Episode 19 – 2016’s Technology, Design, and Marketing in Review

The Digital Natives Cast kicks off the new year with a special episode where our host Matt reviews some of the biggest trends of the prior year. This week’s episode is broken into three segments; technology, design, and marketing with a special review of the best marketing campaigns in 2016.

The Future of Digital Natives [1:00]
Technology [2:30]
Design [11:00]
Marketing [13:42]

Technology; The Year of Automation and Artificial Intelligence

Over the past year, one of the biggest advancements have been in the areas of automation and artificial intelligence. As an avid lover of those two particular subjects, Matt breaks down some of the greatest inventions, innovations, and leaders in the realm of technology.

“I would first reference Elon Musk and the things he’s doing with his companies. He’s one of the people that have really pushed automation and AI forward in 2016” -Matt
“One area we always talk about is the use and implementation of personal assistants and they’ve changed the way we do a lot of things.” -Matt
“Marketing has changed a lot because of personal AI assistants because it’s increased the likelihood of impulse buys in products.” -Matt
“I had the opportunity to attend a conference where a speaker talked about Chatbots. He was saying he ran an A/B test comparing email open rates of around 25% to Facebook Chatbot open rates around 80%.” -Matt

Design; The Year of Minimalism and Mobile Extremism

Automation and AI have had a huge impact on design in 2016; in a way, it’s pushed the trends from 2015 into an extreme state. Because of necessity to create content that’s understandable by AI, minimalism continues to be a big trend while the mobile craze has almost gone to an extreme state according to Matt.

“Material design gained some major momentum in 2016 because of the emphasis on minimalism.” -Matt
“We’ve also seen a resurgence of retro designs using geometric objects, bright colors, and very simple patterns.” -Matt
“One of the biggest changes in design in 2016 was facilitated by The Accelerated Mobile Platform which was implemented in 2016 but will be fully utilized in 2017.” -Matt
“Design is shifting to a user experience emphasis, yes it may look beautiful but does it make sense?” -Matt

Marketing; The Year of User Experience and Targeted Advertisement

While Matt spoke about user experience in terms of design, he believes that it had its largest impact on marketing. User Experience is now driving the way we create ads, websites, and mobile apps more than ever before and it’s something that’s being too commonly overlooked.

“Targeted advertising has been going on forever but the tools to do it are now being made available to everyone.” -Matt
“The next stage of targeted advertising, and what will be big in 2017 is native advertising which is the idea of putting an advertisement in an area or space that it doesn’t stick out” -Matt
“If you want to beat the algorithms and have everything that you post be seen, post live videos endlessly, on every platform.” -Matt
“On Facebook, out of 100 followers; 20 will see a text post, between 30 and 40 will see a picture, 45 to 55 people will see a video, and between 60 and 70 will see a live video.” -Matt

2016; The Year of Weird Stuff in Advertising

To wrap things up for this week’s episode, Matt takes some time to look back at some his favorite ad campaigns of 2016. In summary, we can all probably agree with his thoughts that 2016 has been a weird year in advertising but it’s been working for some major brands!

#1 – Deadpool Movie Ad Campaign

#2 – Spotify Billboards Ads

#3 – Puppy Monkey Super Bowl Baby Video

#4 – Morton Salt and OK Go music video

#5 – YouTube Rewind Year in Review

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