Internet of Things or IoT revolutionizes various industries, including the content marketing area. Global spendings in IoT is expected to cross the mark of $6 trillion by the year 2020 with manufacturing, utilities, transportation, and logistics industries being the top adopters.
Clearly, IoT is proving as a major disruptor for businesses. One of the striking examples can be seen in how brands are changing the way they promote themselves, specifically via content marketing. With the ability to communicate messages with the least human intervention, IoT has largely impacted the content delivery system accelerating the huge volumes of data and increased dependence on data.
IoT brings a host of content opportunities for marketers, taking content beyond blog posts and social media. But that’s not it. Let’s explore other realms of content marketing which are going to be significantly affected by IoT.
1. User’s Search Behavior Will Change Dynamics of Content Marketing
Ever since Siri and Google Assistants have made their way to the mainstream, search behaviour has transformed considerably. Studies confirm that voice search is estimated to share 20% of all the searches. The trend is not expected to set down any time sooner and is instead, anticipated to cross 50% by 2020 end.
Apparently, if your content does not meet searchers’ changing interests, your content marketing strategy is expected to fall flat. Voices searches are different as compared to the conventional search paradigms. They are not just longer but tend to incorporate natural language elements.
For instance, here is how searches for a user looking for nearby eateries would look like:
Conventional Search: Best eateries in New York
Voice Search: Hey Siri, can you find me best eateries in New York?
Arguably you need to revamp your content marketing strategy and SEO tactics. Focus on long-tail keywords and question phrases. Go for a language which is commonly used by humans. Make FAQs a part of your content strategy. Know your audience in order to understand their challenges and incorporate their area of interests to create compelling content.
2. Content will Find New Ways to Reach Target Audience
With so much emphasis on content marketing today, there is literally a content jungle out there. IoT has not just changed search behaviour, but even how readers consume this widely available information.
Often considered as zero-sum, content marketing is more than that. Connected devices are expected to introduce a host of new content consumption opportunities, from small multi-tasking windows to a large chunk of previously unavailable time.
And that’s typically how recipes are now open for cooking enthusiasts, whenever they want, with kitchen appliances attached on the internet-connected sphere.
Internet-enabled self-driven cars are already paving ways to transform long commutes into lengthy periods of engaging content. The platform will extend media experience to vehicles, seamlessly integrating content libraries, streaming subscriptions, and social networking into each and every ride.
3. Content will Now Augment Reality
AR market is expected to surge up to $11.8 billion this year and forecasted to cross $60 billion by the year 2023. Giants like IKEA and Google are already tapping AR’s potential to deliver sophisticated AR experience to users via smartphones.
In combination with connected devices, AR is changing the paradigms of content delivery. Smart windshields display directions and details about surrounding landscapes. This combination enables the layering of all sorts of information from the explanation, videos, prices, addresses, related social media comments, ratings, etc.- onto real life.
Therefore, with the right mapping and user experiences, the content will no longer be siloed and will be integrated into the world around us. That’s creating a new avenue for the content marketers to brainstorm and come up with striking ideas to deliver their content.
4. Contextual targeting will be vital than ever
Talking about the current dynamics of content marketing, it is very easy for people to skim past the content on web pages or mobile apps. However, with content delivered via smart objects such as curtains and helmet visors, people’s tolerance to this irrelevant content will decrease manifold. And that makes good contextual targeting important than ever.
The right piece of content presented before the right audience at the right place will be the most valuable aspect of content marketing strategies. Combining all the ingredients into one valuable content will be highly effective in the upcoming era. However, one should know that if one of the elements goes wrong, customers won’t be as forgiving. For this purpose, brands will have to implement more sophisticated channels for data collection and utilization.
5. Data proficiency with iot
With large chunks of data available on the internet, details about your content consumers and their behaviour are just at the fingertips. However, what will set your brand apart from the competition is how you make sense of that data.
It will be important for content marketers to extract data, process and analyse it, and interpret it to create a content copy that consumers are trying to discover. As analytics become crucial than ever, marketers will be required to level-up their game and team up with data scientists to deliver relevant information.
6. Content Marketing Experience in a New Way
Experiential marketing is not new. Brands have been promoting their work through experience, rather than a traditional marketing message for a long time now. This allows consumers to connect with the content rather than just read it.
Content marketers who still lag, need to join the power of experiential marketing understanding how it can help them discover new types of engagement.
The Right Time is Now
IoT adoption is accelerating at breakneck speed. If you have not yet tapped IoT for better business opportunities, the time is now to start brainstorming on how you can integrate IoT in your existing resources.
With content marketing paradigms changing upside down, content marketers will be required to create content which is smarter, more flexible, and personalized.
Content creation will be largely driven by a huge chunk of data and create unprecedented scope for opportunities if used effectively. Although IoT and content marketing mix are in early days as of now, the dawn of beginnings is already here. Stay tuned with us for more insights and upcoming changes in the years.