Presented with a list of digital-related opportunities and asked to name the three most exciting for their organizations this year, 43% of digital marketers pointed to mobile optimization, according to [download page] a new Econsultancy study produced in association with Adobe. Mobile optimization – which the report refers to in part as the need to make every digital experience work well on any device in any location – took top honors from last year’s leader, social media engagement, which tumbled from 54% to 35% of respondents.ÂÂ
Targeting and personalization, a new option this year, actually tied with social media engagement for second place on the list, with 35% seeing it as top-3 exciting digital opportunity this year. While a couple of areas besides mobile optimization moved up the excitement scale among marketers this year – content marketing (30% vs. 18% in 2012) and marketing automation (23% vs. 11%) – several dropped off. Those include content optimization (27%, down from 37%), brand building/viral marketing (18% vs. 27%), video marketing (18% vs. 24%), and social media analytics (14% vs. 19%).
For the most part, the areas that dropped off in terms of excitement are also being seen as lesser priorities this year. That list includes content optimization, brand building/viral marketing, video marketing, and social media analytics, each of which were less likely to be perceived as exciting or a priority this year. Interestingly, while twice as many respondents this year see marketing automation as an exciting area, the proportion who cited it as a top-3 priority this year actually decreased. Conversely, fewer find conversion rate optimization exciting, but more indicated it to be a top priority.
About the Data: The 8th Quarterly Digital Intelligence Briefing is based on an online survey of more than 700 client-side (53%) and agency (47%) respondents, carried out in October 2012. 60% are based in the UK, while 46% are B2C-focused, 32% B2B-focused, and the remainder equally focused on both.
