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8 Expert Predictions For Influencer Marketing Technology Trends In 2018
If you are tired of the same lackluster results of your marketing strategies and you want to make it more effective, you need an influencer. These days marketing became actually one big contest for customer’s attention. So maybe it's time to think outside the box and get some fresh ideas from people who are the leaders in this new, word – of – mouth marketing. The consumers are changing and you need to have a better grasp of what are their needs and desires. Their habits, needs, and demands are not the same as they were centuries ago.
American psychologist, Abraham Maslow, known for his theory about the hierarchy of human needs, depicted an idea that we should only speak about positive qualities of each man. There is an overall shift to popularizing the information that is promoted by an influencer over television and newspaper ads. These new strategies allow a company to have leverage on how technologies are changing the consumer’s behavior. Marketing is no longer about things you sell but about the stories which are told to promote them. The most powerful marketing tool is a word, and today’s craftsmen are powerful influencers who are changing the new world of marketing.
Everyone is wondering what’s next in the influencer marketing world. Consumers need products and services with which they can relate to. They want the brands to speak to them. This is where the influencers step in. While the total digital ad spending is constantly overtaking TV and newspaper ads, the only thing that is left is to revive your business by adapting to this new way of social reach.
1. Lorraine Murphy, the founder of The Remarkables predicts 2018 to be all about quantity and including different kinds of research in the influencer process. As the competition increases its viability, some of “the players will drop off.“ She also states that: “We expect the hockey-stick growth of Australian-based channels to continue into 2018. With the testing of Facebook's second newsfeed in recent weeks, YouTube may be the last channel that prefers the content creator over paid budgets.”
2. Tessa Cavalot, the founder of Gravitas emphasizes the significance of data analysis. 2017 was a year of influencer campaigns, so to achieve the ultimate goals you need to partner with macro influencers to reach the ultimate scale. She states that “marketers will need to look to macros (over micros) that have a following on other platforms, not only Instagram but more importantly well-established blogs, to provide them with a realistic ROI. In the same breath, these trusted voices and their blogs will need to understand the return of search, to stay on top of the ever-changing algorithms, an open platform versus Facebook and Instagram algorithms, which is a closed platform.”
3. Danielle Robay, influencer at Danielle Robay LLC thinks that customers are tired of the repetitive content. It will be all about branded content. The Instagram will serve as the main device for promoting stories which people can relate to. She considers that “Video will continue to grow and become critical for online audiences, and social accounts will serve as media platforms more than ever before. For instance, popular accounts that were once known for posting funny memes will transition into mini-Buzzfeed type platforms.”
4. Taryn Williams, the CEO of The Right Fit made a very interesting comment on how we have just opened the door of influencer marketing and this is only the surface of it. The most powerful and productive technologies are yet to be discovered. However, quality always prevails and this should be the ultimate goal. Her predictions reveal that “on Instagram, we’ll see influencers with the highest engagement rates reign supreme due to the many algorithm updates favoring quality content. You’ll be calling influencers ‘creators’ in 2018, signifying their ability to create content that resonates.”
5. Tiffany Farrington, the founder of Social Diary argues about how the companies will eventually measure the success. She hopes that this year the consumers will become more intolerant to the fake and manipulative techniques which some influencers tend to use. In order to move the influencer technologies to a higher level, the industry “will have to improve its metrics and move beyond 'Likes'.”
6. Roberto Blake, the founder of Awesome Creator Academy puts an emphasis on the role of a live video and its role in following the new trends regarding the quality of video products. He believes that “brands can take advantage of this by partnering with influencers on brand integrations for high-quality live stream content since live viewers are more engaged and likely to respond to calls to action.” The applications that use live platforms such as Facebook and Youtube recognized this trend and they are improving its features daily.
7. Liza Glucoft, the executive producer of programming at AwesomenessTV made a brief remark on how customers all around the world mostly use mobile phones when searching for a variety of useful information. So “the marketers will continue to embrace mobile-first, socially-driven campaigns.” She contrasts the role of micro influencers and macro influencers and supports the opinion that micro influencers will eventually become the real-time winners. The priority is to design campaigns that will target the ultimate consumers who will actually go to the store and buy the product or use the service. It’s not about the number of followers you have but what kind of technologies you use and how eloquent you are.
8. Stephanie Horbaczewski, CEO/Founder of StyleHaul agrees with Liza Glucoft in one thing and that is that this is the year of the micro influencers who work on small platforms. Reaching the audience in never been simpler than now and “StyleHaul increasingly uses data and technology to monitor how audience responds to a branded content post in order to measure impact, and also to create more meaningful and effective campaigns.” Intertwining different technologies and cooperating with different content creators will have a significant impact on how this industry will evolve.
Today's marketing strategies are emphasizing the one thing that is known for centuries; people's trust can be gained only through words which convey strong, inspirational messages. Combined with media sources such as pictures and videos, they are actually capturing a story with which people can relate to and admire. So sit back and relax, and enjoy all the wonders of the new marketing evolution.
Sources:
http://vampcollective.com/influencer-predictions-2018/
http://www.adnews.com.au/influencer-marketing-predictions-for-2018
https://www.tomward.com/articles/the-influencer-marketing-trends-that-will-dominate-2018
© 2018 Fatima Memija Bahtic
