There was a time when marketers had a basic set of tried-and-true tools available to them to get their message across to consumers. But today’s emerging technology and the next wave of marketing tools that accompany it hasve changed the rules of content marketing at a blinding pace.
Seventy years ago, Harvard professor James Culliton saw marketing leaders as having a basic toolbox or “a mixer of ingredients.” The only tools needed to build a solid marketing platform, he said, were the classic “Four Ps”: price, product, promotion, and place.
Time and the new wave of technology have changed that. A simple toolbox is not enough for today’s content marketing.
Enter the Marketing Alchemist
Chris Pemberton of Gartner told his readers last year there were several emerging technology trends that would fundamentally change marketing. He said, “Technology will unleash another wave of disruption on marketing. Rather than sharing the same simple tools, successful marketers today are more like modern-day alchemists competing with a “mixture of programmatic advertising, conversational bots and dynamic pricing models executed by personal virtual agents.”
Disruptive Technology Trends in the Marketing World
- Dependence and Independence from large platforms — Giants like Facebook, Instagram, and Google — cannot be discounted. They mediate how people consume information, how they buy, and who they buy from. Content writers must keep in mind how their information will appear on these.
At the same time, marketers have to maintain a certain amount of independence. The rules are changing every day. For example, the 3G of yesterday demanded more written content while the 5G of today opens a whole new door to video and real-time marketing. - The Internet of Things and digital products have exploded the number of digital touchpoints; today’s flood of interconnected devices carries the potential of far more timely and detailed information for the consumer. What consumers read about on their phones on the train can continue as a more detailed article on their iPads when lunch offers more time. Voice assistants have opened up a whole new world of possibilities (more of that later).
- Building block or atomic content make marketing more adaptive — there is a new wave of personalization that offers customization of a customer’s experience based on demographic, behavioral, and psychographic data.
Think & Hear First, Read Later
Perhaps the single greatest change agent in how people consume information is voice assistants. Voice-activated speakers like Google and Alexa have already moved us light years beyond Siri or Cortana.
Remember the scenario where a commuter read a blurb on their phone and then more on their tablet. More and more barely-awake consumers ask Alexa, “What’s new in business?” and then brush their teeth as their new roommate suggests a blog post on Barrons they might want to read.
Today’s content marketer can pull out his alchemy bag, think up something that Alexa might say about their content. Just like one needed to think about shorter sentences and paragraphs for first blogs and then phones, today’s content marketers must think about how their words will sound when Alexa or Google Assistant speaks them.
If you didn’t get a voice assistant for the holidays, go out and buy one (or maybe five) for yourself. Here is why consumers are using them more and more:
- They allow us to more easily multi-task.
- They enable us to do things faster than other devices.
- They empower us to get answers and information instantly.
- They make our daily routines easier.
This new wave of emerging technology may be disruptive but it sure is exciting!
WriterAccess is proud to be contributing to the technology that empowers marketers to make their worlds better places. With a small army of writers, editors, translator, and content strategists at your fingertips, our platform is leading the way to greater things to come!
Tim G. has written well over a thousand blog posts for use by business and professionals in a variety of fields. These blog posts include posts for political, writing, new, and educational sites. Tim’s experience includes meeting daily and weekly deadlines for time sensitive information. Blog posts have also been created specifically aimed at good SEO results.
