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The digital marketing industry is continuing to evolve, and you need to keep up with the content marketing trends that appear. SEO and content marketing should always be best friends — one should not live without the other.

That's how we come to the idea of searching the trends in content marketing which influence SEO so you know what to expect and how to place yourself on the wave and not against it.

We've talked about the importance of content on our blog on multiple occasions, especially since Google started to focus their ranking signals on content. We even researched how you can rank on top Google positions without links with a proper content strategy in place.

With so many trends to choose from the content marketing area, we had a hard time narrowing down the ones that will have a high impact on SEO, but nevertheless, here they are:

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1. Natural Language Search and Voice Search Content

Voice search is one of the content marketing trends that is increasing viciously. According to Google, 20% of mobile searches are now voice searches. Moreover, voice-activated content has constant growth.

An increasing number of people in the United States are using voice to conduct searches. An Emarketer study shows that one-third of the US population uses voice search. A comparison beside search typed queries and 71 percent of consumers prefer to use voice searches (PricewaterhouseCoopers).

What this means for SEO: The trend has a high influence on SEO. We performed some searches in Google trends to understand the evolution and to have a clearer understanding of how voice search can revolutionize the SEO world.

What to do: Use natural language and create relevant content that is easy to read, just like you are talking with somebody — not over-optimizing for the sake of SEO "success." Build a content strategy optimization for voice search and use conversational marketing.

When asking a question in your article, try to respond to it in a full sentence, giving a specific response, make it easy to skim and invest in building trust. Try using a conversational tone in your content and optimize for long phrases or even questions.

2. Optimized Content for User Search Intent

Content and search engines together changed the way they work. They are now in sync, have strict rules and are definitely content marketing trends you should follow. The trend in content shifted the focus on the user, and Google is trying to deliver better optimized and personalized content to each user — hence the user search intent.

To understand the user search intent you need to perform a lot of keyword research. If you understand what your users want and what their intent is when they are searching for a specific query, half of the job for ranking on that keyword is done.

What to do: Perform keyword research, look through analytics and conduct studies to find out what is their pain point, if they find what they need on your website. If the bounce rate is high that means they don't find what they are looking for.

See what keywords do they look for on your website search box, then follow their path through the pages they navigate and design the customer journey map. There are lots of ways to better understand your audience and optimize your content for user search intent.

3. Personalized Content Experiences

Personalized content is the new buzzword in the content marketing trends world. Studies have shown that this year we'll have more content than before, and this story has been around for some years.

Personalized content creates a connection between the brand and the customer and has lots of benefits. According to Evergage's 2019 Trends in Personalization Survey Report respondents saw that personalized content delivers better customer experiences. 88% of U.S. marketers reported seeing measurable improvements due to personalization.

What this means for SEO: Personalization has started to become critical in the future of content marketing. It is a content marketing trend that has a big influence on SEO. That means more appropriate content for each user, based on their last searches on site, on their last activity on social media, on the actions taken on-site and so on.

What to do: If one user downloads an e-book from your site, next time you could offer similar e-books, or you could welcome them by name on your site. Go further, and send them personalized emails. Creating personalized experiences through adaptive content can increase your results and bring more conversions.

4. Content Creation Process Has Reconfigured Its Steps

We all know that people used content creation by starting with a keyword they wanted to rank for and creating content around it. The deceiving part of this content creation process was that it started to attract a lot of thin content just for the sake of ranking high in Google, with no intention of serving the user.

The content creation process changed and now follows a more natural and more user-friendly path. Now you have to start with finding a content gap or a problem and getting the answers to that through your content.

What to do: Start with the topic by looking on social media sites; forums or client's questions, reviews, feedback, comments or support questions. Following high rankings in Google with no value content is no longer an option.

Google Trends is an option for following popular topics, based on their searches. Follow popular websites in your industry, or follow trending hashtags on Twitter.

5. Content Marketing Will Be Written Only for Content Marketers

Unfortunately, content marketing is starting to be addressed to content marketers. The Marketoonist said the evolution of content marketing is simple: we write content for content marketers.

We got to the point where there is so much content written from one minute to another, that a lot of content is rewritten in some parts. You go to a conference where lots of experts gather and start talking on a topic, and for sure multiple ideas will pop-up and at least 5 people will write about what was discussed. Each has a unique style, but inevitably some ideas will be similar.

What this means for SEO: Tremendously. If you are using article spinning techniques, you are putting your website in danger. Instead, if you're trying to offer valuable content and write content for the content marketers, you must keep up with it. There is a high competition out here, you must have information that educates the audience and offers engaging content.

What to do: Don't write what is already there. Make it personal and talk from your experience.

6. Context Is the New Era of SEO

A new content marketing trend is embracing the content culture and the knowledge-sharing industry. It is about the patents that talk about context and how search will change its form. The trend started with the saying "context is king." After all the time we heard content is king, now the times changed and a new concept will rule the whole kingdom.

Google's attention on the user intent when searching started to have a high significance because context is something beyond keywords. Now, Google is trying to focus on user intent to offer more accurate and personalized results.

What to do: Focus on lots of other indicators, besides keywords. We need to create a relationship between terms and concepts in content. For example, if we are writing about "Volleyball rules," then you need to think of all the keywords and phrases that are related to your topic and include them there. Make sure you think of the users' intent. What are they trying to find out? What are their questions? And try to offer responses in a friendly tone.

The content must answer to the title. You should use synonyms of your title, and not repeat the focus keyword hundreds of times.

7. Influencer Marketing Has More Power

Influencer marketing is a popular tactic and a growing trend. According to a study by Nielsen, 83% of consumers trust recommendations from their peers over advertising. People trust recommendations from individuals over brands.

Moreover, Celebrity Intelligence conducted a study where they saw that the ROI generated by influencer marketing is 11x times higher than banner ads. Another study says that influencer marketing yields a $6.50 return on investment for every dollar spent.

What this means for SEO: SEO can have a lot to gain from the influencer marketing trend because you can create articles and content to support your campaign and explain what you did and create a story around it. Not to mention, if you have an innovative idea, you can create word-of-mouth and lots of links will "flood" your backlink profile.

8. Full Transparency for a Better Customer Experience

The Global Trust in Advertising survey by Nielsen shows that Europe has the lowest trust rate in advertising compared with the other continents. That explains, on the other side, the reason of the GDPR existence. This change can improve people's trust and create a better world on the web.

The EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) created a lot of fuss. Lots of webmasters sent emails to users to give their consent to continue using the website.

What this means for SEO: Customers expect transparency and feel safe knowing what information you are using, whom you give it to and what they can share or not. A very interesting approach is the content experience approach. When creating your content strategy, you need to think that your audience will interact with you in different ways, through different channels and formats, all elements of a bigger experience.

9. Video Content Is the Most Preferred Type of Content

As you probably expected, video consumption has tremendously increased in volume in the last year and it's one of those content marketing trends that is here to last. Here are some interesting stats:

YouTube has over a billion users, almost one-third of total internet users
87% of online marketers use video content (OutBrain)
Having a video on a landing page can increase conversion by 80% (EyeView)
51% of marketing professionals worldwide name video as the content format with the best ROI (Insivia)

What this means for SEO: Video content has become the most preferred forms of content. According to a study by Outbrain, 86% of marketers prefer video and livestream, instead of blog posts, slideshows, articles or others.

What to do: If you're a Facebook user or Twitter user, create video content there and share it with your target audience. Make sure your video has a high quality and the message is easy to understand. Use live videos. They are so popular right now. When you post a live video as a brand on Facebook, it automatically sends a notification to all of your fans.

10. Native Advertising Is Rising Rapidly

Native advertising is known to take the lead and grow faster in the years that will come. It's one of the content marketing trends you can't ignore. A research by Native Advertising Institute says that more publishers are adopting native advertising. 51% of them already have. 82% are positive toward native advertising.

What this means for SEO: All these numbers can work very well for you and can bring you revenue if you decide to use a native advertising campaign. There are platforms that can help you share high-quality content and increase the number of traffic through content amplification.

Example: CNN used a native advertising campaign that helped them increase their revenue by 60%.

11. Bite-Sized Content Revolution

The length of a piece of content has always been a topic of discussion. Bite-sized content changed the way we consume media. We are bombarded with information from lots of channels and our attention span has changed because of that. We can get easily distracted.

Twitter revolutionized the way information was distributed. You had a limitation of 140 characters so that tweets could fit into single SMS messages. The way we write and use social media marketing to share information changed the way we read and consume content, as well.

What this means for SEO: Bite-sized content has lots of advantages such as fighting against boredom, and it is easier to remember because it is the essential, and it is adaptable to the readers. It works very well for those who are avid users of social networks and newsreaders.

What to do: Follow the "bite-sized content" trend if you want to attract other categories of readers. Try to cover the news and other information that is fresh, by offering more value and more information in an easy-to-read article.

Expert Perspectives

Industry experts have weighed in on the shifting content marketing landscape:

"Great content! I like to read suggestions that don't impact SEO directly but have so much impact in the long run," comments Dennis Adriaansen. "I mean, personalized content doesn't boost SEO rankings. But it indeed boosts user engagement. Engaged fans will share more and even link to it when they can!"

Ryan Byrd adds: "Terrific post. I love the concept of the 'bite-sized content' so often we go for the long and informed but it can be too much."

Conclusion

Content marketing is a changing industry just like any other. We were witnesses at the video content that changed the rules of how we see content nowadays, becoming at one point of the most preferred type of content. Influencer marketing comes quickly in the forefront and if you use the right influencer and concept you have a high chance to craft great content around it and create word-of-mouth that will mean: brand awareness, more content, higher visibility, and increased traffic.

The content marketing trends focus will fall on the personalization, context and natural language in your articles. Everybody is looking for experiences. That's one of the reasons why native advertising has increased so rapidly and will grow even higher.

The recommendations from our article will help you get started with making your content trend-approved. Kick your marketing approach a notch. Follow the guidelines and implement a better content strategy to achieve your marketing goals. Investing in content is better when you're thinking smart and strategic. Content marketing trends can show some directions.