Marketing is either traditional or digital.
But now, the difference between traditional marketing & digital marketing is almost negligible.
Remember, earlier billboards used to carry either printed paper or vinyl-made marketing materials?
Now we have digital billboards.
The concepts broadly remain the same, but the marketing mechanism has changed in the digital world.
Trends are similar all across the marketing spectrum. Read this insight to discover the top evolving digital marketing trends in 2023 & my observation about the same.
Digital marketing trends 2023 that are truly bonzer!
- TikTok Reigns – The fuel that caught fire.
- Instagram Fights Back – TikTok’s heat makes it more blazing.
- Youtube Shorts – Fireworks without noise.
- Local platforms – Shining moon among fiery stars.
- Vernacular is here – A spark that shines!
- Voice Search – Still “the next thing”.
- Influencer marketing- the flame encompassing all industries.
- Chatbots – Burning cash on customer service is so dinosaurous.
- Conversational Commerce – it’s hot and live.
- Omnichannel marketing – it’s everywhere!
- VR, AR & Metaverse – it’s time to be a god, create your own universe!
- Amazon Ads – The true king to the eCommerce throne.
- SEO, SEM, SMM, PPC – Data is the don.
- Yahoo, Bing Ads – Spoilt lads, but not that bad.
- Virtual events – It’s a reality.
- LinkedIn – B2B marketing taking off.
- AI writing tools – Not so content with quality.
- NFTs in marketing – Still li’l cryptic, but a molten iron
- Community marketing – The game of engagement
- Video – Going & going
- Push Notifications, push growth
- Predictive analytics – beating the competition
- Geo-fencing – personalisation pizza for marketers
- Cookies – still tasty.
- VoIP – Not just for VIPs
- Podcasts = Talking & rocking
- Cashing creators – The gig economy is visiting the marketing lanes
- Tech trends for marketing
TikTok Reigns – The fuel that caught fire
TikTok is a social media platform that has become very popular in recent years, especially among younger users. It allows users to create and share short videos that are usually set to music.
Here are some evolving digital marketing trends on TikTok in 2023 for brands:
Collaborating with influencers:
The organic reach on this platform is insane. Brands can leverage the same and partner with popular TikTok influencers. The collaboration can be paid or free depending on who you’re collaborating with. This is called influencer marketing, where brands engage with influencers to create brand relevant sponsored content to promote their own products, services, and/or agenda. And it is the biggest digital marketing trend in 2023 on TikTok – influencer collabs!
Using hashtags:
Brands can use popular TikTok hashtags to make their content more discoverable. This can help increase their visibility and reach on the platform. Hashtags are like a community/group without any limits.
Creating branded content:
Brands in 2023 will create more and more of their own TikTok content for LinkedIn as well. Anyways, you can start with something as simple as an organizational branded hashtag challenge like #growthRomeo, or a series of videos featuring their products or services.
Using music and sound effects:
TikTok is all about AR filters & effects. That’s a mistaken thought. TikTok is as much about music as video, so brands can use popular songs or sound effects to make their content more engaging and memorable (legal aspects need to be checked for using or not using IP protected properties).
Ran a couple Running advertising campaigns:
Brands can also run paid advertising campaigns on TikTok, much like Linkedin & Meta ad campaigns targeting specific demographics and interests.
Overall, it’s important for brands to be creative and think outside the box when it comes to TikTok digital marketing. The platform is all about having fun and being entertaining, so brands that can tap into that spirit are likely to be successful. Those were the top highlights from the TikTok digital marketing trends for 2023. Let’s move now to their biggest rival.
Instagram Fights Back – blazing hot!
Instagram rides on the support of 500 Mn+ DAU, and 1Bn+ active monthly users. The platform is constantly evolving, and to keep the users hooked, new features are being added all the time.
Here are some of the Instagram digital marketing trends we anticipate to see in 2023:
Increased focus on e-commerce
The biggest digital marketing trend on Instagram in 2023 that brands should closely keep an eye on is the platform’s push for e-commerce. This is a two way sword for the platform where they can attract more brands to create user-centeric content, and creators too remain glued to Instagram as they will get extra content monetization channel.
More interactive content
Polls, quizzes, and live Q&A sessions were pre-existing on Instagram, but recently Insta has been pushing users to interact with the apps more. That’s another digital marketing trend worth keeping an eye on in 2023!!!
Video, Video, Video
Video is on fire, not just on Instagram but it is the biggest digital marketing trend of 2023 on every other social platform. Youtube shorts, TikTok, and Instagram reels are the talk of the town and is likely to launch more tools for original creators, and this trend is likely to continue as the platform continues to roll out new video features and tools. If you want to rock Instagram marketing game in 2023, get on to the video trend.
Personalization and targeting:
Ad personalization by harnessing AI powered processing of the data collected from users is one among most fiery digital marketing trends of 2023.
Overall, it’s important for companies & brands to stay abreast of rising digital marketing trends on Instagram, and to be creative and adaptable in order to succeed on the platform.
Youtube & Shorts – Fireworks without noise!
Youtube has 1.8Bn+ active monthly users with incredibly good average time spent on the platform i.e., 19 minutes/day.
Here are some of the Youtube digital marketing trends we anticipate seeing in 2023:
Push Youtube Shorts
Youtube Shorts is a new feature that allows users to create and share short, 60-second videos that are designed to be watched on mobile devices. Youtube has set aside a $100Mn+ fund specifically for Youtube shorts creators. Though the war right now is between Instagram Reels & Tik-Tok, but Youtube shorts can’t be ignored. Short videos will continue to be sensation in the coming year and are one of the top digital marketing trends in 2023.
Search discovery & ads
Youtube is not merely a video streaming platform! It’s more. Youtube is the world’s 2nd largest search engine. The search discoverability of youtube remains brilliant. This is one of the edges where youtube leads over Meta, Instagram, or TikTok. Based on search intent, youtube can serve its users quite personalized ads. One of the key digital marketing trends to see in 2023 is “what new products youtube introduces in 2023 to take on TikTok & Reels”!!
Search to social platform
Slowly, under the hood, youtube is making the shift from being a search engine & video discovery platform to video-based commerce & social platform. Recently they rolled out a new feature where people can have their own identity in the youtube URL. Earlier this feature was missing.
Live streams & creator monetization
Live streams, creator monetization, and some other features too are on Youtube’s Radar. It’s lately helping even B2B organisations too.
Those were some of the interesting video & digital marketing trends from the Youtube universe 2023!!!
Local Platforms – Shining moon among fiery stars!
There are several local social media platforms in India that are popular among users in the country including Moz, ShareChat, Roposo, Chingaari, etc., Similarly, we
Here are some of the local platforms led digital marketing trends we anticipate seeing in 2023:
Consolidation of social media platforms
Chingaari, which is a local brewed social media startup in India, clocks in 50 million traffic, Sharechat enjoys above 100Mn+ MAUs.  As of now, the market is fragmented but going forward we hope to see multiple strategic consolidations i.e., mergers and acquisitions. This is something, we are keenly watching. If this happens, it will be interesting to see how the local digital marketing trends & dynamics changes which is right now dominated by Google everywhere!
Search discovery & ads
Local platforms mostly don’t have any creator side ad mechanisms but some of these platforms like Sharechat has really good creator discovery algorithms in place.
Live streams & creator monetization
Like reels, shorts, and TikTok videos, these local platforms are heavily focused on audio & voice live streams. That’s one of the many ways creators earn cash i.e., through coins & donations.
Those were some of the interesting digital marketing trends from the brewing local social platforms 2023!!! Because the competition is less on these platforms, chances are that you can easily amass good following in short time. Try out!
Vernacular is here – A spark that shines!
Developed specifically for users who speak a particular language or dialect.
Examples of Vernacular apps & how they are shaping the digital marketing trends in 2023:
- Sharechat in India,
- Vkontakte in Russia,
- Baidu Tieba in China
Vernacular apps is more of a strategic digital marketing trend, esp in India where every 2 km the dynamics change in terms of user behaviour, dialect or preferences.
India is a country of billion people with some 21+ major languages.
For an enhanced CX, startups need to adapt to this vibrancy of India, and luckily, that’s what the amazing startup India community is doing. For instance, Sharechat is available in 14 Indian languages!!!
Vernacular influenced digital marketing trend is going to rise further in 2023. We predict it as one of the biggest digital marketing trends in 2023 in the Indian startup landscape, if not anywhere else in the world.
Voice – still “the next thing”!
When people don’t type things on a search engine but use their voice to ask queries!
Examples of Voice search & are they really shaping digital marketing trends in 2023?
- Alexa, who won the last American presidential election?
- Okay Google, How many centuries Virat has hit in his entire career?
And if stats are to be believed, 58% of users on the internet are using Voice search!!
Is it convenient?
Yes, at times.
But mostly, as long as it is not a common behavior among the masses, it is going to be awkward and weird to do voice search in the public. But in a closed space like dining room, in between conversations, you no longer need to pull your phone out to prove your point. You can just ask Alexa or Google! Or while driving, you can ask for directions, or a score update, etcetera.
We don’t see major shifts in the voice led digital marketing trends in 2023. But yeah, big tech is pushing this behaviour among users because this will help them a lot in AI voice generation solutions. So, we never know… a big incentive attached to this digital marketing trend and boom the world will go all gaga about it in 2023. Anything is possible!
Summing up the Digital Marketing Trends 2023
From metaverse & openAI’s ChatGPT, we have covered every digital marketing trend for 2023 that we feel can be relevant to organisations & marketing executives who are leading high growth startups & enterprises. If we missed out anything, feel free to drop a few comments below.
If you need help with developing digital marketing tech solutions and need IT staff augmentation services, aka IT outsourcing services from India, please feel free to reach out to me 🙂
