Speed of response, ability to adapt quickly to new and changing scenarios: the past two years have put marketers and strategists to the test, often forcing radical changes in planned marketing strategies.
If the year that just ended was one of recovery and finding stability after the shock of the pandemic, this 2022 will surely be the year to dedicate to digital transformation, the only opportunity to thrive and grow in the post-pandemic era.
So what can we expect from this new year and what 2022 marketing trends should we take into account when designing our strategies, putting users and customers at the center?
Key points of the article
- Commerce 2022: the boom in online shopping continues
- Marketing trend 2022: space for content and people
eCommerce 2022: the boom in online shopping continues
Perhaps it should no longer be considered just a trend, but a true cross-cutting phenomenon that has revolutionized buying habits and behaviors: even in 2022, eCommerce is set to confirm its primacy as a shopping channel, even among the most skeptical consumers.
In the past two years, many sectors, even those most reluctant to digital transformation, such as the food&beverage sector, have found new life through online sales with considerable increases in revenues, so much so that 2022 will be the year for many realities to consolidate results.
Omnichannel, logistics efficiency, more secure and fractional payment systems, personalization of the customer experience, live streaming shopping, big data and artificial intelligence are confirmed as the eCommerce and marketing trends 2022, a year in which the real challenge among players will be played out in the name of value-added services.
Marketing trend 2022: space for content and people
Posts, stories, videos and more: the world of online advertising, read Google, is increasingly focusing on storytelling and content, the real key to stimulating users to buy. And if the creativity of an effective ad must meet at least 4 criteria (attention, branding, connection and emotionality, direct call to action), what choices can be considered better than engaging influencers and turning their customers into real brand ambassadors?
One of the major 2022 marketing trends we will witness is precisely that related to the Influencer Marketing and Referral Marketing, but perhaps first of all to that of Conversational Marketing, that is, the opportunity for customers and potential customers to get in touch, talk, interact with a brand in the ways and at the times they prefer. Thanks to the growing use and use of social networks but not only: platform marketing automation and the use of artificial intelligence have given companies the opportunity to integrate conversational marketing activities within their strategy with considerable results in terms of increasing leads, improving customer care service and retaining their audience.
Marketing trend 2022 and social commerce: the new frontier of online sales
Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest: from simple showcases and channels for entertainment and sharing to real sales tools.
The year 2021 has seen, even in Italy, the growing use of social platforms with a view to sales both as a support and as a viable alternative to the more traditional eCommerce, at least for smaller realities, a trend that seems destined to be confirmed in the year that has just begun.
You view products in the feed and with one click you can proceed to purchase, without leaving the platform on which we are browsing: buying thus becomes even simpler and faster, the entire path of viewing and purchasing the product fluid and perfectly integrated into the user experience of the social itself.
Marketing Trend 2022: preparing for a world without cookies
The countdown begins: Google, following in the footsteps of Mozilla and Safari, has declared that as of 2023 its Chrome browser will no longer support third-party cookies. Less data about users’ shopping and browsing behavior and preferences on the openweb and, consequently, much less information available for targeting users. But how to cope with this new challenge? 2022 will be the year when marketers and strategists will have to rethink their strategies by focusing on information gathering through their own platforms, concentrating on first-party data.
Never before has it become more important to know one’s audience, collect and normalize data from multiple sources and channels within a single environment, thanks to the contribution of customer data platform such as Blendee.
With the contribution of artificial intelligence e machine learning, such data can be transformed into real wealth, enabling a profiling and evolved segmentation of the brand’s audience. From user profiling and segmentation to offering personalized customer experiences, the step is short: communications and content can be personalized at every level of user interaction and across multiple channels, from the website to e-mail, from SMS to push notifications to campaigns on Google ADS and major social channels.
Marketing and phygital experience: evolving not to die
In a world described as “Onlife” where the user experience seamlessly unravels between virtual reality and the real world, phygital represents the winning key to innovation, marketing and customer experience.
Increasingly smart technologies, augmented reality, big data and artificial intelligence, together, will increasingly represent the winning key to integrating brand-consumer touchpoints. This means designing experiences to create value, putting human needs at the center and innovating rapidly through the contribution of customers themselves as co-creators of the experience.
A 2022 undoubtedly full of exciting challenges lies ahead: a data-driven marketing approach will certainly be key to optimizing and driving our strategies to success.
