The year 2020 was a whirlwind ride, to say the least. Among the predicted digital marketing trends for the last year, some were quickly adopted and became a norm, while others were left behind due to the pandemic.

Ecommerce was one of the top industries to reap high profits last year, with many new startups entering the space and making a huge splash. The sale of remote working tools also went through the roof. If you’re a startup striving to make a mark, you need to quickly make the most of the marketing trends to get a leg up among your competition.

For this year 2021, what are the top digital marketing trends for startups to watch out for?

Let’s find out.

5 Top Digital Marketing Trends for Startups in 2021

Our digital marketing specialists at YellowFin Digital have been working hard with startups and small businesses in the Houston area, helping them cope with the new pandemic challenges. Our digital marketing agency has helped numerous Houston businesses spend less and profit more with customer-centric strategies in the past year.

In this blog, we’ll look at some of the digital marketing trends for 2021 predicted by our digital marketing agency.

  • 1. The Enriched Chatbots with Conversational-AI

Chatbots have become one of the top digital marketing trends in the past few years. It’s still continuing to be on the list with the enhanced conversational-AI experience that many customers crave.

In fact, in a study conducted by Juniper Research, it’s found that the mainstream adoption of chatbots is expected to cut business costs by $8 billion by 2022.

For new startups, the chatbot is seen as an affordable way to provide the best customer service with minimal intervention. There are various online chatbot tools for budget-friendly rates customized by startups to offer quick, satisfactory answers to customer queries.

  • 2. The All-Time Favourite Video Marketing

Video marketing has become an essential marketing strategy with so much potential in increasing your conversions through multiple ways. Customers now prefer the easy way – viewing a video on the go than reading through a lengthy article.

There are so many ways you can use videos to market your startup:

  • On the homepage of your website as an introductory video
  • On the YouTube channel 
  • As a part of the paid advertising strategy
  • Social media posts
  • Product explainer videos
  • Video thumbnails for blogs

Depending on the industry your startup is in, you can simplify your customers’ lives with a short, concise video that answers their questions.

When you’re adding videos, make sure to add proper subtitles, background music and clear audio for maximum benefits. You can also ask your customers to send you videos of their testimonials and use them for your marketing campaign.

  • 3. Voice Assistant-Enabled Searches

Voice-controlled digital assistants like Siri and Alexa are slowly and surely gaining momentum in the search volumes.

Previously, marketers optimized their websites for only the searches that’ll be typed into the search box. But with the increase in the sales of voice assistant devices, websites now need to be optimized for voice searches too.

In research conducted by the Pew Research Center in 2017, it was found that 46% of Americans are using digital voice assistants.

Among them, 42% of the people used it on their smartphones, while 14% used a voice assistant on a computer or a tablet and 8% used it on a standalone device like Amazon Echo or Google Home.

With almost half of the population using voice searches, it’s becoming increasingly important to optimize the content for those voice searches and SEO best practices. 

If you want to add voice search optimization to your SEO strategy, you can reach out to the specialists at our digital marketing agency in Houston.

  • 4. ROI-Rich Influencer Marketing

Open any social media platform and you can see a bunch of top influencers promoting products and so many followers devouring every word they say.

Influencer marketing is a powerful tool when used properly and can quickly increase revenue by multiple folds. 

According to a study by Business Insider, the number of money brands spends on influencer marketing is predicted to increase to $15 billion by 2022.

Among the influencer marketing strategy, more than three-fourth of the brands focus on Instagram over other social media platforms. But this isn’t to say that you should also focus on only that social media platform.

Analyze where a majority of your target customers are. Pick that social media platform, find out the influencers who can sway the consumer decisions, and rope them in to promote your startup’s products.

  • 5. Quick-to-Shop Social Commerce

Social media e-commerce is gaining popularity, with brands branching out and using it for quick conversions.

While there are brands that use social commerce as one conversion point, some are using it as the sole e-store. The shoppable posts on Instagram and Facebook are making it easy to buy products in a single click. 

For physical product-based startups, social commerce is a great advantage to fetch high revenue with minimum investment. With just a few high-def photographs, attractive product descriptions and great customer reviews, companies can easily convert their social media followers into long-time customers.

We offer setting up social commerce pages on these social media platforms as a part of our digital marketing services to maximize your reach and take advantage of the micro-moments.

Wrapping Up

There are so many other digital marketing trends for 2021. Among all of those, these five trends are the easiest and most beneficial for startups to implement.

So, if you are a founder or a marketer in a startup, we highly recommend you to devise your marketing campaigns by keeping these trends in mind.