【2023 Archives】

As Benjamin Franklin wrote023 Archives “Nothing is certain except death and taxes.”

He might as well have added that it’s a near certainty that writers will trot out lists of predictions at the beginning of any new year. I won’t exempt myself from that rule, but whereas many are content to predict new trends, I’ll restrict my predictions to those trends I believe are dying, unless they get some major form of life support.

1. Twitter!

Will Twitter become the new MySpace? While it may be too early to say goodbye to Twitter, we all know it’s struggling while Facebook and Snapchat continue to grow. Twitter’s share is 27.3% among all social media users, a decline compared to previous numbers. Although the return of Jack Dorsey may herald a wave of improvements, Twitter has been languishing for years now, and it may be too little, too late. The company made minor changes last year, like not counting images and video toward the 140 character limit, and has hinted at more changes, but it will take more than a little bit of flexibility to woo new users.

Twitter struggled during 2016 with a potential sale to Salesforcewhich ultimately didn’t happen, appearing to indicate Twitter isn’t seen as an attractive target. The company also cut 300 jobs and morale is said to be at an all time low with more cuts expected to occur this year.

Just as Twitter seems to be losing its hold on social media, other networks like Instagram and Pinterest are growing rapidly. Instagram grew to 600 million users in 2016, adding 100 million of them in just the last 6 months of the year. Pinterest also passed a major growth milestone, announcing it had accumulate more than 150 million active monthly users.

2. Big banner ads

There was a time when there were big banner ads on every site, distracting you from concentrating on your purpose. However, this trend is fading away as marketers concentrate on other tools such as native advertising, which have been shown to be 53% more likely to generate leads. Much of this trends appears to be related to higher mobile usage, where click rates on banners are notoriously low.

3. Stock images

The use of stock images is decreasing as businesses turn to personalized images and videos. Generic stock images don’t support an authentic identity and inhibit users from connecting with brands that use them. On the other hand, personalized images improve content performance by increasing likes, shares, and click through rates.

4. Fake reviews

70% of Americans check online reviews before making a purchase, according to a 2015 studyby market intelligence agency Mintel. Around 88% of customers believeonline reviews are as authentic as personal recommendations. As might be expected, this has attracted an industry that produces fake reviews to those willing to pay for them. In 2015 Amazon began filing lawsuitsagainst companies for publishing fake reviews. Consumers are also becoming more savvy. When fake reviews stop working, companies won’t buy them much longer.

5. Popup ads

In August, 2016, Google announcedit was looking to penalize websites that use annoying pop up ads and interstitials. Do pop ups work? Sure, but Google apparently has the data to show that people don’t like visiting sites with pop ups as much as sites that don’t have them, so it only makes sense for Google to boost the rankings of websites that remove them.Outline your 2017 digital marketing strategy keeping these trends in mind. If you were planning to spend heavily on Twitter ads or fake reviews, it may be time to change that plan.

Josh Steimle is the author of Chief Marketing Officers at Work and the CEO of MWI, a digital marketing agency with offices in the US and Asia, and despite being over 40 can still do a kickflip on a skateboard. 

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