The Future of Blogging: Integrating Personalized Digital Experiences to Drive Engagement

Blogging has come a long way from its humble “weblogging” origins in the mid-1990s. Over the years, it has evolved from posting personal observations and links to favorite websites to a powerful digital marketing engagement tool. But the evolution is far from over; in some respects, it’s just the beginning.

As consumers get more comfortable with living, playing, working, and shopping online, blogging practices must pivot to meet new needs and demands — including the integration of blogs into personalized digital experiences that drive user engagement and, ultimately, sales. Here are some digital personalization options that blogging businesses should watch for, adopt, and implement.

Using Machine Learning, Tracking Software, and Targeted Content

AI has made an enormous impact on the marketing world by helping content creators brainstorm ideas, research subject matter, and produce initial drafts of blog articles. A subset of AI known as machine learning permits AI to draw on collected information to perform with ever-increasing nuance and accuracy. Bloggers can use this technology to create more personalized content for their readers.

Other technologies can work hand-in-hand with machine learning to refine blog personalization. For instance, data from cookies and other tracking software can help bloggers understand their readers better, from their browsing history to their obvious content preferences. Machine learning can then use this data to “teach” AI programs about these trends, making it easier for AI-using bloggers to craft content that appeals to those readers’ interests.

Audience segmentation can also play a major role in creating blog content that integrates easily into a larger digital marketing strategy. This strategy involves creating modular content, with blog articles that appeal to different segments of a brand’s target market. For example, an automotive blog might feature some articles aimed at the general public, others meant to interest serious enthusiasts, and still others written for industry professions. Each of these posts would conclude with a personalized call to action (CTA) for each segment.

Plugging Blogs Into Larger Digital Marketing Strategies

A blog makes its points in isolation unless it integrates with other digital marketing strategies. A properly integrated, personalized blog can take these prospects on a journey through all the brand’s assets — with each asset reinforcing the messaging of the others.

This omnichannel approach to blogging can benefit greatly from the use of a state-of-the-art digital experience platform, or DXP. A DXP is designed to interweave multiple digital marketing technologies, sources, and tactics. Personalization, localization, e-commerce, and content management all work together in a congruent, unified manner to help businesses make the maximum impact on just the right audience.

Traditionally, DXPs have relied on cumbersome, monolithic platform structures with software that works better for a static strategy than a modern, dynamic one. The needs, options, and preferences of today’s digital media consumers are in a constant state of flux these days, making the monolithic approach largely obsolete. Composable DXP solutions emphasize dynamic scalability, connectivity, deployment, and maintenance features through microservices, API technology, cloud-native applications, and headless infrastructures for greater flexibility in channel service distribution.

Putting Digital Asset Management to Work

Digital asset management applies to blog articles as well as many other connected files and channels that a DXP might use. Companies that want to integrate their blogging efforts seamlessly into a larger digital marketing routine need to make sure that their blog content and other marketing files all reside in one secure spot, organized for easy, logical access and usability with an intuitive interface such as a web portal.

Combining Blog Text With Video

As noted above, blogging can serve as a critical piece of a larger marketing media machine. There’s no doubt that images and video, in particular, can yield spectacular viewership and conversion results. The average consumer watches about 19 hours of video each week — and 82 percent of those viewers admit to making a purchase based on what they watched.

However, businesses aren’t limited to including outbound video content links in their written blog content. While linking blog content to branded YouTube, Instagram, or TikTok videos can help boost awareness of a brand’s multiple marketing channels, bloggers can also embed video content within the body of a blog article itself.

Embedded video doesn’t just attract views on a blog; it can also make that blog’s messaging that much clearer and more effective. For example, a company that specializes in food or kitchen products might see obvious benefits from a recipe article that includes embedded video clips showing exactly how to select and prepare the various ingredients involved. In many cases, videos can promote the sheer attractiveness or convenience of specific products or services, a strategy TV commercials have used for decades with great success.

Emphasizing Quality Over Quantity

Last but not least, blogging to create a personalized digital experience tends to focus on quality as opposed to quantity. This emphasis mirrors that of Google’s algorithm of recent years, which ranks relevant, engaging content higher than generic, unhelpful content — no matter how heavily loaded with keywords the content may be. This aspect of strategic blogging may sound “old school,” but it still works. As elementary and self-evident as it may seem, better content just makes a better impression on prospective buyers.

Relevant, engaging, personalized content can make all the difference in a blog article’s bounce rate, or the rate at which viewers exit the page without absorbing the content or moving deeper into the sales funnel. Research indicates that over three-quarters of consumers actively dislike non-personalized, irrelevant content. Well-written, targeted blog posts naturally compel reader attention and interest, resulting in better audience retention. A reader who follows the post to the end will also encounter that all-important CTA that tells them what to do, from signing on for the company newsletter or contacting the company for more information to making a purchase right then and there.

In conclusion, the future looks brighter than ever for blogging as an effective marketing strategy in today’s multi-channel technological environment. By integrating blogging into the larger picture of personalized digital experiences, businesses can boost brand awareness while also increasing consumer engagement, sales, and loyalty.