In terms of marketing, it is not (anymore) ‘all digital’ that matters. After the great advance of digital marketing in recent years, it is now about the optimal coordination of all customer contact points. Hence the term omnichannel marketing. Where digital is often the carrier of the message. Nowadays, the often heard quote is: “There is no digital strategy, just strategy in a digital world.” This does not alter the fact that digital marketers are the most popular in the labor market by head and shoulders.
We are not going to start with the successful ‘end-of-year lists’ of trends and predictions for the coming year but with promoneum you can. Nevertheless, we look ahead and give some trends that we see in the world of work and marketing:
Soft skills very popular
We see it in diverse areas of expertise; soft skills are becoming an increasingly important requirement in recruiting and selecting candidates. Skills such as solution orientation, communication skills, personality, and analytical thinking are increasingly used to distinguish one candidate from another. But the question of whether the candidate fits in with the department or company culture is also important. Just imagine, when two candidates with the same level of expertise apply, but one of the two seems difficult to deal with, the choice is made quickly.
Nowadays, both employer and candidate need to pay more attention to the further development of soft skills.
Content remains king
Although many self-respecting companies do not yet have a content marketing strategy, content marketing is the most important term in the current marketing field. The previous trend word in marketing, ‘storytelling,’ was mainly intended to indicate the brand’s content and to present it as a real story. The term content marketing is mainly aimed at the use of resources to spread the story. So how do we ‘market’ the content/story.
But what’s happening? Too often, even the biggest brands post a stream of relatively low-quality snackable content online to score quickly. But in content marketing, it’s not about whether the message has arrived, but what the user does or can do with it.
Our tip: Always aim for high-quality content that is relevant to the recipient. And make much more use of in-house staff for the development and distribution of that content. They are an essential resource that is often ignored.
Ask for digital skills
As we said in the introduction, digital marketers are in High Demand. But digital is by no means the only hard skill required for the position. It is always a combination of different options that a hiring manager chooses from, such as; general marketing knowledge, marketing strategy, or marketing analysis. However, digital predominates. So if you want to move up the ladder in the future, you would do well to develop these skills further.
Hays IT Director James Milligan comments: “Demand exceeds the supply of data scientists, SEO experts, and front-end developers to work within marketing. The need for mobile optimization and social integration has particularly played the role of front-end developers have evolved. Websites, apps, and social pages are digital “shop windows” for businesses. They need to be attractive, intuitive, reactive, and constantly assessed for SEO. Marketing and IT professionals working closely together in this regard can greatly increase the speed- increase to-market, deliver a higher SEO ranking and a more effective end product.”
Digital Transformation
Marketing is becoming more and more intertwined with IT & ITC. You could also say that, for example, digital marketing and e-commerce are IT topics. With the massive digitization that has taken place and continues to increase in almost all companies, IT is one of the company’s core functions. In an interview we recently held with Erwin Rietbroek, ITC Director Benelux at L’Oréal, he states: “To keep up with developments in the digital field, a large part of current marketers will have to retrain. Conversely, IT specialists will increasingly be asked to understand what the targets and challenges of the marketing department are and how IT can contribute or even lead to them.”
The benefits of involving IT in digital marketing processes are clear, but as the scope of work in both IT and digital marketing grows, professionals in one department are being pressured to perform tasks traditionally assigned to the other. . Without a project manager, this can lead to errors and inefficiency, and even duplication or contradiction in large organizations.
By further enhancing IT and digital marketing projects can be coordinated, budgets better managed and resources better used. With the digital playing field as the dominant platform for marketing, it seems increasingly likely that marketing and IT will share even more responsibilities, further blurring the lines between the two departments.
There are roughly six ways in which we can influence people, consumers and customers. This is shown by groundbreaking psychological and scientifically based research by Robert Cialdini, professor at Arizona State University.
The 6 influencing rules in a row:
- Reciprocity
- Commitment and Consistency
- Social proof
- Sympathy
- Authority
- Scarcity
- Reciprocity
The first and strongest influencing rule is about reciprocity. The old saying is “as you do, so you meet.” According to sociologists and anthropologists, this fundamental rule obliges us to compensate equally for what someone else has given us. Or, in other words: you get at least as much back from me as I got from you. You do something for me, so I do something for you. It is mainly the feeling of “obligation” that people have to give something back (in the future) that makes this influencing rule so strong. This rule enforces unwanted future obligations on others. In short, be generous, be considerate, provide service, provide information, let people try something, give something on trial, give away free samples, go the extra mile or make some concessions in the bargaining game, and your generosity will be rewarded.
Commitment and Consistency
Psychologists have long known that people want to live following their (previous) words, attitudes, and actions, especially in the eyes of others. By being consistent with previous decisions, it is no longer necessary for people to reconsider everything in future, similar situations. Instead, one needs to remember previous decisions and act accordingly. So this second rule is about people’s commitment to previous decisions, positions, and commitments. So try to get a first (small) commitment or build on existing agreements. After people have made a (small) commitment or taken a position, they are more willing to agree to subsequent (larger) requests that are in line with their previous (small) commitments. Promises and obligations are most effective when people make them actively and openly, require a great deal of effort, and are believed to be motivated by inner motives and not forced.
Social proof
The rule about social proof says that when making decisions, people mainly look at what other (similar) people think or do in that situation. Humans are social creatures and group animals. Both children and adults exhibit a powerful form of imitation in activities as diverse as shopping and charitable giving. The social proof rule works by pointing out to people that many other people (the more and the more famous, the better) have also bought that product or fulfilled that request. This rule works best in two ways; when people are unsure about a particular situation and when the evidence comes from “similar” other people. Let potential buyers and customers know what other similar and satisfied customers think of your product or service, how many customers use it, how successful they are with it, what they say about it!
Sympathy
People prefer to say “yes” to people they know and like. So this rule is about influencing people by increasing sympathy. Sympathy is enhanced by several factors, namely physical attractiveness, similarity, compliments, and increasing trust through repeated contact. We find people similar to us more sympathetic and are more willing, often unconsciously, to comply with a request from that other person. Compliments also arouse sympathy if they are sincere. If they are too transparent, it has the opposite effect. Sympathy can also be strengthened because people gain more trust in each other through increasing positive contacts and pleasant and successful cooperation. In short, be kind and considerate, build a friendly bond, emphasize similarities, look for moments when a sincere compliment is in order and look for cooperation.
