Digital Marketing / Inbound Marketing

Rise & Advertise – What’s new in Digital Advertising?

By Indrani Pati
January 17, 2021

The world of advertising is constantly adapting to the latest trends in the market and businesses are simultaneously leveraging these ideas to send better promotional messages to an expansive audience. With 2020 behind us, every business is coming up with its own set of marketing strategies to take on 2021 in a better-prepared way. With both consumers and businesses becoming better accustomed to the digital ecosystem, brands are all set to take on the upcoming challenges with several new digital advertising trends. Here are five such trends you will definitely see all throughout 2021.

Growing necessity of Omnichannel platforms

Also known as creative management platforms or CMPs, omnichannel platforms will become a dire necessity in the year 2021, rather than just being an additional bonus. By integrating all the formats of digital advertising such as banner ads, display ads, mobile ads, digital videos, etc., these platforms will help businesses in increasing their flexibility of approaching the target audience apart from giving a big push to their efficiency and productivity. This will help them create more compelling ads by continuously tracking the audience response and making the necessary changes to ensure a seamless customer experience. Since this platform will gather a lot of data due to multiple channels, the analysis will help them bridge the gap between themselves and their consumers. Research data reveals that 79 % of consumers prefer personalised customer services, and omnichannel platforms effectively cater to the same.

Increasing popularity of Programmatic TV

It is being predicted that by 2021, a third of the global TV ad revenue will come from programmatic TV, and therefore, this is one trend that brands should be careful not to miss. Consumer behaviour has changed a whole lot since 2020, and nobody can deny that this shift has been caused by the pandemic. Keeping this in mind, businesses in 2021 will give a good amount of importance to programmatic TV advertising so as to target their end-users more effectively. With new players in the market like Apple TV and Disney Hotstar, businesses will keep proper track of the war brewing between these streaming channels to keep a close eye on how the audience is interacting with their TVs. Further, businesses will purchase TV inventory via programmatic platforms and also try to bring in traditional methods of advertising under the automation umbrella to smoothen out the whole process of programmatic advertising.

OTT will be in-trend

The growth of the OTT industry is expected to attain great heights in 2021. In India, between March 2020, and July 2020, there was a 30 % hike in paid subscriptions in the OTT industry - the numbers shot from 22.2 million to 29.0 million, and this is only expected to expand. Consumers can now go beyond borders and access international content. Hence, they will do proper research to get their hands on the best quality content and search for subscription plans that suit their needs - whether monthly, quarterly, annually or whatever plan the platform offers. Since consumers are willing to pay money for good content, they will try and from their end that they get their money’s worth. Further, OTT platforms will also help in penetrating niche markets and reach small towns and rural areas.

Virtual Events will become more frequent

Since consumers are doing everything from the comfort of their homes, businesses will resort to hosting online events - be it for the launch of a product or sharing any kind of information. In-person events are barely an option anymore which is why virtual and hybrid (a combination of in-person and online) events will become more popular. This will be a great opportunity for businesses to engage a much larger audience because there are no boundaries for reach in the digital space. These events will be highly interactive and have question-answer sessions to invite as many attendees as is possible. Convenience is a strong factor here which holds a significant amount of importance for the consumers. Furthermore, surveys have shown that about 67% of people believe that hybrid events will be the in-thing in the future, and also, 71% said that they will continue to attend events digitally even if they have the option for LIVE visits.

Interactive Content will be the new normal

The age of one-way advertisements is gone as businesses are trying more and more to focus on higher engagement rates. For the audience to feel involved, two-way communication is necessary. This is the reason why interactive ads will become more common. Consumers will be made to feel like they are having a one on one conversation with the brand so that they do not feel like they are a part of the crowd. This kind of engagement will also make their experience more wholesome and enjoyable. The year 2021 will see a lot of quizzes, surveys, feedback forms, polls, questionnaires, etc. so that the consumers spend more time on the brand itself, and also with the brand. Statistics tell us that by 2021, growth in social, connected TV, and over-the-top (OTT) advertising will drive programmatic display to almost $80 billion. For businesses to get used to their consumers’ requirements, they will have to keep manoeuvring their lens to get the best results across multiple touch-points. So, these are our top five digital advertising trends that we think will help you flourish in your digital journey and help you in driving those desired numbers.