Best Practices For Digital Marketers 2023

Digital marketing is constantly evolving and changing, and 2023 will be no exception. Marketers must adapt and innovate with new technologies, consumer preferences, and privacy regulations to stay ahead. Here are some of the best practices for digital marketers in 2023 that will help you achieve your goals and connect with your audience.

1. Gather First-Party Data

As third-party cookies are phased out by the end of 2024, first-party data will become marketers' most valuable source of information. First-party data is the data you collect directly from your customers or prospects, such as their names, email, preferences, behaviour, and feedback. This data is more accurate, relevant, and trustworthy than third-party data, allowing you to personalise your marketing efforts and build long-term relationships.

To gather more first-party data, you must provide value and transparency to your audience. Offer them incentives, such as discounts, free trials, or exclusive content, in exchange for their consent and information. Explain how you will use their data and respect their privacy choices. Use tools like forms, surveys, quizzes, or chatbots to collect data engagingly and interactively.

2. Embrace Inclusive Media Planning

Inclusive media planning ensures that your media mix reaches and represents the diversity of your target audience. It means creating inclusive content that showcases different perspectives and identities and choosing the right channels and publishers that resonate with your audience.

Inclusive media planning can help you avoid bias and stereotypes, expand your reach and relevance, and build customer trust and loyalty. To achieve this, you need to audit your current media plan and assess whether it reflects the breadth of your audience. You must also review your keyword and topic exclusions for potential bias and invest in authoritative voices and publishers that support underrepresented communities.

3. Align Your Marketing With A Purpose

Consumers today are more conscious of their choices' social and environmental impact, and they expect brands to do the same. They want brands to have a clear purpose beyond profit and align with their values. They also want brands to take action and demonstrate their commitment to important causes.

To align your marketing with a purpose, you must identify what matters to you and your audience and how you can make a difference. You must also communicate your purpose effectively and authentically through your content and campaigns. For example, you can use storytelling techniques to showcase your mission, vision, and impact. You can also partner with relevant organisations or influencers that share your purpose and amplify your message.

4. Optimise Your Content For Result Types

Search engines are becoming more sophisticated and user-friendly, offering different types of results for different queries. For example, a search engine may display featured snippets, images, videos, maps, news articles, or shopping results depending on the user's intent. These result types can help users find what they are looking for faster and easier.

To optimise your content for result types, you need to understand the intent behind each query and create content that matches it. You must also follow the best practices for each result type, such as using structured data, keywords, tags, captions, or ratings. Doing so can increase your visibility and click-through rate on search engines.

5. Measure Your Content For ROI

Content marketing is one of the most effective digital marketing strategies and the most challenging to measure. Many marketers need help to prove their content efforts' return on investment (ROI) and justify their budget allocation. However, measuring content ROI is essential for optimising your strategy and demonstrating value.

To measure your content ROI, you must define your goals and key performance indicators (KPIs) for each content or campaign. You also need to use tools like Google Analytics or HubSpot to track and analyse your metrics across different channels and stages of the customer journey. Some common metrics to measure content ROI are traffic, engagement, leads, conversions, revenue, retention, or advocacy.

6. Leverage AI-Generated Content

Artificial intelligence (AI) transforms how marketers create content by automating tasks like writing headlines, captions, summaries, or even entire articles. As a result, AI-generated content can help marketers save time, money, and resources and generate more relevant, personalised, and engaging content for their audience.

However, AI-generated content is not a magic bullet that can replace human creativity and judgement. Marketers need to use AI-generated content as a tool to enhance their content creation process, not as a substitute. They also need to verify the AI-generated content's accuracy, quality, and originality and ensure that it meets their brand voice and guidelines.

7. Explore New Digital Channels

Digital channels constantly evolve and expand, offering marketers new opportunities and challenges. In 2023, some of the digital channels that will likely gain more popularity and attention are:

Voice search

Voice search uses voice commands to search for information or perform actions on devices like smartphones, smart speakers, or laptops. Voice search is convenient, fast, and hands-free, and it can provide more natural and conversational interactions. To optimise your content for voice search, you need to use long-tail keywords, questions, and phrases that match how people speak.You also need to provide clear and concise answers that voice assistants can read aloud.

Podcasts

Podcasts are audio shows that cover various topics and genres, such as news, entertainment, education, or business. Podcasts are popular because they are easy to consume, informative, and entertaining. They can also help you establish your authority, credibility, and personality in your niche. To create a successful podcast, you must define your target audience, format, and goals. You must also produce high-quality audio content that provides value and engages your listeners.

Live streaming

Live streaming broadcasts video content in real-time over the internet. Live streaming is interactive, authentic, and immersive, and it can help you connect with your audience on a deeper level. You can use live streaming to showcase your products or services, share behind-the-scenes stories, host Q&A sessions, or collaborate with influencers. To make the most of live streaming, you need to plan your content ahead of time, promote your live event across your channels, and encourage participation and feedback from your viewers.

8. Personalise Your Marketing At Scale

Personalisation is tailoring your marketing messages and offers to each customer or segment based on their preferences, behaviour, and needs. Personalisation can help you increase customer satisfaction, loyalty, and retention and boost your conversions and revenue.

However, personalisation can also be challenging to implement at scale, especially as customers expect more relevant and timely experiences across multiple channels and devices. You need to leverage data, technology, and automation to personalise your marketing at scale. You must collect and analyse data from various sources to create a 360-degree view of your customers. You must also use tools like CRM, email marketing, or personalisation platforms to deliver personalised content and offers across different touchpoints. You must also test and optimise your personalisation efforts to ensure they are effective and aligned with your goals.

Takeaways

Digital marketing in 2023 will require marketers to be more agile, innovative, and customer-centric than ever before. By following these best practices, you can prepare for the upcoming changes and challenges in the digital landscape and create a winning strategy to help you grow your business and delight your audience.