The approaching new year brings the question: “What new trends will push marketing forward next year?” The real answer is that no one knows – but paying attention to 2018’s trends allows us to make educated predictions.

These are my predictions for the top 3 marketing trends to expect in 2019.

Increased trust in social proof and reviews

The internet has become complex, and people aren’t always sure which content they can trust and which content is designed just to make them buy something. Everywhere you look, there are ads about ‘product x’ being the best thing since sliced bread, but there’s no way to know how true that statement is – which is why reviews and social media posts from friends are so powerful. People are more likely to trust a positive review about someone liking a product versus talking to a salesperson they know is being paid to tell them how great the product is.

This isn’t an assumption; it’s backed up by statistics. A study by Fan & Fuel found that “88% of customers put as much weight on online reviews as they do on personal recommendations” and that “86% of people hesitate to do business with a company if it has negative online reviews.” That means what customers say about you and your products matters more than what you say about yourself. A good 2019 goal is to get as many customer reviews as you can.

Programmatic advertising

The internet is so saturated with ads that people are often immune to advertising. Luckily, programmatic ads use artificial intelligence to target a specific audience that’s interested in your ads; instead of paying for ads and manually sending them, you pay per impression, which is determined by AI. You can reach a more well-defined audience, which saves money, makes your ads more efficient, and is less frustrating. According to eMarketer, “almost 90% of digital display ads in the U.S. will be programmatic by 2020.”

Voice search

Perhaps the trend we know the least about is the rise of voice search, but you can’t let it sneak up on you – it’s here to stay. You might think voice search only happens in the B2C space when people ask Siri about food near them, but a recent survey by Stone Temple found that 50% of voice searches are performed at the office. As marketers, we must focus on making our content SEO-optimized for voice, which means shifting away from the complex terminology that makes our products/services sound amazing and using simplified wording that mimics the way people actually talk. (As people understand more about voice search, you’ll see content change to reflect natural speech.)

2019 is quickly approaching, and everyone wants to know which trends will jumpstart their marketing. While there’s no perfect formula for figuring that out, a little research allows us to make good educated guesses. If you’d like to talk more about these trends or would like help with your marketing, please contact us. We’d love to talk!