One of the most important aspects of marketing is showing up where your target audience is.

This means keeping on top of the latest trends and including them as part of your strategy.

To make things slightly more difficult – these trends are always changing in line with new technology and the ever-changing world of what’s popular.

So much so, it can be difficult to keep up. 

What worked for you a year ago might not work at all if you tried it again today. 

This is why as marketers it is so important to plan your strategy according to what’s popular right now while keeping an eye on what’s upcoming. 

What strategies are working in 2021? 

Event Marketing

We are living in a world that is more digitally focused than ever before. 

It has become trickier than ever to build what feels like genuine human connections, especially when you can’t put a face to a brand. 

It’s no wonder then why event marketing has stood the test of time. It is an opportunity for customers to get to know you and what you have to offer in a more personal way. 

Throughout 2020, virtual event marketing provided itself to be an incredibly useful and enjoyable alternative to in-person events for both marketers and businesses alike. 

When traditional in-person events like conferences, roadshows, and expos were put on hold for the foreseeable – it forced the world to adapt and take these events online. 

And it’s worked really well.

So well in fact that it seems likely virtual event-marketing (or at least a hybrid version) will continue post-pandemic. 

Virtual events are cheaper and easier to put together. Recording the event also means more people can enjoy than ever if they couldn’t make the live event.

The value of holding virtual events is also in the ability to capture metrics and data which can be analyzed for performance. These are figures that wouldn’t have previously been available and can be used in improving your events going forward.

Video Marketing

This research by Merit concluded that Millennial B2B decision-makers rate video content as their most preferred channel to research B2B products and services. 

The power of video is demonstrated by its stick-ability. 

It’s been around forever, but more people than ever are using the medium of video for communication. 

During the lockdown period, it has proved to be the easiest (in some ways the only) means of face-to-face communication. 

Video is everywhere and the advancements in technology make it more powerful and accessible than ever. 

People love to digest information in video form rather than reading their way through long blog posts or articles.

Why spend your time searching for the information you need when you could watch a video that tells you everything you need to know in a couple of minutes? 

Things to include in your video marketing strategy are: 

• Adverts – Get those creative juices flowing with some advertising videos. Not only are adverts informational, they can also be entertaining and memorable to customers. 

• How-to-videos – This helps B2B customers see how the product they are considering buying will work for them in practice before they buy. It allows you to demonstrate your information in an easy-to-understand format for your business customers. 

• Video testimonials – using video testimonials made by customers helps to bring a level of trust and credibility to your brand to other potential customers. 

• Webinar clips – with webinars, you can use the recording and break it down to share the best clips with your audience. This means that while you might not get thousands of people all joining you live at the time; your audience can enjoy and digest the best bits of your webinar in their own time. If you’re interested in learning more about this, it’s what we do here at Milk Video and we’d love to learn from you what you’re looking for. 

Live Chat

It is tempting to think of live chat as just one of those “bots” that pops up at the bottom of the screen asking you if you need any help. 

The truth is – people and businesses love the instant reply they get in solving any questions or complaints they have. 

There is so much more you can do with a live chat feature. 

It will take a little work, but there are some great ways to figure out who to best use your live chat software to convert more visitors into sales. For example, you can install live chat on the most important pages of your website, such as at the cart and checkout section.

Word of Mouth

No matter what year we are in, the power of word of mouth can never be underestimated.

This is especially important when your business is new and you’re trying to build your brand reputation.

It’s important to make sure you show those who recommend you to others how valuable they are to you and how much you appreciate them. You can do this through referral incentive programs and discounts.

Email Marketing

Email marketing is still very much alive and kicking.

Why? Because it works. 93% of B2B marketers use email.

It is important to have an email list for your business as this helps to build relationships with your customers and generate sales.

Following on from this, personalization of your email marketing is key to getting good results from your customers.

47% of email recipients will choose whether or not to open your email based on the subject line.

Something as simple as addressing your customers by their name can make a huge difference.

Paid Ads

It’s not a new concept but it is one that still works. Many large enterprises use paid ads alongside content marketing in their strategy.

The benefit of paid ads and pay-per-click campaigns is that you can get your content and brand out there in front of new, targeted audiences all the time.

While SEO will help you, in the long run, to get organic traffic over to your website, it takes time to make it work.

Paid Ads on the other hand can help you bring in new leads quickly while jumping to the top of the queue in the search rankings.

This is a great way to supplement your other forms of marketing.

Podcasts

This ties in well with video marketing.

It allows your audience to digest and consume your information through an audio medium that is easy for them to listen to in their own time.

Podcasts can also help your B2B customers get to know you and develop a deeper connection with your brand. It helps your customers to see you as people rather than just a business.

It doesn’t need to be the best, Spielberg-directed piece. If you have something worth saying, say it.

The best thing about podcasts is that they are relatively cheap to make and free to put up on podcast networks.

Statistics show that there are over 850,000 active podcasts and 30 million podcast episodes – there’s still plenty of space for you.  

In addition to podcasts, you can create audiograms from the recordings. Here’s a tutorial on how to create an audiogram with Milk Video.

LinkedIn

There are over 706 million people and 55 million businesses on LinkedIn with member engagement proving to be stronger than ever.

LinkedIn has been rated the number 1 most trusted social media platform, with 96% of B2B marketers using LinkedIn to distribute content and 80% of B2B marketers choose to put content on LinkedIn rather than other paid advertising.

LinkedIn is a platform for professionals to connect with businesses and other professionals.

It makes sense to include it in your marketing strategy because…it works. Businesses trust the platform and use it to do business.

Since the pandemic hit, LinkedIn also now offers a live streaming feature – Linkedin Live – that allows brands to speak directly with customers.

Putting Customer Experience At The Heart Of Everything

Whatever marketing strategy you use, you need to have the customer in mind throughout the whole process.

Valuing your customer is never going to lose its importance. Even in B2B marketing, you’re still dealing with people on the other end of your campaign.

This is why it is so important to keep up with new trends and keep stock of what’s working and what isn’t to make sure you’re doing the best by your audience.

For example, those businesses that have not transformed the way they work throughout the pandemic have not survived. 

This is the importance of using innovation and creating customer-centric experiences that serve your audience. 

Customer experience is the trend that will never go out of fashion.