Just when you think you’ve encountered all of the digital tools available for your online marketing strategy, a plethora of new trends pop up. These days, it’s virtually impossible to keep up with all of the technological advances and new business techniques designed to help streamline your company’s marketing campaign. Therefore, it’s best to simply try a few at a time, relying on trusted resources to give you solid planning ideas for your new, more effective strategy. If you’re looking to optimize your digital marketing plan and don’t know where to begin, here are some recent and highly relevant trends that have already been making the rounds within the industry, sure to help you improve your marketing efforts in no time.

Despite it still seeming too surreal to be used in everyday life, artificial intelligence has indeed made its way into the marketing industry. It can be utilized for collecting customer data and analyzing search trends or patterns among consumer behavior, allowing you to use this knowledge to increase your competitive edge and get a better understanding of your customers’ needs. Chatbots are already highly in use as well, especially in the B2C retail sector, and they’re advanced in processing natural language to communicate with customers in a realistic, relatable way. Any of these AI advances can be a great boost to your digital marketing strategy, regardless of the product or service you’re selling, and can lead you into another hot trend which is conversational marketing. Customers are tired of being bombarded with overly sales-y advertisements, and they would rather see more emotionally-charged messages that have a warmer feel to their tone. Therefore, it’s crucial to offer personalized messages and stories across your social media pages to breathe life into your brand, making it seem less cold and robotic.

In regards to social media, influencer marketing still remains a highly effective tool amongst social users. Influencers hold onto mass amounts of followers because they’ve earned their trust, and this loyal audience is exactly what you need for your own business marketing efforts. Joining up with a relevant influencer in your industry can prove incredibly beneficial for your brand, as well as relying on social media stories elements to connect even further with audiences. Using the “My Story” feature for your business can help you engage with customers on a personal level, which increases your brand awareness and the traffic to your website, all in a cost-effective manner.

However, you choose to update your digital marketing strategy, be sure to include any of these trends to stay ahead of the game and/or hold a competitive advantage within your industry.