Beyond the Internet of Content

This year, we invited a panel of leading Google industry experts to guide us through the content marketing landscape we’re in right now. They shared insights from various points of view, and in doing so revealed things that could drive content marketing trends in the coming years. Our list of their suggested outlooks follows below. Here are their predictions for 2020 based on the panels analysis so far…

This post was originally published on 01 June 2019. Voice search takes over

Voice search accounts for 1% of queries at present, but it’s probably about 3% in 2020. This is because we’ll see a confluence of technological advances in search engines, voice assistants, hardware devices, and the ever-expanding database of websites that allow voice search to work properly. This will definitely drive Amazon‘s growth in terms of the search volume going forward.

Go slow… with thoughts about the future

Social media uses a lot of copy and analysis to find relevance for your content. That means there are a lot of trees flying over each other trying to find the best way to include certain keywords in a content post. In future, social media will be using more natural methods in order to allow their users to find content they are already looking for, making it easier for them to browse their feeds. Content marketing will take over your marketing

However, this can mean a loss of control, as brands will have to take their creativity back in-house. As our society and internet are becoming more information rich, this will become a very common situation in many organisations. Instead of hiring huge teams of statisticians, engineers, technologists, etc to gather all this data, people will start to look to companies like HubSpot and Marketo for a solution to this problem.

This will start to become more standard in the coming years. Streaming becomes the norm

As soundtracks have become more of a medium, we will start to see streaming more and more. But it’s not just about downloads and MP3s, but also voice search or content that people want to know about but don’t have to download. One interesting trend we’re watching will be the development of brands who are now using programs like Ambiguita, BitTorrent, and the latest release of Pandora, that will help them deliver customisable audio experiences. Search terms will be used to create different experiences that will be tailored to individual preferences and need. The great thing about such a program is that you can distribute these changes across platforms and devices.

In the future, it will all become part of a marketing automation, which will give brands the ability to break all the rules and create completely new experiences. Integration and interrelation of channels will be great for many brands, with the typical industries performing across all channels – including email, social media, video, and mobile. Gaming will be huge. You will be able to connect all your platforms and games will have an extremely significant presence. Each platform of gaming will have a culture of itself, but if done correctly you will be able to present a true experience. It will have different games that cater to each platform and to different players.

This won’t just be one game for Windows 10, or Minecraft on the Xbox One – it will be a multi-platform experience that will exist in tandem with each other, and the other platforms, in some cases. These will be the platforms that have the best games and have the most people who are already a part of them. Content marketing and search

Most industries around the world are getting much better at ranking for some types of content. But content marketing is still working with a fairly finite audience that still has their bases in text and is largely choosing text to be the focus. The content market in 2020 will have a diverse range of topics to choose from. One common mistake companies make is to focus on certain keywords that cater to a tiny group of consumers.

That’s not enough to attract a client base that will keep you in business. The content market in 2020 will have a diverse range of topics to choose from. This will include older topics, and new content and new formats that are applicable to this growing market. You’ll not only be able to have relevant content, but it’ll also have a wide range of ways to distribute it – over a variety of different channels. However, there’s still a very wide gap between how much you need to spend to make new content relevant to your audience. Most industries around the world are getting much better at ranking for some types of content.

But content marketing is still working with a fairly finite audience that still has their bases in text and is largely choosing text to be the focus. The content market in 2020 will have a diverse range of topics to choose from. Content will be front and center

This is where it gets a little more tricky, as in most sectors, the content market is getting even more fragmented than it was previously. Even if you have a fairly common keyword in the market, people with different traits are using different platforms and spreading their content through various channels. Those people will be looking for different keywords, too, making it hard to find relevant, informative content for them. There has been an enormous content space created since the birth of search, and content will be front and center in 2020.

We are starting to see a shift towards much more deep content not just for the sale of products, but also for the purchase of opinion. These are pieces of thought and insights you want to share with someone. That content will not be in the form of a product description, but an article that’s going to guide you through a complex process so you can get better results. For some of the non-branded industry, the idea of seeking out an opinion piece, an opinion piece will be the goal of their SEO activities.