Content Marketing in 2021: Trends and Useful Tips

All large companies draw up annual marketing plans to make their work more efficient. When doing so, it is important to take the content marketing trends for 2020 into account. That means understanding well which directions will be popular this year, what goes into creating quality content marketing, what interests and attracts the audience, and which formats and new communication channels you need to master. Let's look at all of these aspects in this article.

Podcasts — an important trend

      A podcast is an audio program. In format it resembles a radio show hosted by two or more people who discuss a topic set in advance. The standard format — an expert is invited as a guest and asked questions on literature, art, economics, political science, acting and other fields the guest knows professionally.

     Sometimes the format changes and, for example, two experts discuss a problem, or there is no specific topic at all and the hosts talk about various subjects and the latest news. A podcast can include video, yet its main value lies in the audio. For listeners, this content comes first.

     According to forecasts, podcasts will be one of the main content marketing trends this year. They offer high quality and wide reach, they are growing fast and they are very useful for business. Here are some features of the podcast format that matter for marketing:

• audience loyalty. People who listen to podcasts absorb every word, because this information interests them, and long recordings do not put them off, even when they run an hour or more;
  
  
• fast growth. New podcast listening services appear every day, many media outlets produce their own episodes, and this content regularly makes it to the top of multimedia catalogs;
  
  
• open niches. The market has yet to fully take shape, and you can still claim a niche on a particular topic;
  
  
• convenience. Listening to a show is much more convenient than watching videos or reading articles. And a podcast is easy to listen to while you do other things. 

Engagement through interactive content 

     In 2020, interactive content means content that involves feedback from the audience, since two-way communication is far easier to take in than passively scrolling through feeds and pages. If users can interact with content and influence it, its popularity will grow. That is why quizzes, top lists, contests and loyalty bonuses are so popular. 

The influence of social media 

     Today's internet users spend a lot of time on various social networks. They may spend all their free time there, catching up on news, reading articles, working, studying - and this should be taken into account when planning content marketing for 2020. 

An author's voice

Texts with a personal author's voice are trending again this year. Carefully polished, extremely concise pieces written by every rule of the informational style are losing popularity. Readers prefer literary texts with a distinct author's style. Recognizable texts with an individual style are easier to take in and quicker to remember; they stir different emotions and make people want to share them with others. 

Infographics, video and images    

     Visual contact remains relevant in content marketing — videos, infographics and pictures still grab attention and are easy to remember. Visuals help people take in content better. Using different color schemes, recognizable logos and memorable images is an important tool that raises brand recognition. 

Creativity 

     Internet users already took a liking to creative ads by well-known bloggers last year. Now creative ad inserts are reaching a higher level. The new ad inserts have a plot, a script, bright sets and rich props. This is full-fledged content where the brand is mentioned indirectly, presented to the viewer as a native advertising product, and this attracts more new customers.

A fine line

     This year, walking a fine line is on trend: presenting facts the audience may react to in mixed ways. This applies to politics, tolerance, religion, and the latest news in the country and the world.

     For all the risk of crossing the line, brands that prepare topical content still stop short of crossing it and win the audience's attention. People actively discuss them, retell and share their content, and in doing so they popularize the brand.