5 Marketing Predictions For Second Half From Wunderman Brazil President

Digital marketing has gone through a massive reinvention in recent years, not only in the Latin American region but globally, too.

Digital marketing has gone through a massive reinvention in recent years, not only in the Latin American region but globally, too. Marketers around the world now have many different tools at their disposal to turn internet users into customers. Innovations range from social media ads to website layouts meticulously designed to encourage users to consume.

Antonio Bicudo, a partner at Wunderman, shared with CMO.com’s LATAM staff how he expects the rest of 2016 to play out in the world of digital marketing.

1. More sites will become responsive: The first trend is increasingly shifting from an option into a need. Technology is constantly changing our industry. For the remainder of the year we will continue to see new websites developed responsively so as to adapt to any screen size. This applies to any device, whether a computer, a tablet or a smartphone.

2. SEO will continue its shift into content marketing: Search engine optimization, aka SEO, is not dead. It has just grown up. What was once seen as an obscure practice for directing users to your website is turning into what marketers now call “content marketing.” Rather than simply entering keywords that bring up searches related to your product or service, filters are becoming increasingly strict, requiring companies to create useful content for users in order to be relevant for searches.

3. Videos will become the main content platform: Just as the internet has evolved, so has the way we consume content. Thanks to YouTube’s success, in 2015 video platforms consolidated their position as one of the primary ways of transmitting content. With videos, we can achieve a much higher rate of user engagement and conversion than by using other media. Studies show that visitors stay on a page for two minutes longer when it contains a video.

4. Design and speed will become a necessity, not a luxury: The websites that will stand out for the rest of the year will not only be those that offer the best content, but those that do so as efficiently and effectively as possible. This means that the way your site is designed and how quickly it loads are essential factors for turning your visitors into customers.

5. Content will become more interactive: What turned BuzzFeed into one of the biggest sites on the internet? It wasn’t the signature headlines or its list-form articles. It was the quizzes. BuzzFeed was able to transform the personality quiz into a viral phenomenon by appealing to people’s egos. When people answer a quiz, the site encourages them to share their results with friends on social networks, motivating everyone else to do the same.

This kind of interactive content was also one of the most-visited posts from The New York Times, which included a quiz about the linguistic variations in different regions of the United States. This format is successful because it engages users in a way that gives them a unique experience when they consume that content.

Going forward, expect to see more interactive content in video format (such as 360-degree videos), virtual reality, and ads that establish a dialogue between companies and their target audiences.