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Content Marketing’s importance was not limited to 2015 only; it also plays a significant role in 2016 (and will in years to come). Adjusting your strategy to evolving trends should be top of your list as content marketing is changing fast. Take a look at our overview to see which trends you should not miss this year.

Trend 1: Focus on Quality and Leave Out SEO Wisdom

As the content marketing boom creates tons of new content, users can barely process it. For this reason, the quality pressure will continue to increase in 2016. Only if you produce unique and high-quality content, will you be able to set yourself apart from the competition. Thus, it shouldn’t be your aim to cover as many topics as possible, but just the right ones.

That’s why you should publish only a few, but high-quality articles over a longer time span. Also, consider that the times of implementing certain keywords in a text as much as possible, or optimizing the keyword frequency, are over. Don’t rely on vintage SEO wisdom, as not only users, but also search engines prefer quality in posts that deal with a certain topic, and describe it in proper terms.

Trend 2: Using Facebook and Publishing More on Social Media

As social networks want to keep users on their sites, “foreign” content is a threat to them. That’s why Facebook has taken a step towards social publishing with its newest innovation, the Instant Articles – a new form of multimedia posts. Many of the large social networks will follow this example.

Instant Articles enhance your options for creating content: For example, you can create mashups from texts, videos, photos, maps, and a lot more. Instant Articles is currently in its beta stage. However, you’ll soon be able to conduct content marketing using it as well.

Facebook is also interesting for your strategy when you have customers in their prime, as the age structure is moving towards people from 25 and up.

Trend 3: Content Marketing Algorithms and Robot Journalism

The web is getting increasingly less clear due to the masses of information, which is why content marketing algorithms are being developed and improved, which can grasp the information easier, simplify it, and connect it. As the algorithms scan social profiles, they are 100% designed for users, which can give you a large advantage as a content marketer.

Due to the improvement of the content marketing algorithms, robot journalism will become increasingly more sovereign as well. These are articles written by machines. They only deal with basic topics. However, the style, as well as the information links are getting increasingly better.

Trend 4: Bank on “Mobile First”

Content marketing is still focused more on desktop users. However, the goal for 2016 should be to create your content strategy according to mobile user behavior. For that, you need detailed knowledge of how your users behave when visiting via smartphone, tablet, and other devices, and what they expect from your content in a given situation.

Trend 5: Content Becoming Even More Visual – Snapchat and Instagram

Not just because it is easier and faster to consume, visual content is extremely successful. For this reason, you should – especially when your target audience is younger – bank on Instagram and Snapchat. Besides many advertisement options that Instagram provides, the portal Snapchat allows you to swap photos among the users and share entire image series. This comes with the advantage that visual storytelling can be conducted to properly address your target audience.

(dpe)