Farewell and good riddance 2020. The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has upended how Asia businesses operate. The world of digital marketing continues to evolve. It goes without saying that as a savvy marketer, keeping up with the digital trends is part of the trade. Whether you are considering to engage and retain current customers and generate more traffic, leads, and revenue, attending digital marketing events in Asia is a great way to stay ahead of your industry.

From a digital marketing standpoint, what are the big waves in Asia marketing? Let’s explore the 6 Asia digital marketing trends that could get a bigger bang for your business in 2021.

6 Must Know Asia Digital Marketing Trends in 2021

1. Voice search is a digital marketing norm in Asia

Voice search is a technology that allows users to perform searches on the Internet using voice commands. As a result of the advancement of speech recognition technology, this function has become a new way to query on the Internet in Asia.

Ever since Apple revolutionized voice search technology with Siri in 2011, people have used voice search to provide them with almost all assistance: check the weather, play music, call someone, set alarms and indicate directions. As more and more users in Asia prefer using voice instead of text when searching, voice search becomes the next frontier of SEO in Asia digital marketing.

Asian digital marketers should pay attention to the voice search trend and choose SEO-optimized keywords that are compatible with what people use to ask virtual assistants. According to Google’s CEO Sundar Pichai, content must be specifically optimized for voice. Staying relevant and more visible to consumers will help increase traffic.Text-based search might soon become a thing of the past, and that’s why Asian digital marketers should care for both voice and text search for keyword optimization, so as to increase traffic and visibility.

2. Asia mobile commerce market

Mobile commerce is the natural development of e-commerce in Asia digital marketing. According to Research and Markets.com, the Asia-Pacific mobile payment market in 2019 was US$559.29 billion and is expected to reach US$207.42 billion by 2025, with a compound annual growth rate of 23.91% during the forecast period. This shows the huge potential of mobile commerce in Asia digital market.    

Due to the coronavirus outbreak, mobile commerce has evolved rapidly in Asia, consumers are less inclined to shop in-store and rely more on mobile phones or tablets for their purchases.They can shop in mobile apps, social media platforms, company mobile commerce websites and shopping ads. This already contributes to the growth of existing industries and digital services, including: digital content purchase and delivery, mobile remittance, mobile banking, mobile marketing, location-based services, coupons and membership cards.    

Retail e-commerce market volume in Southeast Asia from 2019 to 2020 with a forecast for 2025, by country
Source: https://www.statista.com/statistics/647645/southeast-asia-ecommerce-market-size-country/

Mobile internet user penetration in the Asia Pacific region from 2018 to 2019 with a forecast for 2025
Source: https://www.statista.com/statistics/201232/forecast-of-mobile-internet-penetration-in-asia-pacific/

Benefits of Asia mobile commerce:

2.1. Approach your potential customers anytime, anywhere

Whether used for mobile search or social media, mobile commerce platforms enable brands to time their ads. Digital marketers can reach customers during their morning commutes, lunch breaks and even during downtimes. Optimizing content for mobile devices means you can reach your consumers at all times, even while on the go.

2.2. Omni-channel experience

An omnichannel experience is that the store can sell both online and offline, or through multiple online channels. Mobile commerce can make contextual commerce easier, and it is a more strategic embodiment of universal omnichannel.

2.3. Fast and convenient online payment    

The emergence of mobile commerce provides customers with truly diversified payment options. Mobile commerce has adopted mobile wallets, and customers can achieve one-click checkout in online stores. When shopping at the new online store for the first time, there is no need to manually enter your credit card and shipping details again.    

3. Shoppable posts reach a new era in Asia

Compared with independent ecommerce sites, shoppable posts make it even easier to purchase products online. There’re not as many items shown on the social media post to dazzle customers, and customers can easily click the shopping icon of any product displayed and go directly to the checkout. Purchase is done without leaving the app.

With the wide range of digital marketing platforms in Asia, such as Instagram, Facebook, YouTube and Pinterest, Xiaohongshu etc. companies can maximize their conversions and ecommerce influences on multiple platforms.

Tips for using shoppable posts in Asia digital marketing

3.1. Use shoppable tags to encourage sales

Shoppable tags can help companies get more results from their shoppable posts. These tags contain the name and price of the product as product descriptions and post with attractive images. When you post a photo with a product tag, you can allow anyone who views the photo to directly view the product, without having to visit your profile twice and find the link in bio. This is a great way to draw the attention of time-critical social media users.

3.2. Narrate your brand story well on social media

Brainstorm your stories or narratives, as long as they are consistent with your brand and are authentic. By incorporating stories into your social media marketing strategy, you will be able to attract consumers in a natural and responsive way.

3.3. Listen to the data

What digital marketers should always do when managing the shoppable posts is access account analysis. Make the most of this data because it can provide valuable insights to understand which posts are best for your brand. If you find that a particular format works well, you can use it more frequently to encourage interaction and conversion.

4. Rise of chatbots in Asia

A chatbot is an artificial intelligence designed to simulate communication with customers. Customers can directly interact with chatbots through chat windows, messaging or voice applications. There’re basically two types of chatbots, namely Flow chatbot and AI chatbot. Flow chatbot is a tree-based model that users will be guided to follow a predetermined path defined by the developer. AI chatbots are self-trained, they can generate a backlog of knowledge based on the information they receive from interacting with customers.

Many brands in Asia have already been using chatbots to manage calls, frequently asked questions and other common customer service inquiries, providing a fast and engaging customer experience. The robot uses artificial intelligence to search a large amount of information instantly and accurately to select the most relevant answer for consumers, creating immediate replies and save time for brands on other business developments.

Benefits of using chatbot in Asia digital marketing

4.1. 24/7 service

Chatbots can run 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, and they can serve your customers even when you are sleeping or performing other tasks.

4.2. Increase your sales   

In a recent experiment conducted by HubSpot, using “form” to test out the path in Facebook Messenger, the cost of lead was found to be reduced by 477%. Incredibly, when using Facebook Messenger as a Content Delivery Channel. The Facebook Messenger broadcasts had an average open rate of 80% and an average CTR of 13%. That was 242% and 609% better than their email controls, respectively. Not bad for free bot integration.    

4.3. Immediate response

Contemporary consumers aspire to immediate results and rely on businesses that can be delivered in time. A study on the user experience of chatbots found that as long as they get quick help, 40% of consumers don't care whether the answer is from human or robot.    

4.4. Save cost and time    

Consumers are not the only one who benefit from chatbots. As companies can quickly resolve basic customer queries, they can save the cost of customer service. In addition, PWC research shows that 34% of business executives said that using chatbots can reduce workload and allow them to focus on creating new business ideas.    

5. Create a balanced Asia social media mix

Active social media user penetration APAC 2020 by country or region
Source: https://www.statista.com/statistics/255235/active-social-media-penetration-in-asian-countries/

There is a significant overlap between the audiences of each social platform. To maximize digital marketing effectiveness, Asia digital marketers should select and focus on not more than 5 popular social media so as to utilize all of them.

How to balance a social media mix in Asia digital market?

5.1. Define the role of your social media channels for your customer path 

Because of the large audience overlap between these platforms, portfolio opportunities are more about the potential to attract existing audiences in new situations, rather than the potential to attract new audiences. Therefore, focus on organic social media on fewer, bigger, and better platforms to get the most rewards.    

5.2. Identify the most popular social media platforms in a specific target audience    

Social media platform preferences do vary by location, age and gender, which you can find insights on AsiaPac. Consider the contextual relevance of each platform and its relationship with the various marketing content you publish. In fact, it is worth A/B testing a few different platforms to see which one is best for your specific needs, and focus on the most effective ones.    

6. Asia Martech

Martech is a combination of "marketing" and "technology", meaning to use digital technologies to optimize the work of marketing . The rise of Asia digital marketing technology can contribute to a wide range of digital marketing areas, including but not limited to digital analytics, customer relationship and media management. With Martech being able to use technology and data to serve the right consumers more easily and accurately, it’s time for Asia digital marketers to step up their digital marketing game.    

Six areas of Martech in Asia market    

Asia digital marketing technology solutions are roughly divided into six main areas, including advertising, content and experience, community relations, commercial sales, data applications and management.    

6.1. Digital asset management    

Digital asset management helps organizations to create, manage and organize digital media assets such as ad banners, videos and documents. They often have search and filter functions. Bynder and Canto are some of the tools in the industry.    

6.2.Content management    

A content management system, a.k.a. CMS, is a software which manages customer experience or web experience. Famous examples are WordPress, Drupal and Joomla.    

6.3. Social media management    

Social media management helps companies to streamline the social media routine, from scheduling posts to tracking performance and competitor benchmarking. Examples are Hootsuite, Zoho Social and SEMrush.    

6.4. Customer relationship management    

A customer relationship management tool helps companies store and manage contact info, accounts, leads, and sales opportunities, in one central location. Examples are Salesforce and Freshworks.    

6.5. Marketing automation    

Artificial intelligence and big data are booming, and many softwares focus on data-driven marketing. Marketing automation simply is the science to use digital technology to automate marketing activities. For example, use AI to organize customer data and deliver the most relevant content at the right time; it can also be applied to chatbots that interact with customers in real time, and personalized e-commerce product recommendations, and many more.    

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6.6. Digital analytics

Choosing the right marketing analytics tools will help digital marketers measure data correctly and optimize marketing efforts. It will make the difference between failing to reach marketing goals.    

Summary

So far, the Asia digital marketing trend of 2021 seems to revolve around six distinct concepts. Make good use of these 6 Asia digital marketing trends to provide you with opportunities to stay ahead of your competitors. If you feel overwhelmed by its extensive marketing services and are not sure where to start digital marketing in Asia, then at AsiaPac, we have a team of experienced Asia digital marketing experts who provide the most digital marketing solutions to cater your needs. Click here to get a free proposal now!

About AsiaPac Net Media

With an extensive digital marketing experience of serving more than 2,500 clients across Asia in sectors such as education, travel and hospitality, finance, Government and others, AsiaPac’s expert team is highly recognized for the excellence in providing performance-driven services to businesses across Asia, and global corporates targeting Asia markets. If you’d like to learn more about AsiaPac and the work we’ve done, visit our Work page. For more information on AsiaPac/ AdTech and our services, please contact us at info@asiapac.com.hk /info@adtechinno.com.