What will Advertising look like in 2020?
This year brings a plethora of opportunities and challenges for marketers as they battle to keep up with the continually evolving human behaviour and advancing technology.
- 2020 turns a new leaf for marketers as they hope to redefine many rules in advertising as they explore the new benefits of AR, VR and voice recognition.
- So that brands can continue to thrive in the New Year, they must find new ways to connect and engage with consumers in an era of high consumer expectations and competitive disruption.
Augmented Reality
“Global spend on augmented and virtual reality is expected to reach $18.8bn this year.”
The shift in consumer attention towards mobile has been progressing over the last few years, people have been gaining confidence in navigating this online world available at their fingertips and now that they are competent in this area, they want more. Consumers desire more high-quality experiences. New Instagram Story filters, TikTok and Snapchat indicate that consumers are reaching new levels in their creativity through augmented reality.
“Not only the improvements on devices and software have created a fertile ground for ‘augmented creativity’ but there’s also a real appetite for AR from a savvy audience. Be it functionality-driven solutions or entertaining games that turn any environment into a playground, there’ll be AR experiences for everyone.” Michael Abdel, founder and executive creative director of The Sphere Agency.
This consumer interest will see brands experiment with the marketing benefits of AR by building engaging, valuable and immersive experiences. Alongside the use of AR, high-quality video content will continue to soar as shows from studios, publishers and entertainers will be created specifically for mobile.
Voice Search
3.5 billion Google searches are made every day.
According to ComScore, they have predicted that by 2020, 50% of all online searches will be performed using voice search.
If brands do not consider optimising their website for voice search, a significant number of users will be lost, now that the normality of devices like Amazon Alexa and Google Home is increasing thanks to their ease of use.
“2020 will be the year we see a significant acceleration in voice-based marketing activity. Voice assistants on mobile or home devices are changing the way we search for information and access services” Paul Swann, executive creative director, Thinkerbell Sydney
Video
Consumers respond well to visual content and this is obvious from the success video saw in 2019, and 2020 will be no different. On average, live videos shown on Facebook Live and Instagram Live are more likely to keep the target audience watching three times longer than pre-recorded videos.
Video content means brands can form a lasting connection with their audience, as 80% of consumers can recall a video they saw in the last 30 days. It is worth brands not only considering live video but also long-form videos. While short messaging is beneficial in the short term, it is less likely to resonate to the same extent as long-form which provides a deeper level of engagement.
Personalisation
2019 saw savvy consumers tuning out advertising noise that was not relevant to them. 2020 will be the year personalised marketing soars as marketers focus on creating lasting connections with their target audience. They have noticed that traditional advertising efforts are losing their effectiveness and to overcome this, they will focus on personalisation.
80% of consumers in a survey of 1,000 people stated they would be more likely to invest their time in a brand that offered a personalised experience. Marketers need to embrace this change so the opportunity to connect meaningfully with an audience is not missed.
Marketers experienced a year of heightened consumer expectations, increasingly savvy consumers and continual competitive disruption in 2019. Although 2020 does not indicate this will slow down, marketers have the opportunity to build on the progress made this year to stay competitive and ahead of the game in 2020 while reaping the benefits of technological advancements.
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