Did you know this Monday, February 8th was Chinese New Year?
Yep!
HAPPY CHINESE NEW YEAR!
Guess what else? It’s the Year of the Monkey. Any idea what the Chinese say about the Year of the Monkey?
Well, the New Year (of the Red Monkey) is going shake, rattle and roll! (That’s hot off the presses from the official Chinese horoscope website.)
In short, lots of change and uncertainty is on the horizon.
So what does all of this mean for your business? Well, all of the marketing trends you’ve been ignoring are about to BITE BACK.
Here are 5 top marketing trends you’d better watch out for…

Customer Experience Matters Most

Once upon a time, it was just called customer service. And that term just meant providing responsive and courteous customer care. Then customer pools grew, businesses got bigger, automated phone attendant trees became incomprehensible lattices of frustration, while email and websites replace people-based interaction.
But if the millions of complaints, pleas and horror stories logged on social media and web communities have taught us anything, it’s that people crave customer service. Before they buy. When they buy. And after they buy. Long after.
So now it’s called customer experience. In other words providing responsive and courteous customer care throughout the buying process – before, during and after. And it’s a crucial component of effective marketing.

Social Media Is a Communication Tool, Not An Ad Platform

Wanna generate leads and sales? Facebook and Twitter ads aren’t gonna do it. Social media isn’t an immediate lead generation or direct sales conversion tool.
It’s real value lies in presence and communication. The more platforms your business is active on, the larger your digital footprint (a critical SEO consideration). And the more opportunities prospects and clients have to interact with your business, i.e. talk about, share, recommend, etc… Community and connection are driving marketing more than ever.

Go Mobile or Go HOME!

The number of mobile web browsers surpassed desktop users a while ago. Google announced their mobile smack down about a year ago – the systematic suppression of search results for websites not mobile optimized. This means business websites that aren’t mobile optimized are losing prospects. And those losses are going to grow exponentially.

Video is on FIRE

I predicted online video as the year’s top marketing trend in Part I of my 2016 Marketing Playbook. And the experts agree! Forbes Magazine contributor, Daniel Newman, says video and streaming apps are going to EXPLODE this year.
And while video skews younger, a must if you want to reach millennial prospects, the demographics are expanding. Survey after survey indicates internet users of all ages seek out video content online. It’s no accident that YouTube is the internet’s second largest search engine.

Content Remains King

Good content – thoughtful, carefully crafted and value-packed – remains a key component of effective marketing. But with so much content being churned out, and so much crappy content in the mix, engagement is a critical factor in content that contents and converts. That brings strong storytelling to the forefront.
Valuable content delivered with engaging storytelling will not only improve your SEO, it will make your business standout from your competitors.

What Does the Year of the Monkey Mean for Your Business?

Are there marketing trends you’ve been holding out on? What and why? Swing by my Google+ page and share your thoughts.