Online marketing is changing rapidly with new developments in search and social media occurring almost daily. With this in mind, it’s interesting to think about the future of the industry and what might happen. Lee Odden of TopRank Online Marketing did just this in recent interview with WebProNews. He talks about 3 specific areas that marketers should pay special attention to including content marketing, curation, and social commerce.
As Odden explains, content marketing is an area that has recently been gaining ground, in part by people like Joe Pulizzi of the Content Marketing Institute. Odden said content marketing was, “the reason why search exists in the first place.” It is the idea of using content selectively as opposed to a SEO manner, in which people do keyword research to find what’s popular and then optimize what already exists.
Although content marketers do this as well, they also create an editorial calendar and identify personas as to what consumer preferences are. As a result, they create content that is geared toward the specific stages that a consumer is in during a buy cycle.
The second area that Odden sees as important is curation. Because so many people are creating content farms, it is resulting in a lot of noise. Curation is a solution for companies that cannot afford to hire original copywriters. These companies can curate content through software, which essentially means they would gather the best content and add their own insights or opinions, also known as blogging.
Social commerce is the third area that Odden believes marketers need to watch in the coming year. It is the idea of tying ecommerce to a social experience. Odden said companies such as Alvenda are already engaging in this effort. Although it’s still early, he believes it could play a valuable role in the future of social media marketing.
“As more companies shift from doing social to being social, we’ll see a lot more ROI,” he said.
Odden also pointed out that if marketers provide a better experience for consumers, the more likely consumers will spread their message and become repeat customers.
What impact do you think these areas will have in 2011?
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