Digital Trends for 2022 - Futuresoft Lunch & Learn

Lunch & Learn
Digital Trends in 2022
By Nkemdilim Uwaje Begho
www.futuresoft-ng.com

1. The Evolution of Digital Marketing
2. Digital Customer Experiences X Data Driven Strategies
3. Strategic Content Marketing - PR, Thought Leadership
and SEO
4. Mixed Reality is the New Reality
5. The Talent War is just beginning…
Overview

1. The Evolution of Digital
Marketing
Cross Generational Marketing, The Digital
Commerce Evolution, Digital Support

Cross Generational Marketing
Gen Zers are growing up are and are seen as the trendsetters with
enough influence to control consumer behavior and create cultural
shifts. This segment should be on the radar of any consumer focused
brand that is looking to stay relevant in the future.
The Evolution of Digital Marketing
● Brands that have people of all ages in their target market, must
cater to the different generations and their preferences when it
comes to messaging, visuals, content and channels.
● Retro Content is taking center stage → brands are leveraging
cross generational nostalgia
Gen Z Oldest Gen Zers are 24 this year
Millennials Oldest Millennials are 40 this year
Gen X Gen Xers are in their prime working years and earn way more
than any other generation.
Baby Boomers Baby Boomers are getting ready for retirement or are already
retired

The Digital Commerce Evolution
Digital is fast becoming the biggest sales channel for most retail brands
and the way we sell has evolved and is continuing to change.
● Digital Commerce experiences are evolving and are helping
brands increase reach, influence purchasing decisions and build
loyalty and trust
○ Livestream shopping
○ Social commerce
○ Mixed reality experiences
○ Influencer marketing and influencer commerce
● Customer experience becomes even more important than the
actual product or service
○ Customer support and consumer education is paramount
○ Speed for the win: Response times and Delivery timelines can
set you apart

Digital Support
As consumers are evolving, it is no longer enough just to list a customer
support email on your social media and call it a day. Customers expect
help and answers in a blink, and your support channels and support
team need to be set up in a way that they can respond with valuable
feedback at the speed of light.
● Digital Customer support will expand beyond answering basic
queries to using DMs, chatbots, providing personalized advice,
and more
● Increasing DM interactions on social and messaging platforms will
help solve issues faster - this means having a digitally savvy, well
oiled and well trained customer service team behind your
channels.
● Proactive customer engagement is key in identifying customer
experience bottle necks, customer service issues as well as
product issues.

Recommendations
● The current marketing landscape demands innovation and testing
→ develop an agile approach to marketing in 2022
● Invest in social listening to understand trends and in cross
generational marketing strategies that are supported by unique
customer experience and content (types and formats) for each
generation
● Invest in the changing face of E-Commerce and optimise your
E-Commerce experience, channels, customer support and
turnaround time
● Digitalise your entire E-Commerce value chain and ensure that the
customer experience is supported by content, agility, ease of use
and a human touch
● Make support channels valuable, easily accessible and frictionless
→ explore platforms like Discord

2. Digital Customer
Experiences X Data
Driven Strategies
Consumer 4.0, Interconnected Experiences,
Conversations, Humanisation &
Personalisation

Consumer 4.0
Consumer 4.0 demands a more digitized communication and a
deeper relationship with your brand, while having a belief driven
purchasing mindset….
● More important than having a digital presence is using the
appropriate platforms to communicate with your target audience
● Product and service are no longer the exclusive focus of the
business relationship
○ Your Brand: Brand identity and brand personality matter
○ Your Values: Alignment on values and thought is important
○ Consumer Involvement: More than just purchase-centric
relationships: Consumers want to be part of the decision
making and not just consume
○ Community: Consumers want to belong to a community and
get added value by making a purchase
Digital Customer Experiences X Data Driven Strategies

Interconnected Experiences
Whether online or offline, the consumer is expecting a frictionless
customer experience that fits into their day to day / lifestyle
● Frictionless Customer Experience is key → good reviews, quality in
all areas, agility, speed, ease of the customer journey, multiple
contact, information, purchase and support channels
● Interconnected means that we must analyse how people go
about buying things in this digitally integrated world and tailor our
customer journeys accordingly → The whole ecosystem
surrounding purchase decisions must be taken into consideration
when creating interconnected experiences
● In the interconnected context, the questions to ask are
○ What's our customer-experience strategy?
○ Who owns it?
○ How do data and insights support it?

Conversations, Humanisation & Personalisation
CX must focus on service, not sales, orchestrate engagement, not
campaigns and must be human and personalised.
● Communication is no longer one way → consumers want to be
heard and want to influence product development →
Conversations have to happen - Brands have to engage
● Consumers want brands that are human, brands that care, brands
that support causes, brands that celebrate their own, brands that
showcase the humans behind them, brands that engage with
their stakeholders and communities they operate in.
● Data Plays a big role in knowing your customer → Out with
generic, in with segmentation and personalisation
● The technology used is secondary and informed by the strategies,
which should be 100% data driven

Recommendations
● Review your brand identity, values, touchpoints
● Update and optimise your Buyer Personas and Customer Profiles →
Have cross generational personas and profiles
● Invest in creating value add and community around your brand
● Invest in CX Strategy and an interconnected customer journey
● Invest in reliable data that can give you consumer insights
● Engage and include your consumers in product design and
customer journey optimisation
● Humanise and Personalise your brand and your customer
experience as much as possible
● Constantly innovate around your customer experience → it may
be just the right time to hire a Chief Customer Experience Officer

3. Strategic Content
Marketing - PR, Thought
Leadership and SEO
Search Intent, Evolution of Content
Formats, Executive Profiling and
Multi-Stakeholder Management

Search Intent
SEO is evolving and becoming more human centric than algorithm
centric.
● Search intent - the reason behind a search - is now driving SEO
rankings
● Google tries to understand the reason behind search queries and
categorises them based on intent (e.g. informational query,
navigational query, transactional query or commercial
investigation query)
● Content Type, format and content angle need to be designed
and optimized with search intent in mind in order to improve
ranking
● Relevance and content will be the foundation of SEO success in
2022
Strategic Content Marketing - PR, Thought Leadership and SEO

Evolution of Content Formats
Only 19% of consumers find brand-created content authentic - this shift
towards belief-driven buying has made peer reviews and word-of-mouth
marketing more important than carefully curated feeds of a brand - It is
time to explore new content formats.
Community Content:
● User Generated Content (UGC) and Influencer content is becoming
more and more important in attracting, engaging and converting
potential customers. → The strategic role of UGC in marketing will
evolve massively in 2022.
Micro Content
● With shrinking attention spans, micro content will quickly become the
norm. Time to review your content formats and look at how you can
create bitesize content pieces that are quick and easy to consume.
Audio & Video
● Consumers have fallen in love with Live Audio and pre-recorded audio
and this won’t change and become more and more mainstream
● Video will be the primary form of marketing media being created,
followed by blogs and infographics

Executive Profiling and Multi-Stakeholder Management
With ESG (Environmental, Social, and Corporate Governance) on the
rise, stakeholder management is no longer about consumer and
shareholder communication alone and CEOs are being challenged to
engage and give the brand a face and more importantly a voice.
● Stakeholder mapping and stakeholder engagement strategies are
no longer a nice to have
● Every brand should have Messaging Pillars to shape their
communication and narrative at the executive level
● Communications departments need to focus on strategically
positioning CEOs and C-level executives for meaningful
engagement with the various stakeholder groups → executive
profiling strategies are key for any brand that wants to win when it
comes to PR, Community and Stakeholder Engagement and
thought leadership

Recommendations
● Review and optimise your content marketing strategy to ensure it
is strategically positioning your brand with regards to PR, Thought
Leadership and SEO
● Ensure that you understand the search intent of your target
audience and develop content in line with it
● Understand the audience that is already posting about you and
analyse what they post about in order to leverage UGC at scale
● Engage the community by sharing, reposting and mentioning
people who post about you or by sponsoring conversations in your
niche
● Invest in micro content as well as video and audio content and
position yourself for strategic content partnerships that can drive
your content distribution
● Invest in stakeholder mapping, stakeholder engagement
strategies and executive profiling strategies

4. Mixed Reality is the
New Reality
Hybrid Experiences , XR (AR & VR) - Immersive
Reality, The Metaverse (Web3.0, Crypto, NFTs)

Hybrid Experiences
Whether at work, events, conferences or in retail - when it comes to
engaging and communicating with your consumers and stakeholders,
hybrid is here to stay.
● All events and interactions must be designed with hybrid in mind
● Hybrid events have the ability to create truly transformative and
experiences and significantly increase your reach as they allow
people from all over the world to participate.
● Hybrid allows you to increase lead generation and creates
content that can be repurposed into various formats and can
become the foundation of your content marketing strategy.
● Data and Insights will be what drive decision making and trends
around Hybrid experiences
Mixed Reality is the New Reality

XR (AR & VR) - Immersive Reality
As generational marketing becomes more relevant, so does immersive
reality - Neo Consumers (Consumer 5.0) are influenced by interactive
digital TV and immersive reality - a reality where technology enables
the replication of the human senses in simulated spaces.
● Commerce will be completely disrupted by immersive reality
● AR and VR are becoming a core part of the customer experience
as well as institutional learning and development
● Gamifying the in-store experience with social apps will redefine
retail commerce in the coming years → campaigns needs to be
true to your brand identity and also resonate with your audience,
providing them with some value and not just focus on selling.

The Metaverse (Web3.0, Crypto, NFTs)
The Metaverse has gone mainstream and a huge shift is happening,
which will impact your Digital strategy in many ways.
● Especially retail and luxury brands are quickly finding their place in
the Metaverse and are finding ways to connect with Consumer 5.0
and any other early adopters
● Ethereum is going to be what will drive and develop the App store
of the future
● NFTs are not just digital art, but are playing a huge role for brands
when it comes to loyalty rewards in retail or for exclusivity in the
luxury segment
● There is a growing talent shortage around Web 3.0

Recommendations
● Embrace Hybrid and build winning strategies around your event
marketing and lead generation
● Invest in mixed reality experiences especially if Consumer 5.0 is the
next frontier
● Invest in developing expertise in everything Metaverse
● Invest in creating a Metaverse strategy
● Invest in talent development and acquisition to ensure you have
the right skills required to build mixed reality experiences
● Involve your consumers and build experiences with their feedback

5. The Talent War is just
beginning…
An Employees Market with Global
Opportunities, Hybrid Work, New
Occupations and a growing Talent Gap

An Employees Market with Global Opportunities
It’s an employees market - especially in the digital space with a
widening talent gap.
● For the first time in decades, bargaining power is shifting from
companies to employees
● Virtual jobs allow job seekers to apply for global roles - location is
no longer a defining factor → global opportunities come with pay
in forex and often more exciting projects to work on
● Employees are moving from rigid corporates to agile and more
flexible startups with exciting and fun cultures that foster growth
and innovation
● Culture, flexibility and value adds offered carry more weight than
job title or pay
● 4 day work weeks are becoming a thing on the global stage
● Retaining employees has become harder than ever and this trend
will continue especially for highly skilled tech talent
The Talent War is just beginning…

Hybrid Work
Many teams are not willing to go back to 100% physical and People
and Culture teams all over the world are trying to strike a balance that
makes sense for both employees and companies.
● Research shows that almost half of employees (47%) would likely
look for a job if their employer doesn’t adopt a flexible working
model.
● Hybrid is here to stay - having rigid and forceful back to the office
policies will increase your attrition rates
● Hybrid models need to be tailored to the strategic goals and
needs of the business as well as include key culture enforcing
activities as well as learning and development initiatives.
● Big Tech is supporting hybrid work with WFH and home workspace
allowances
● HR / People and Culture teams are juggling more than they ever
have and are in dire need to be re-trained and re-tooled

New Occupations and a growing Talent Gap
Meta is creating 10,000 new jobs across Europe to build the metaverse
- many of these are jobs with new and never before existing job titles
and job descriptions. Even with this by 2030 there will be a deficit of 85
million tech workers if there isn’t a strategic intervention.
● People and Culture teams need to have strategic digital focused
recruitment and retention strategies, which means that they need
to have digitally savvy and future proof people in their team
● To survive in 2022 innovation and agility must be second nature →
Roles will evolve, new roles will be created and cultures must
become more agile and more focused on future proofing the
organisation

Recommendations
● Re-evaluate working conditions, policies and any rigid structures
you may have when it comes to people and culture
● Build a brand that attracts talent: flexibility, value add, alignment
in values, learning and growth opportunities are often more
important than pay → employee experience is just as important as
customer experience
● Invest in building a sustainable talent pipeline by investing in giving
junior talent opportunities to get experience and grow (internship
and graduate trainee programs)
● Learning and Development must be driven by innovation and
future proofing strategies
● Review the structure of your HR / People & Culture teams and
ensure a digitally savvy person who understands your overall future
proofing strategy is included.
● Continuous training of people and Culture leaders and their teams
is an investment not a cost centre

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