When it comes to using audio online to market your business, it’s important to be aware of the trends and to try to predict what will be important in the future – as well as keeping your ear to the ground about what is important today. Sometimes predictions become true and sometimes something else happens. But, if you are mostly prepared you can change on the fly as needed to accommodate new trends. Here are nine trends to watch for in 2015.

1. Providing More Value for Less Will Become More Important – Consumers are very interested in getting a lot of value for their dollar, as always. But, when it comes to audio they’re becoming accustomed to high quality productions. Thankfully, the technology to produce high quality and provide value to your audience isn’t expensive. The most expensive thing you might purchase is a good microphone.

2. Producing Customer-Centric Audio Products Will Increase – More consumers will want to listen to audio products over reading print products. They can listen while doing other activities and most people enjoy doing more than one thing at a time these days, such as driving and listening.

3. Importance of Online Communities will Increase – With the advent of Facebook groups, smart business owners are harnessing the power of online communities. Starting forums and private membership sites in which to distribute your audio to your audience is an excellent way for a business owner to get the interest of their audience.

4. Acknowledging Mobile Influence on Audio – There is no doubt that mobile is a huge game change for everyone who has an online business or wants to market their business online. Now mobile cannot be an afterthought, it has to be part of the plan.

5. Podcasting Will Become More Prevalent – Due to the fact that the technology is getting less expensive and the barriers to entry have lessened, more business owners will engage in podcasting as a way to distribute information to their audience members.

6. Provide Free and Paid Content that Work Well Together – As the future comes upon us, smart business owners will need to find ways to incorporate both paid and free content for their audience to digest. For example, you might have a few free podcasts for your website visitors to listen to, but then direct them to iTunes to find more.

7. Need for More Original Audio Content Will Increase – As the audience gets used to fresh content, the demand will become even greater for even more content. The audience is truly insatiable, which is why you have to always be on the lookout for ways to create more content.

8. Quality Will Become More Important as Competition Increases – As more business owners enter the audio marketing channel, your audio products need to increase in quality in order to compete. Invest in the right tools, and try to produce professional results.

9. Teleseminars Will Continue Being Popular – Even with the popularity of webinars, teleseminars are still very popular and will continue to be popular ways to get a lot of information out to many people at one time.

Watch out for these trends in 2015 for when it comes to audio marketing for business owners. What trends do you think will become important as time moves forward?