Digital Marketing Predictions for 2021: What the Experts Have to Say

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Want to ensure this year is your organization’s best one yet? Get valuable insight from the experts and discover the top digital marketing predictions for 2021…  

The year 2020 might have been one for the record books, but that doesn’t mean that 2021 can’t explode with new possibilities for you and your business. We, along with many other marketing experts, anticipate some great things for this year. So, we wanted to share some of these digital marketing predictions and trends to help you put your best foot forward. 

What’s in store for 2021 in terms of digital marketing? Let’s talk about what you can expect and how to shift your business to keep up with the trends so you can ride the profit wave right into 2022. 

Focus on Brand Authenticity

One of the biggest digital marketing predictions for 2021 is the continued focus on brand authenticity. Long gone are the days of posting societally admirable tweets just to keep with the “moral Joneses.” Only say what you mean in 2021—or don’t say it at all.

Brand authenticity is precious, and you should cherish it at all costs. Be careful not to risk losing it just to be culturally appropriate. Follow up your messaging with action that proves what you say is exactly what your brand embodies.

What does this mean? 

It means you need to put your money where your mouth is. In other words, don’t post anything that doesn’t resonate 100% with your brand. Stop the virtue signaling and live true to your real values. Or else, you will likely be called out for it. 

The good news? Those businesses that have protected their brand authenticity will get rewarded in the coming year.

Recent events have caused consumers to reflect more, and with this comes a desire to become better people and connect with those they deem honest and reputable. Consumers will buy from brands they can trust and find meaningful, and authenticity is right at the center.  

Customer Experience Personalization

You can’t just post random ads that lack research and planning and expect high returns, especially in this current unsettling climate. As mentioned earlier, audience connection is critical during these times, more than it has been in the past. Your audience wants to be courted; they want the royal treatment, and they expect you to understand their needs before they buy from you. This is where personalized marketing comes in, and this is why it’s earned a spot on this list of digital marketing predictions and trends. 

Companies that personalize website experiences see, on average, a 19% increase in sales. The reason is that when you personalize your audience’s interactions and experiences with your brand, you develop a trusted relationship that blossoms into increased sales and loyalty.  

How do you personalize your marketing? 

First, you need to KNOW your audience by gathering data on their traits, characteristics, and behaviors. 

Here’s an example: Let’s say you segment your subscribers by interests based on behavioral data you gather from your website visitors and what they interact with on your site. You can send personalized messages to your subscribers based on their interests. So, if your target consumer visited your “red high heel shoes” website category 10 times in the last week and added it to their cart, send relevant emails showing the same products to this consumer to further engage with them. The key is to personalize your interactions with your customers based on their unique interests and behaviors. 

There are many other ways to gather market research data and use it to personalize experiences. Here is a past article we wrote that dives into this subject in much more detail. 

The Quick-Start Marketing Guide to Launching High-Converting Personalized Strategies (with Examples)

Pivot to Virtual Events (on Steroids)

Last year, in-person events were abruptly canceled, and there are no signs of them returning anytime soon. Fifty-five percent of technology marketers adapted their in-person events to virtual activities to mitigate loss, hoping to garner the same participation. 

Hosting virtual events is one way to take advantage of the growing trend, but this will get stale if you do not take it one step further. Virtual events do not feel like in-person gatherings, as 30% of consumers are already exhausted at how much their lives have “digitally” changed. Businesses need to find a way to keep the experience as “real” as possible. 

To boost the attendance of virtual events, one of the digital marketing predictions from Gartner and other experts is that incorporating real-time experiences will become all the more necessary—and we wholeheartedly agree. Your audience misses real-time interactions—the pandemic has them craving more real-life experiences.  

While you can’t give participants an in-person event, you can beef up your digital events to encourage more interaction, so it feels closer to a real experience. Here are some tips to implement:


Shift from Luxury to Essentials


If your company sells luxury products, you might have experienced a drop in revenue in 2020. The reason is that, with the pandemic squeezing people’s wallets, consumers are more focused on surviving (remember the TP shortage?) rather than spending their surplus on unnecessary items. This means they will likely be purchasing essentials instead of high-priced luxuries. 

If you are a luxury brand, this doesn't mean that you need to start selling essential items. The key is to consider shifting to messaging that positions your brand as one that can help customers thrive during these difficult times. Even if you do not sell high-priced items, consider pivoting your messaging slightly to showcase how your products/services help customers survive and thrive. Meet the basic needs of real people who may or may not be having a hard time coping. 

How can you do this? As an example, the luxury clothing brand Tory Burch appeals to the homebody during this time. The typical fashion-forward couture images on the brand's Instagram profile are now joined by images of the founder in a casual (and comfortable) setting in her home. These images appeal to the stay-at-homer who is trying to live as comfortably as possible during an unsettling time. 

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Greater Emphasis on Technology

What happens when consumers replace their away-from-home shopping experiences with home-based digital shopping? They get much smarter and more savvy exploring the tech space. As a result, they demand better experiences.

What does this mean for you? Improve your UX (user experience) and ensure your website/app visitors can easily navigate your online properties to find what they are looking for in the quickest time possible. 

Here are a few places to start:

What does this look like? Well, let’s say you gather behavioral data from your website visitors. Where are they clicking? Where are they exiting your site? What stops them from getting through checkout? What hinders them from contacting you? Use a tool like Hotjar to watch your users’ behavior in real time. 

After reviewing the data, you might discover that visitors are retreating after getting to your payment page. More in-depth research reveals that visitors are getting confused about shipping charges. You fix the issue by adding a small note on your checkout page, and your conversions increase by 25%. Yes, this can actually happen, and pretty quickly when you collect the right data and leverage it to improve UX and increase sales. 

Tighter Content Moderation

According to Gartner, by 2024, 30% of large organizations will identify content moderation services for user-generated content as a C-suite priority—making this one of the digital marketing predictions worth paying attention to. 

User-generated content (or UGC) is merely content created and posted by people not affiliated with your brand that includes some brand component (typically a product mention or showcase). With the current polarization in our world, managing and protecting your reputation with UGC will become even more critical in 2021. 

There are a few ways to moderate your content to protect your reputation and keep your brand safe. These points were adapted and revised from Gartner. 

Digital Marketing Predictions for 2021: What You Need to Know

If you want to survive and thrive in this new year, you must understand the industry’s shifts and turns, which are primarily driven by your audience’s changing needs and desires. Seek to understand how your audience’s needs and concerns have changed during 2020. Start there and then apply the information from the digital marketing predictions we talked about in this article. Here they are again:

We have been helping our clients adapt to these trends as we saw them shift last year. If you would like to have a chat on how we can help you adjust your digital marketing to boost your leads and sales in this new year, we’d love to talk. 

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