Providing the exact content that your customer is looking for is like hitting the bull's eye. 

Influencer Marketing will explode

Using influencers to promote content is the topmost content marketing trend this year.

Various cosmetics and luxury brands have been using influencers to promote their brands for many years, but now every brand is looking to use influencers who have a substantial number of followers on various social media platforms.

Source: Search Engine Journal

The main reason to engage with influencers is that now marketers are focusing on delivering their message through a medium that is more reliable and authentic than any other advertising media.

By seeing the popularity of influencer marketing, we can say that paid advertisements are becoming less effective. 

According to Inc, influencer marketing has a greater ROI of about 11x when compared to other advertising media.

Along with influencers, brands are also employing their own loyal customers as the voice for their products/services. Satisfied customers are incentivised for promoting the products/services by sharing their experiences of using the company's offering. The audience relates well to the stories coming from someone like them, and they find the use cases to be more linked to their own.

Having visuals and videos will be non-negotiable content pieces

Videos and visuals are here to stay, and you won't be able to survive in the market without them. This is going to be the favourite content marketing trend for many marketers.

Source: HubSpot

According to a survey, 91% of B2B buyers prefer to get information through interactive visuals and video content.

Facebook and many other ad channels are showing interest in paid and organic placements of visual and video content due to their higher engagement rates.

Why are videos and visuals gaining popularity?

Because videos get 135% more organic traffic than link posts, images, and statuses on any social media platform, users are spending 3x more time watching videos than reading any regular content.

According to HubSpot, video is growing with great speed. More than 48% of marketers are planning to add YouTube and Facebook videos to their content marketing plan.

So, if you haven't started giving priority to videos in your content marketing strategy, now is the time.  Add videos and visuals to your content and make it more attractive and meaningful to your audience.

Investment in virtual events will work wonders

Owing to the pandemic, the year 2020 made virtual, the new normal. The brands also started reaching out to their potential clients through virtual online meetings. On the content side, they organised virtual events, webinars, etc to engage with the target audience.

Going forward, the year 2021 shall see more of these virtual events being organised, ensuring reaching out to a better-targeted audience, offering quality content, and a way better content delivery, so as to have better traction for the brand.

At the end of the day, the audience will only be attracted to the virtual event of webinar and will attend it, if they find any value being delivered through the content therein.

Source: Content Marketing Institute

Conclusion

Content marketing is not going to fall back, it's only gonna grow by leaps and bounds. As a marketer, you can't afford to risk the profitability of your business by ignoring the effectiveness of content marketing. It is the right time when you should start investing in content marketing.

Stop asking - How can your content marketing efforts drive more sales? Start asking yourself - What value can your content offer to your target audience?

Grab this opportunity and follow these trends and watch your sales soar high like never before!