10 biggest marketing trends for 2021

3. 1)Purpose-driven marketing
2)Reconnecting with your customers
3)Loss aversion
4)Relatability will drive growth
5)Social E-commerce is blowing up
6)Video and storytelling will rule
7)Reduce, reuse, repurpose
8)Going virtual
9)Marketing is getting smarter
10)Website speed is more important than ever

4. 1. Purpose-driven marketing
2020 was a challenging year.
The pandemic impacted every country globally and
pushed smart brands to change how they communicate
with customers and prospects.
Many smart brands embraced purpose-driven
marketing.
Purpose-driven marketing is a strategy used by an
organization to center its external communications
efforts around a social cause that aligns with its core
values

6. What is purpose-driven marketing?
In purpose-driven marketing, a brand connects with its
audience through a common cause they both believe
in. All of a brand’s actions and decisions are stripped
down to a simple question: is this representative of our
purpose?

7. 2. Reconnecting with your customers
In 2020, brands struggled to find the right words when
communicating with customers and prospects.
Some brands chose to stay silent.
Others mostly ignored the pandemic and continued to
communicate as if nothing was happening.
And, some leaned-in to important and controversial
issues that polarized their target audience.
As things calm down in 2021, brands must find ways
to reconnect with customers and prospects.

8. Reconnecting with your customers

9. Reconnecting with your customers

10. 3. Loss aversion
People don’t like to lose.
Whether it’s losing a game, an argument, or an item we
want to buy, we don’t like it.
In fact, people make buying decisions that are
motivated by their desire to avoid a loss.
Smart brands understand how to leverage loss aversion
to improve their messaging and marketing campaigns.
In marketing, a loss aversion strategy takes the form of
limited-time deals, expiring coupons, holiday sales, or
even limited resources.

11. But, in 2021, loss aversion strategies need to be more
human.
To effectively use loss aversion in 2021, you must
appeal to your audience’s situation and present your
product or service in a way that helps them avoid loss.
But you must recognize that people have incurred huge
losses in 2020 so the messaging must be more sensitive
than ever.
Just the idea of a loss is enough to create a strong
reaction.

13. 4. Relatability will drive growth
Social media is fast, easy to use, and very far-reaching.
For many businesses, it happens to be one of the best
ways to market products and services.
As social media continues to expand, many brands are
taking advantage of its high traffic attraction through
user-generated content (UGC).
User-generated content is created by customers or
users, not by the brand.

15. UGC has been growing exponentially for the past five
years (largely due to influencer marketing). It is a
great, authentic way to market your products and
improve your brand image.
UGC has many benefits, including better engagement.
Studies show that people are 28% more likely to
engage with user-generated content than traditional
company-based posts. And, user-generated content
reflects Relatability and trustworthiness.

16. 5. Social E-commerce is blowing up
Now that social media apps are utilizing user-generated
content, we expect another significant development in
these online platforms – the rise in social E-commerce.
It has never been easier to buy something online.
Recently, apps such as Facebook, Instagram, and
Pinterest all updated or introduced shops directly in
their apps. Chances are, if you scroll past something
you like, you can buy it instantly from that app with
just a few taps.

17. In fact, social E-commerce is already shaking up
traditional e-commerce. According to HubSpot, 71%
of people are more likely to purchase from a brand
based on social media referrals.
This isn’t just a fad. More than half of online
shoppers have made at least one purchase through
social media channels.
With the integration of shopping in social media apps,
online shopping will be a force to be reckoned with in
2021.
Plus, if you pair social E-commerce with UGC, your
brand’s social media presence will be stronger than
ever!

18. 6. Video and storytelling will rule
In an age where social media is impossible to avoid,
people consume and interact with hours of media every
day.
Most of the content we consume is in the form of
images, text, and videos. But, videos are quickly
becoming the king of attention-grabbing marketing.
Videos allow you to integrate more content but in a
more friendly and bite-size serving. Tik-Tok and other
streaming platforms’ popularity is signaling a
significant shift to the way we consume content.

19. Video and storytelling will rule

20. The best videos are usually fast-paced and share your
brand’s product, story, and call-to-action quickly and
efficiently. A strong video is highly memorable and
comfortable to watch over and over again.
The best videos are usually fast-paced and share your
brand’s product, story, and call-to-action quickly and
efficiently. A strong video is highly memorable and
comfortable to watch over and over again.

21. 7. Reduce, reuse, repurpose
2020 forced most brands to shift to a virtual work
environment.
It’s not easy to release unique and creative content
across all mediums when you don’t have the same tools
or spaces that brands traditionally used to create
content.
Instead, companies focused on repurposing content
they created for one channel (like a podcast, for
example) and edited it to publish on another medium
(on Twitter or Facebook, for example).

22. Repurposing content saves time and money. And it
creates more consistency across different touch points
with your target market.
Plus, if you create engaging and high-quality content, it
makes sense to share it on many platforms to expand
that content’s reach.
Content atomization is one of the best techniques when
repurposing content.

23. 8. Going virtual
2020 radically changed the way people interact. It
wasn’t possible to hold in-person conferences, meetings,
sales pitches, or do what we all took for granted before
the global pandemic.
Many brands pivoted to digital events and meetings.
Those experiences proved to be cost-effective and
allowed brands to reach more people at a lower cost.
As the world improves in 2021, companies are not in a
rush to return to traditional business ways.

24. We do expect to see more physical conferences and
events. But, virtual events will transform the events and
experiences industry in 2021 and for years to come.

25. 9. Marketing is getting smarter
Artificial intelligence (AI) is expanding what you can do
with marketing campaigns.
Not only is AI expected to influence product design
trends, but it’s also expected to push the limit on content
creation and automation.
AI will help deliver fast, accurate, and personalized
content – directly to your target audience.
AI will also help create content by supplying data,
sources, and references.
Smart chatbots powered by AI will help to support your
marketing campaigns seamlessly by providing relevant
information to your sales and support teams.

26. Marketing is getting smarter

27. 10. Website speed is more important than ever
In mid-2020, Google announced a new ranking factor
called “Core Web Vitals,” set to debut in May 2021.
Core Web Vitals are designed to measure how users
experience a web page’s speed, responsiveness, and
visual stability. They measure the time it takes for the
main content to load (ideal is 2.5 seconds or faster), the
time it takes for a page to become interactive (less than
100 ms is ideal), and the amount of unexpected layout
shift in the visual content of the page (ideal is less than
0.1).

29. Google believes that when a web page loads quickly, is
interactive quickly, and the layout doesn’t shift much,
people will generally be happy, improving peoples’
search experience.
Page speed times have always been important. But
they’re becoming even more important in 2021.

30. Conclusion
Few brands will succeed in 2021 by
marketing as they marketed before
2020. The new normal requires brands
to adapt, evolve, and rethink what
they’re doing.
Keep these ten marketing trends in
mind as you’re planning your
marketing strategy.