It’s hard to believe 2017 is already well underway. If you haven’t taken a look at the trends that lie ahead, now’s the perfect time.
As you begin this new year, consider looking at your business’s marketing strategy. In particular, think about your content. Now is the perfect time to take a look at what you’ve done so far and how 2017 can be even better. While you build your strategy for the new year, here are some trends to keep a close eye on.
Trend #1: Content Is King (But Only If It’s Quality)
First, let’s all acknowledge that content is still an effective and useful form of online marketing. Content marketing may even be one of the most successful forms of online promotion. By publishing quality content, you can increase sharing as well as brand awareness for your business.
Beware, however, that your content is your brand, and as such, each piece of content you release needs to match a high standard of quality. If you achieve this, you’ll spark interest among clients and new business partners alike. You may also find that other businesses build links to your site. Eventually, this will increase the ranking of your business website as your domain authority rises.
Trend #2: Be Careful With Link Building
You can still use links as part of your content, but they need to be naturally embedded in the text. Due to new Google algorithm updates, it is crucial that any link building looks natural. Otherwise, you can all but guarantee a piece of content will earn your site a Google Penalty (and we shouldn’t have to explain how difficult it is to recover from one). Make sure the anchor text fits with the rest of the content and avoid adding too many links. This will be seen as link stuffing, and again, it could put your site under scrutiny by Google.
Trend #3: Infographics Just Keep on Giving
If you want your content to be shared, you need to think about how to make it attractive and interesting. Releasing infographics is a great way to encourage sharing, because other sites will want to post them if they include interesting information. By trying this strategy, you can use infographics to naturally build backlinks for your business and expand your reach. You can also look into using both images and videos to make the content that you release more dynamic. This will help you attract more interest from readers and users. Video content has also recently skyrocketed in popularity, and this trend looks to continue in 2017.
Trend #4: Use Your UCG
User-generated content became incredibly popular in 2016, and for good reason. With UGC, you can save yourself some time and instead let users create content for you. There are various ways to encourage your users to share content. You can open up a forum, for instance, so users can engage and interact with each other. You should try to add key individuals to this forum, such as business partners who will help encourage content sharing. You can then use the content released in these forums on your site and on your social media profiles. It’s a win-win situation because clients feel connected to your company and you get free promotion.
With these key trends looking to shape content strategy in 2017, we can’t wait to get the ball rolling.
