5 Mobile Marketing Trends You Can’t Afford to Miss in 2019
Go mobile or go home, has been the message for most businesses and marketers for 2018 and trend watchers have been on the lookout for what’s new. We saw many businesses transforming from websites to mobile-only businesses and the mobile app explosion still continues. But before we dive into the trends for 2019, let’s understand how consumers behave on mobile devices.
According to Google, more than 50 percent of search queries globally come from mobile devices (experts say this number is now closer to 60 percent). The category with the highest percentage of mobile search volume is “Food & Beverage” with 72 percent. Following the restaurant industry, is health, sports, news, lifestyle, and retail. Businesses in these industries and many others will instantly see results when going mobile.
1. AI and Mobile Marketing — A Perfect Match
AI is not just some jargon that can be thrown around and not take it seriously. Like it or not but the waves of AI and ML is crashing at your doorsteps and it is here to stay. In 2019, the global AI market is expected to be worth approximately 11.283 billion U.S. dollars.
We can expect more AI integrated apps in the coming years. It almost seems like Amazon has found its way around with AI in everything it does. We already know how Amazon uses AI to understand and predict its user behavior and suggest recommendations to users on the basis of their previous searches/purchases. We can expect more from Amazon in 2019 as to how it leverages AI to its mobile marketing workforce.
Uber also uses AI-based routing to equip its drivers with the best suggest the routes to ensure a smoother and safer ride. They also use AI to let your contacts know if your car is involved in a crash.
Marketers will leverage AI to deliver better Ad experiences. AI improves the performance of a marketer’s content, making space for better monetization efficiency and improved analytics functions.
2. AR/VR — Retail, Travel, and Media
Much like every year this year Augmented Reality will be a key trend to look out for because it’s still growing. Although most brands these days are using it in their app for visual aesthetics and conversions.
After the success of Pokemon Go in 2016 very few brands have leveraged AR in their apps. Last year we saw the launch of fully AR equipped IKEA Place app that lets users’ place furniture in their rooms and experience it live and Loreal’s YouCAM app supported by AR.
Early this year at Google event we saw the new AR supported Google Maps and its plan to explore AR more aggressively.
3. App Gamification
How do you get people to do things on your app? Engagement is the key! Capturing their attention and motivating them to take an action is critical. App Gamification lets your foster that kind of engagement. Why Gamification? Because it gives the user control. The first gamification of app dates back in 2009 when Foursquare allowed its users to search and discover new places. Apart from being a social tool, Foursquare also lets users collect badges and other achievements.
Since then there were bigger players like Nike, Codecademy, Starbucks etc. implementing gamification into their apps. We’ve seen gamification as a common practice with a lot of EdTech and learning apps such as Duolingo, Babbel, Memrise, BYJU’s and so on.
We can expect to see more apps to gamifying their apps in 2019 and
- Significant growth of more game-like system interfaces
- An increased focus on app user performance
- Tap into the potential of virtual and augmented reality
In fact, in a recent poll, 50% of startups said they were integrating gaming elements into their strategy this year. But it’ll be interesting to see who does it best?
4. Videos
Videos are the most consumed form of content across the devices. In fact, more than 70% of YouTube video views are via mobile. Videos are an easier and fun way of sharing information. Since a video is such a strong driver of mobile traffic, it’s high time that businesses start producing amazing video content.
Businesses are able to capitalize on mobile only video platforms to connect with their audiences similar to Facebook. Remember Dubsmash? So businesses like Tiktok (earlier Musical.ly) have managed to eat the user share from Facebook. And with it won’t be long to see the app market flooded with such video apps.
Significant advancements in e-commerce have also been seen in Instagram’s recent product update on saving and shopping products you want to buy from video posts.
5. Influencer Marketing
More B2B brands and apps embrace the idea of influencer marketing. and shoot for engagement via influencers’ individual platforms. We all know how influencer marketing is a tough nut to crack for B2B businesses.
B2B brands have realized that It is easier to market their products/services through an influencer. With their extensive network, the reach becomes a lot easier and is cost effective as compared to traditional marketing. Influencer marketing can be at times a lot simpler and it can also get a lot complex. Co-branding events such as virtual conference, webinars have been one way to go about it. Product placements on other social channels that the influencer is active on, sponsoring a podcast is another way.
The key to successful influencer marketing is the partnership between the brand and the influencer. While you might get the reach and amplification you need for your product to the target audience, one needs to measure and tie it back to their core business metrics.
Conclusion
While there may be a different set of trends in your respective industry, these trends vary and take into consideration how you can market your app and leverage the ever-growing technology to do so.
These are my observations and trends I believe will play a prominent role in shaping mobile marketing for 2019. If you have more such trends then I’d love to hear them.
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