
Instead of starting the year with the classical “predictions” article, I thought I’ll share with you guys my favorite stories from the last year.
January 2016: The 9 Graphic Design Trends You Need to Be Aware of In 2016
As with everything else, design trends don’t just appear all of a sudden, it takes time to materialize and become popular. Even if you don’t follow the trends, it’s still a good idea to know about their existence or even trying to forecast them and use them before anybody else. But, predicting design trends can be a tricky business.
In this article, you’ll see 2016’s possible graphic design trends list by the guys at Canva (every marketer’s must have design tool). See for yourself if they got them right.
February 2016: Confirmed: Google To Stop Showing Ads On Right Side Of Desktop Search Results Worldwide
February came with a big announcement from Google regarding the placement of the search ads. They finally stopped showing the Ads displayed on the right-side of the screen. The idea is to show more relevant results instead of ads (or maybe is a way to avoid the “ad blindness” phenomenon?).
March 2016: My Year In Startup Hell
This is the story of a middle-aged marketing guy of the hottest startup on the East Coast, Hubspot – the one that invented the term “inbound marketing”. Dan Lyons an ex-Newsweek journalist, with no marketing experience, embarked in this new adventure with a lot of misconceptions about the startup world. What happens next will surprise you.
Take the virtual tour of a typical (trendy) tech startups with everything from playgrounds to cafeteria and office spaces. Feel the young vibes and take a virtual walk around the offices of this, now big, company. But also find out the truth about the startup world, how the “tech industry” really works – the lesser known “behind-the-scenes”. Long story short… Dan Lyons, the journalist turned marketing guy, left the hype of the startup world one year later.
April 2016: 20+ Social Media Hacks and Tips From the Pros
In this article, you will find out how the most influential social media experts get their followers count growing like crazy in record times. Influencers like Ian Cleary the founder of RazorSocial, Mark Schaefer, Guy Kawasaki, Darren Rowse from Problogger.com share their little hacks to grow their accounts, to engage more and basically increase their social influence day by day.
You will find out how Nathan Chan’s Instagram account went from 0 to over 400 thousand followers in less than a year; How to optimize images for social media or how to create calls to action impossible to be missed by your fans.
May 2016: On-Page SEO in 2016: The 8 Principles for Success – Whiteboard Friday
If you’re into marketing I’m positive you know Rand Fishkin and his famous “Whiteboard Friday” tutorials on Moz.com. This both entertaining and educational video from May 2016 will teach you a few things about on-page SEO, the complexity levels this process reached in 2016 and how to make sure you’re set up for success.
June 2016: Artificial Intelligence is Changing SEO Faster Than You Think
We already know how fast the SEO industry is changing and how the rules you just learned to be true will no longer work in a few months.
But what happens when you also put Artificial Intelligence into the equation?
First, if you want to know how exponential growth of intelligence (aka Artificial Intelligence) works, the Tim Urban’s article on WaitButWhy.com blog is a must-read.
Then head back to the TechCrunch website to learn about all the SEO changes made by the existing artificial intelligence and some predictions for the future.
July 2016: 15 Content Marketing Trends That Need Your Close Attention
We selected this article from July 2016 because these content marketing trends are actually becoming the norm. So, if you want to create evergreen content that will drive your website traffic to the roof, you need to take a look at this article. You will learn the best ways to use content marketing automation, the mobile platform, video content and much more.
August 2016: 19 Tools to Create Social Media Content
To stay competitive in the social media landscape you also need the right tools to create and share your content. In this fast-moving environment, there is no time to waste. So if you want to make sure that your tools don’t slow you down take a look at the list from socialmediaexaminer.com. You’ll have tools for creating slides, videos, infographics, graphics and so on. It’s a quite extensive list, so I’m sure you have where to choose your favorites from.
September 2016: Who Is Louise Delage? The Troubling Truth Behind an Overnight Instagram Success
Find out who really is Lousie Delage but also learn how she came to this seemingly overnight Instagram success from 0 to over 100k followers. While the story behind her Instagram fame is touching and eye-opening, the story about how it came to be so popular and get so much engagement, likes and followers is a good marketing lesson.
You’ll learn how connecting to influencers, posting at the right times of day and using the best automation tools will grow your accounts fast. One of the best reads of 2016!
October 2016: Stop Trying to Sound Smart When You’re Writing
Are you guilty of always using the fancy-pants words? Or does your readers always complain to not quite get the message you’re trying to express in your writing? Well… you need to take a look at this article. There are some tricks to use to get your message across, to express your emotions and make your reader understand what you want them to understand. Don’t let room for interpretation.
November 2016: 24 Predictions for Social Media and Social Media Marketing in 2017
You know what happens before Christmas, New Years and all the holiday fun… the prediction posts start popping up. I think they’re fun, especially if you revisit them a year later to see how much they turned up to be true. Since 2017 just started, you can take a look on this list of predictions for the major social media platforms. You can decide for yourself which one rings true, but I think they are pointed in the right direction.
December 2016: Confessions of an Instagram Influencer
Have you ever wondered what it takes to be an Instagram influencer? What’s the actual work behind it? What’s the life of a full-time Instagrammer? Max Chafkin asked himself the same questions. So he decided to find out for himself how to become an Instagram star. He published all the details in a story for Bloomberg that’s interesting to read: from how to make the pictures to the tools he used, posting times and so on.
So if you wonder what to do to become social media famous, go ahead and read this article. I promise to you that’s a very interesting read.
These are my picks for the best articles of 2016. I hope 2017 will be as productive as 2016.
How about you? What were your favorite reads last year?
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