Many trends emerged in 2016, but what will 2017 bring?

by Nevine Adel

What is 2017 carrying for online marketers and what are the latest technologies that shall revolutionize the way online strategists work?

chart-by-smart-insight

Connecting the dots in the Digital Era

Last week we had our Online content creators meetup #OCCEgypt where we digged deeper in the latest digital media trends for the year 2017, Media professionals, as well as digital marketing experts, shared their thoughts on what the industry can expect This meetup comes aligned in a series of meetups previously held by InsideOut Today, to bring together all the community of online content creators in Egypt

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Our own Fady Ramzy InsideOut Today CEO Summarised  to the attendees how next generation technologies are changing our behaviors online as following:

The next decade is data “Content Organization is the new SEO”

big-data

  1. He advised attendees to build their own online identity (blogs, websites, portals) using WordPress as it is the world’s most popular & most used CMS
  2. And he explained to attendees how to  structure their content on WordPress using open data technology such as Wordlift
  3. He discussed the Online Video Revolution and the importance of native videos “it’s must now to optimize your videos for each platform, each Video Platform Needs its Own Story Telling Strategy“
  4. Fady explained all about chatbots and how it can transform the way we interact with the internet “Chatbots will drive 85% of customers interactions by 2020” so Let’s build the bot here “Chatbots are a game changer for early adopters”
  5. Fady highlighted the Rise of AR/VR “While virtual reality is once again a hot topic … 2017 will really be the year of AR expecting to see more brands coming out with AR games, AR ads, and attempts to capitalize on AR apps that already exist
  6. Live Video Streaming Will Fully Take Off “considering that Facebook started last year by paying media companies $50 million to produce live videos on its platform, it’s clear that the popularity of live-streaming is growing”
  7. Voice search is a fast-growing technology which may change the way we use search engines and have an impact over their algorithms. In 2016, Google declared that 20% of mobile searches were conversational and according to ComScore, voice search will keep on growing, covering at least 50% of all searches by 2020 – How can a website get ready for voice search? Read more here

And here is Fady’s presentation about Digital Media Trends in 2017

Where is the media & online marketing business heading towards in 2017 in Egypt

This was the second part of the meetup, a very interesting Panel Discussion took place where Media Professionals from Radio, Tv, and Journalists shared their thoughts and experience about the online journalism & digital media business in Egypt

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Major Challenges highlighted for the Media and News Industry in Egypt discussed at the Panel Discussion:

Lina Ghadban Independent Journalist said:

  • TV production is controlled 100% by Advertising
  • There’s a big lack of Investigative films due to the high cost of production and lack of resources
  • When it comes to media and news industry, quality control and credible sources is a big challenge

Enas Tharwat Radio and TV Presenter at Radio Masr said:

  • The Online Radio market is constantly evolving, listeners have a multitude of options and therefore won’t invest their time listening to a station that doesn’t provider rich and attractive content
  • Social media marketing: Many Online News Channels are lacking the concept of being effective on social media they use content Quantity over Quality”

Rana Ashraf Video Producer and Journalist said:

  • Lack of awareness, lack of information and lack of trainings is a major Challenge “Employees are Lacking the Awareness and proper training’s Needed to do their job”
  • Some TV stations that are available online, they don’t have a clear, integrated digital marketing strategy

Rawan Lasheen Video Journalist and producer said:

  • Social Media is reshaping traditional Media “it is now the biggest source of news, people are creating the news on social media and accordingly, Media discuss and distribute it”

Radwa El Torify Content Producer at CBC Said:

  • Live videos create higher engagement on social media
  • Media and News publishers in Egypt didn’t adopt yet to the Digital Revolution

How Media and News Publishers in Egypt can Plan for their Marketing efforts for the year 2017:

Going digital is about a whole digitally immersive experience and this should be done through the following:

  • Focusing on Video content variety as well as quality audience and exclusive experience!
  • Investing in professional high quality live video streaming, especially in terms of content quality to maximize the live engagement over social media.
  • Hiring Digital Media professionals and providing the proper training, tools , and vision
  • Building a strong digital marketing plan that includes content creation & management,  and also how to best leverage on social networks for distribution.
  • Awareness on how to implement effectively the digital strategy is very important because building the plan without knowing how to implement it leads to the failure of the marketing efforts
  • How to measure all the marketing efforts online “Assessing Performance and opportunities”

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The Meetup was attended by almost 50 persons it was super engaging and interactive and we had a little surprise for our guests at the end of the meetup and gladly we received lots of positive feedback’s after it ended

Thank you to all who attended the meetup here’s the amazing set of photo’s for #OCCEgypt  

And following the meetup we had a very Interesting Twitter Chat with Thair Soukar Head of Digital Strategy at Sky news Arabia discussing Digital Media Trends in 2017 :

How to transform, innovate and succeed in the digital Era the Must Have adaption for 2017:

  1. “Immersive Journalism” on top of the list. This includes VR/AR & 360 videos, Today’s journalists have to be multimedia producers. Their output has to be cross-platform catering for all types of users
  2. Other trends include, programmatic ads, inbound marketing, social/live, video graphics & influencer marketing “Programmatic ads are approaching search marketing capabilities in terms of performance”
  3. Trends also include chatbots. Some researches predict that messaging apps will be the new OS’s & bots will be the new apps
  4. Live is the favorite type of video “It’s currently expected that video can account for 75% of all web traffic in 2017!”
  5. We need to get journalists to embrace open data. If they appreciate its value & learn how to use it, so will the public
  6. Context is the most important thing to the use & success of open data as a tool for global change. The proper context is key
  7. For open data to work out, it needs to be made relevant to people’s daily lives, not just to NGOs & policymakers’ priorities.
  8. If a video report is worth a million words, then a VR report is worth a trillion! The latter places users at the heart of the news.

Here is the summary of the Twitter Chat #IOTTT  with Thair Soukar

To Conclude:

The Digital Marketplace is rapidly evolving. In the past, a change took place over the course of years; now, it happens within months, weeks, or days. Change is coming in a way that no one can ignore.

So adapting to the latest Digital Trends is always crucial for any business that wants to position itself advantageously and is a must for creating a competitive advantage and accordingly business growth

We would love to hear your opinion and discuss further your digital media predictions and thoughts for the year 2017! To do so, you can:

  1. Join our community & attend our upcoming meetups
  2. Contact us directly
  3. Talk to us the social media way!
 

Nevine Adel

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