As the end of 2014 draws near, content marketers everywhere are reviewing the past year’s strategies and making plans for next year. Content marketing is a rapidly evolving field, which means marketers have to be ready for shifting trends in 2015.
To help you prep for next year’s content marketing campaigns, we asked a variety of brands, marketers and content creators to make predictions about 2015.
From brand newsrooms to algorithms, here’s a look at a few trends that you should prepare to embrace as the calendar rolls over.
Brands collaborate within departments
Ross Hudgen, founder of Siege Media, says communications departments will have to work together to create content.
“Audiences will want engaging content to share, but to compete in 2015 companies need to do more than just write a blog post,” he says.
“There will be a greater focus on how paid, earned and owned media channels within a company can work together. Often times that means combining a lot of internal departments such as marketing, PR, SEO, design and webmaster. It’s hard work, but the pay off can be worth it.”
More businesses build brand newsrooms
Lee Wagstaff, content manager at Bring Digital in the UK, predicts an increase in the number of brand newsrooms, which will produce highly engaging articles that get picked up by big news outlets.
“In 2015, you’ll see more newspapers publishing thought-provoking pieces that promote businesses in a very subtle way,” he predicts. “When you read an interesting online piece, check the byline and there’s a strong chance it will contain some form of link to a brand.”
Interest in ‘listicles’ will diminish
Jacob Chapman, the VP of strategy at Sazze, which propels brands like BlackFriday.fm, says long winded “Top 10” lists will become a thing of the past.
“Lists have gotten longer and longer in an arms race that is getting to the point of ridiculous,” he says. “An article that used to have a headline like ‘The Top 5 Must See Super Villains’ would now look like ‘The Top 37 Super Villains Your Life is Meaningless Without.’ We believe users will grow tired with articles like this.”
Content becomes more specific
Rachael Nichol, the content strategist at SUPPLY, believes generic content will almost completely fall by the wayside as audiences demand more specific content.
“Content marketers will need to specialize their content to specific audiences in order to have any impact,” she says. “This means content marketers must have a deep understanding of who their customer is and be able to test and use analytics to plan and produce their content.”
Obsession with algorithm changes will decline
Ian St. Clair, an SEO specialist at Clicks and Clients, says brands will stop worrying about the constant algorithm changes that search engines like Google continue to tweak.
“Content marketers and companies will stop chasing algorithms and focus on creating the best content possible in the right and honest way, which is what Google wants anyway,” he says.
A few predictions of our own
Show me the numbers – Marketers will continue to rely heavily on metrics to direct their content creation in 2015.
Brands reach outside the office for content – As brands realize the power behind content marketing, there will be an increased effort to find qualified writers to handle the additional workload that content creation requires.
Increased efforts to diversify content – The wants and needs of an audience vary and so should content. In 2015, brands will step up production on things like infographics and videos.
