This post will explain Digital Marketing Trends Keeping up with the rapid developments in the digital marketing sector can be challenging. A good digital marketing plan or campaign also involves a lot of moving components, making it difficult to stay on top of everything.
The Covid-19 pandemic changed how businesses in both B2B and B2C sectors functioned as more consumers made purchases, reviewed products, and conducted research online. The field of digital marketing as well as the jobs held by digital marketers were significantly impacted by this change. However, as marketing departments shifted to satisfy the demand from online platforms, web traffic and online revenues declined in tandem with the reopening of societies.
The Next Big Digital Marketing Trends in 2024
In this article, you can know about Digital Marketing Trends here are the details below;
We spoke with top industry experts for our podcast to help marketers and digital leaders understand this new terrain and pinpoint the major trends for 2024. This thorough rundown of six important industries will assist you in anticipating future advancements and incorporating them into your digital marketing campaigns.
1. Social Media Trends IN 2024
TikTok Will Continue to Grow & Brands Need to Take it Seriously
If you’re not using TikTok already, it’s a platform to think about while discussing social media. Due to TikTok’s phenomenal growth, the app currently boasts one billion users.
TikTok is a very engaging platform (U.S. users log in for up to 850 hours a month), and it gives users and brands the chance to have their videos go viral, which is quite an accomplishment in the social media world.
According to Avocado Social’s Social Media Consultant Alison Battisby, TikTok is a network that marketers should consider carefully in 2024. “TikTok has grown at an absolutely astounding rate in the past year. Given how many of TikTok’s features are starting to the appear in Facebook products, Facebook is the undoubtedly concerned.
With over $110 million in user spending, TikTok was the highest-earning non-gaming app on the platform in terms of revenue in 2021. This merely demonstrates the app’s revenue potential for advertisers hoping to attract younger customers.
TikTok’s growth has also been aided by influencers, many of whom have made enormous sums of money through sponsorship agreements. Brands, according to Battisby, are starting to pay attention to influencer marketing on the site.
“Isn’t TikTok only for kids? For a while, it was welcomed with a kind of eye roll. These days, we see a lot of older celebrities and influencers like Gordon Ramsay; Rod Stewart, for example, is doing really well on TikTok. Companies are starting to realize that TikTok offers a far larger audience than Instagram or Facebook.
Social Commerce Will Become Seamless
Using social media to find a product or service has never been simpler. Brands raced to Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok during the pandemic to provide customers online stores in place of their physical locations.
Thus, it should come as no surprise that an Accenture study projects that social shopping, or social commerce, will reach $1.2 trillion in revenue globally by 2025—a growth rate that is three times faster than that of traditional e-commerce.
The social buying experience is expected to change in 2024 as platforms work in the background to allow users to make payments without ever leaving social media apps, resulting in a seamless user experience. By 2025, Gen Z and Millennials are expected to make up the largest spending group, making up 62% of all worldwide social ecommerce sales.
Battisby predicts that social buying will soar this year: “TikTok has partnered with Shopify, Instagram is the making huge developments with their shopping area within the app,” she says. “You can shop on Pinterest and YouTube is looking to improve their shoppable tags within videos.”
It is imperative for brands to dedicate effort into showcasing their Instagram shop windows in order to generate engagement. Having one outstanding image is no longer sufficient; businesses now need to include many photographs and keyword-rich descriptions to each product. Video is especially important because, as TikTok’s rise and Instagram’s recent change demonstrate, the format’s popularity is increasing among all audiences.
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YouTube Advertising Will Explode
“In terms of advertising investment, YouTube will soar in 2024. According to Brendan Almack, & the Managing Director of the Wolfgang Digital, “I feel like it’s a sleeping giant, but I think that more advertising spend is going to move to YouTube because of the move away from linear TV and the fragmentation with subscriptions and streaming services.”
With the help of its parent company Alphabet, YouTube’s global income increased to approximately $29 billion last year, a roughly 46% increase from 2020. The surge in direct response and brand advertising, along with more traditional TV advertisers, has brought the social media platform’s revenue level to that of Netflix.
“There is a ton of opportunity for growth or headroom for growth. For CPVs, the prices are still incredibly low major brands are either absent or the performing poorly. This implies that anyone can gain a slight edge over competitors by using a clever YouTube advertising plan, according to Almack.
If you want to build an engaging and traffic-generating YouTube channel, check out our blog.
2. DIGITAL MARKETING JOB TRENDS IN 2024
Marketers Need to Upskill in Digital
There is an acute need for digital expertise across all industries as organizations compete to effectively engage, market, and convert consumer behavior online.
Finding individuals with the appropriate skill set is the biggest difficulty facing the digital marketing sector, according most recent whitepaper, “Perpetual Evolution,” which was produced in collaboration with The Economist Group. The lack of training to the upskill marketers comes in at number seven.
According to Alison Battisby & the Social Media Consultant at the Avocado Social, “every brand really looking to enhance their capability in digital marketing, so there’s a huge digital skills gap.” However, finding the skill is proving to be difficult for many. Upskilling employees is one of the major priorities for organizations this year.
Although this demand is a barrier for many in the sector who lack digital know-how or experience in digital marketing, it is fantastic news for marketers. What abilities related to digital marketing will be in demand in 2024?
Matching your knowledge to the abilities employers are seeking is crucial if you want to upskill and progress in your profession. Skills related to the social media & the digital marketing are highly sought for, according to LinkedIn’s study of its job posts. Actually, the media and digital industries account for half of the top 10 marketing positions that are listed below.
The Digital Gig Economy is on the Rise
Many employees have made the decision to adopt a more flexible “gig” lifestyle for their working lives over the last ten years. With the rise of internet businesses and apps like Deliveroo and Airbnb, people now have alternative employment arrangements to the traditional 9 to 5 job.
Prior to the epidemic, there was an increase in the number of gig workers. According to “The State of Independence in America” survey, there are more than 40 million gig workers in the United States. By 2024, more than half of American workers could be independent, according to this estimate, which suggests that this trend may continue to grow.
People are demonstrating a stronger sense of agency at work by wishing to resume work at their own convenience. People now have their own sources of income & the sense of agency, so there is less dependence on corporate America according to the Mischa McInerney, Director of Marketing Digital Marketing Institute (DMI).
This gig economy provides opportunities for in-demand marketing expertise holders. Professionals in creative or digital marketing are increasingly opting to become digital nomads since it allows them to set their own hours and have freedom. In addition, a lot of the digital nomads earn more money than they did in more conventional jobs.
The Competition for Digital Marketing Talent is Intense
It is understandable that businesses around the world are having difficulty attracting and retaining talent given the rising demand for digital knowledge and the expansion of the “gig economy.”
Employers should take the initiative in hiring retaining employees, according to the Órla Stack, Director of the Human Resources at DMI. “We will lose candidates to other employers because they are also moving quickly if we don’t move quickly and don’t meet with them tomorrow.”
“2024, as an employer, will provide significant challenges. Up to 60% of workers in the UK are expected to the explore changing occupations this year. Candidates consider factors other than pay and benefits while considering positions. It also concerns career prospects and flexibility, as well as the measures taken by organizations to foster employee development.
According to Stack, the key to drawing in and keeping talent is to consider your Employer Value Proposition (EVP). Benefits like unrestricted vacation time used to be quite appealing, but with the rise of remote and hybrid work, these days they are less desirable. Businesses must refocus and determine what today’s workers value.
3. DIGITAL TECHNOLOGY TRENDS IN 2024
The Metaverse Will Become a Marketer’s Playground
Although the metaverse has been there for a while, marketers only became aware of it when Facebook rebranded its parent business as Meta in October 2021.
Facebook’s CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, explains the reasoning for this decision by saying, “The metaverse is the next frontier in the connecting people, just like social networking was when we got started.” My goal is for our organization to be recognized as a metaverse enterprise in the future, and I want to base our identity and work towards that goal.
What, though, is the metaverse? In short, it’s a network of three-dimensional virtual worlds that users may connect to via virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR). Popular gaming platforms operating in this space already include Roblox, Pokemon, Fornite, and Minecraft; many of them are well-known to Generation Alpha, the youngest population.
The metaverse relatively digital medium for the marketing, but in recent campaigns, brands have taken advantage of its immersive qualities to promote. For instance, Roblox offered an area called Gucci Garden where users could purchase and try on digital Gucci clothing to customize their avatars. Its goal was to increase younger consumers’ awareness of the brand.
For that reason, one of the digital marketing trends for 2024 should be for marketers to leverage the metaverse. In 2023, 110 million people will use augmented reality (AR) and 65 million people will use virtual reality (VR), according to eMarketer data. Having so many potential young clients in one area is impressive.
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Artificial Intelligence Will Hinder & Help Data Privacy
In recent years, there have been frequent headlines about data breaches that have exposed personal information of individuals. Customers and brands are increasingly concerned about the prospect of sensitive data being compromised or disclosed as our world becomes more and more online.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) has made it possible for search engine algorithms and recommendation engines to gather personal information about individuals without their knowledge. As AI develops, so does the capacity to obtain private data and violate people’s privacy.
A Gartner report projects that by 2023, artificial intelligence will be used in 40% of privacy compliance technologies, and by 2024, global spending on privacy is anticipated to exceed $8 billion.
Although artificial intelligence has been around for a long, its applications are just now starting. However, I believe that its relationship to privacy will be crucial. How do you collect data while adhering to the standards of privacy laws?”states DMI CEO Ken Fitzpatrick.
There are, nevertheless, ways to apply AI that preserve privacy. Businesses can utilize artificial intelligence (AI) in their data privacy programs to categorize sensitive data and to search data for people who have requested to be forgotten (a request covered by privacy legislation such as GDPR).
Brands Will Start to Use NFTs (Non-Fungible Tokens)
There have been many opponents of blockchain technology. Peer-to-peer networks are used in this technology’s data storage, and it has been connected to cryptocurrencies like Ethereum and Bitcoin. These days, Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs), another well-liked virtual currency, are based on it.
“NFTs pique my curiosity greatly. At first, I thought, “Oh no, not another one,” according to Accenture Interactive Experience Architect Brian Corish. NFTs function as a kind of signaling. What makes someone wear a Rolex watch, exactly? You seem to be saying that you’re prosperous or successful.
However, how are NFTs becoming a part of the digital marketing landscape? Brands are utilizing NFTs, a significant component of the metaverse, to connect owners to communities or serve as digital badges.
The NFL provided each fan with the an NFT at the 2024 Super Bowl, customized to match their seat and row, as a way for them to remember their tickets and save them digitally.
In an effort to strengthen the bonds between the real and virtual worlds, metaverse specialists are being actively hired by Disney, the massive media conglomerate. “Storytelling without boundaries in a Disney metaverse” will be possible as a result. Another instance is the art project that Adidas and Prada started, wherein artists can contribute to a tiled canvas that will be turned into a non-fungible token (NFT) and sold.
You are beginning to realize that this is a digital asset that I can possess and that it is a unique item. According to Corish, “you’ll see luxury brands entering the metaverse and offering characters the opportunity to wear this unique outfit.”
4. CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE TRENDS IN 2024
The Power is With the Consumer
Social media and the coronavirus pandemic have altered consumer behaviors in the same way that employees believe they have more options when it comes to their profession.
People have been able to take a step back and consider their decisions and aspirations. Based on GWI’s “Connecting the Dots” survey, American consumers are no longer motivated, obedient, and frugal—rather, they are feeling more brave, adventurous, and powerful.
According to Mischa McInerney, DMI’s director of marketing, “consumers are choosing to the interact with brands on their terms.” What is meant by that? Rather than aiming to provide the right message to the right audience at the right moment, marketers will most likely focus on providing the right answer to the right query at the right moment.
Brands may face difficulties as a result of this power shift, but there may also be excellent opportunities. Nowadays, before making a purchase, customers are looking for openness and want to learn more about a company’s philosophy. A few brands are trying to connect with these fresh feelings and sense of direction.
Consider the “A Brand New You” campaign, a celebrity-filled film produced to advertise Dubai as a vacation destination. It’s all about finding yourself again and making time to live in the moment, and it stars Zac Efron. It has garnered over 6 million views on the YouTube, indicating its popularity.
The Important of Having Conversations with Customers
A shift in power is accompanied by a need for information among consumers. People are looking for information and feel at ease obtaining it online, whether it be on social media, on a forum, or through chat. Conversational marketing has become a hugely popular approach to engage customers because of this need for answers.
The good news is both B2C and B2B firms may benefit greatly from effective conversational marketing. The unfavorable report? You could lose business if you’re not keeping up with your correspondence, reply slowly, or send out inconsistent messages!
According to DMI CEO Ken Fitzpatrick, “customers now expect response query at 2 am.” They will not wait for a duplicate response for three days. This kind of conversational, frictionless consumer experience will become more and more crucial.
Due to customers’ increasing need for information, messaging apps such as WhatsApp have emerged as an excellent means of communication and customer support for marketers. This also applies to social networking sites like Facebook Messenger and Twitter, voice-activated devices like Alexa, and platforms like Slack.
* The pandemic in 2021 is referenced in this WhatsApp statistic – source
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While chatbots have been around for a while, companies are starting to utilize them more frequently for customer service. They also have the potential to boost retail sales, particularly with younger consumers, who are expected to spend $112 billion on them by 2023.
Being ‘Green’ is a Turn-On for Customers
Greenwashing, sometimes referred to the as “green sheen,” is the practice of a business using public relations and marketing to trick consumers into thinking that its goods or services are eco-friendly.
IKEA was one company that faced criticism for this. Despite being hailed as an eco-friendly leader, they came under fire in 2020 for using illegal logging from protected Siberian forests and the Ukraine to make furniture. The Forestry Stewardship Council consequently charged them with greenwashing the timber sector.
Regretfully, there are several such instances of companies engaging in “greenwashing,” a tactic that customers are becoming aware of because they place a premium on product provenance and demand openness from companies, especially in this post-pandemic period.
According to Mischa McInerney, Director of the Marketing at the DMI, “Companies have done a lot of the greenwashing, and I think they’re being held accountable little bit more.” “A few years ago, I would have predicted government legislation to be the biggest shift in environmental impact, but I believe it will likely be driven by consumers.”
Due to decades of fast fashion and textile waste, one segment of the fashion industry has been under intense pressure to make adjustments. Online sales of used clothing are expanding at a rate that is 21 times faster than that of traditional retail, and certain companies are dominating the market. Examples of these include the apparel rental website & Other Stories, owned by H&M, and the resale site thredUp.
Advice: By addressing social concerns on social media, corporations can, when done correctly, increase engagement. Therefore, consider any movements or issues that your business supports or that are related to your offering so that you can discuss them on your social media platforms.
5. SEARCH MARKETING TRENDS IN 2024
Goodbye, third-party cookie. First-party Data (Email) is King
Marketers have long been aware that the third-party cookie was set to expire in 2024, but this date has been extended to 2023. Google made the decision to the stop collecting this data because of privacy concerns. The problem with the third-party cookies is that they allowed marketers to follow consumers’ online behavior without their knowledge.
According to a recent Pew Research Center research, 81 percent of Americans believe that the risks associated with data gathering exceed the advantages, and 70 percent of Americans thought that their data was less safe than it was five years ago.
Advertisers using Google will have to find other methods to identify and target customers because the search engine is adopting a privacy-preserving API strategy, while other suppliers might provide identifying information through PII (Personally Identifiable Information) graphs. The response? Marketers must comprehend how to the use a first-party data approach to boost revenue.
The answer, in the opinion of eCommerce specialist and director of digital marketing Cathal Melinn, is found in email marketing. The most important type of first-party data is email addresses. Under GDPR, you can upload an individual’s email address as a de facto cookie to advertising networks such as Google, Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn when you have their consent to use it in a campaign or marketing activity.
This means that in the upcoming months, developing and managing your email marketing lists will be essential. To make the most of your first-party data, you need, above all, create an email marketing plan that is integrated with your marketing initiatives.
Better yet, zero-party data that a consumer knowingly and deliberately submits through preferences and purchase intents is available. Watch our latest webinar to learn more.
Understand Your Data Better with Google Analytics 4
Google Analytics revealed a platform update near the close of 2020. “Get better ROI long-term marketing using machine learning to the automatically offer helpful insights and give an understanding of customers across devices & the platforms” was the stated goal of the updated version for marketers.
There are five important updates for data experts and marketers to be aware of:
- Improved compatibility with Google ads
- Fine-grained data management
- Intelligent machine learning that recognizes patterns and generates wise insights
- Data measurement with an emphasis on customers
- privacy-focused
In recent months, Google Analytics 4 has been a topic of much discussion. According to Cathal Melinn, director of the digital marketing and eCommerce specialist, “(Now you need to) get it onto website, get it recording data, get it understanding the movements of the site while cookies are still around because cookies are going away.” Also check benefits of digital learning
Cathal suggests building a new “Google Analytics 4” property (formerly known as an App + Web property) in addition to your current properties to keep informed about any updates.
A suggestion for maximizing the value of your data is to watch our data-driven marketing webinar.
Marketers Need to plan for Responsive Search Ads
The discontinuation of Google’s Expanded Text Ads (ETAs) in 2024 is another move that will impact your paid search marketing efforts. As businesses switch to using Responsive Search Ads (RSA) in their place, Google claims that this shift will involve using automation through their ad solutions.
We need to get their search history up to date and into the system because Google will no longer be showing expanded text advertisements in July 2024 As a result, you should begin organizing responsive text ads. The text ad formats that were the Google Ads default will no longer be available after July 2024, according to Cathal Melinn, director of digital marketing and eCommerce specialist.
There are several actions that brands who depend on Google AdWords and paid search marketing should do to prepare for the shift to responsive search:
- To see what works, test your ETAs using a search answer ad format.
- Consider combining Smart Bidding, broad match keywords, and RSAs.
- Look at the “Recommendations” page in your accounts; it provides personalized recommendations.
- Attach titles or summaries to RSAs.
- Variations of trial ads in RSA format
Advice: Simply download our Google advertising Creator Template if you require assistance creating Google advertising for search marketing campaigns.
6. CONTENT MARKETING & SEO TRENDS IN 2024
It’s harder to rank organic content on Google
For many marketers, the best way to get clients to view your content is through Google search. Your brand may be seen by millions of people if you can get your site to be on Google’s first search engine result page (SERP) or, better yet, rank #1.
Here’s an example of what Google returns when you type in “digital marketing skills.”
Google dominates search engine market with a nearly 92 percent share; Bing is its closest competitor with only 3 percent. Google is a slam dunk when it comes to deciding what users view because there are 3.5 billion searches made on the search engine each day.
Google no longer appears to be playing fairly when it comes to ranking organic material that has been optimized for search engines, which presents a challenge for content marketers.
“I believe that Google is wasting a lot of real estate. More advertisements can be seen, and Google is favoring its own products more prominently on search engine results sites. Thus, it’s becoming more difficult to rank organic material, and branded search is becoming more prevalent, according to SEO and content expert Kate Toon.
What, though, is a branded search? Basically, it’s any search term that contains the name of your product or brand. One of the best things about branded search inquiries is that if a customer types in your name, it indicates that they are highly interested on knowing about your brand.
Regarding organic content, it’s also important to keep in mind that buyers are increasingly using Google search to ask inquiries. Answer-based content is therefore essential, and be careful to match keywords to your content (for more information, scroll down).
Core Web Vitals Should Not Be Ignored
Google unveiled Core Web Vitals in May 2020, a user-focused set of measures designed to assess a website’s “wellness” from the viewpoint of its patrons.
These days, your digital and content marketing relies on these Core Web Vitals as ranking indications. By optimizing these, you can raise the usability and speed of your website. Three metrics are used to measure user experience:
- Performance of page loads is measured by Largest Contentful Paint (LCP).
- Web page interaction is measured by First Input Delay (FID).
- The visual stability of a webpage is measured by Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS).
To their own peril, SEO and content expert Kate Toon thinks that many marketers are failing to pay attention to these new indicators. “I believe that the majority of people have not looked at Core Web Vitals or checked the performance of their Google search console.”
Increasing Core Web Vitals scores—which are used as an SEO ranking factor—improving usability, enabling faster loading, and increasing the number of visitors that convert to sales are the objectives.
Invest in Creating Answer-Based Content
Answer-based content was previously discussed as a way to boost your organic search ranking. However, there’s still another incentive to consider producing this kind of SEO content: users are searching for it.
This is seen in the growth of voice searches, which make up 20% of all Google searches, as well as conversational marketing. In the end, what matters is that customers take a more direct approach. In an effort to obtain knowledge more quickly, they are starting to ask questions because they want to know more.
Google is evolving into more of an answer engine and less of a search engine. Thus, it’s critical to comprehend your audience, their problems, and provide personalized answers to each of their inquiries, according to SEO and content expert Kate Toon.
How can you use this to your advantage to address queries in your content, then?
- Examine your buyer personas again, taking note of the problems they are facing and the solutions you may offer. Is it possible to turn that into a traffic-generating blog post or video? (Use this free template if you need to update or don’t have buyer personas.)
- Utilize resources to locate frequently asked questions. Listening search engines can provide you a wealth of information about what people are asking.
- Perform audience research. You can do this by requesting feedback on one of your social media channels or by sending an email to your active subscribers.
- Make a FAQ Schema: To ensure that your material is ranked higher than other content, use a code to inform search engines that it is presented in a question and answer format.
- Provide high-quality, pertinent content: Although it might seem apparent, the material you provide in response to a query should accomplish this. Avoid using it as a chance to make a sale.
B2C & B2B Digital Marketing Trends 2024: Wrap-up
Featured Resource: How to Write a Successful Proposal and Strategy for Digital Marketing
As you can see, marketers have a lot of work and excitement ahead of them in 2024.
To guarantee that you maximize your efforts across channels, the insider digital marketing trends we’ve examined (discussed in our most recent podcast) ought to provide you with insight into the advancements and modifications you ought to incorporate into your campaigns.
There are several things you can do to increase engagement and income, such as exploring the metaverse, reevaluating your YouTube advertising plan, or implementing a question-based content strategy. So why not choose which one to try first and get started? Also check Online Security Risks
Become a Digital Marketing Pro in 2024!
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Consulted as experts in digital marketing for this article were:
- CEO Digital Marketing Institute, Ken Fitzpatrick
- Accenture Interactive MD Brian Corish (ASGR)
- DMI instructor and Avocado Social founder Alison Battisby
- CMO of the Digital Marketing Institute Mischa McInerney
- eCommerce expert and DMI lecturer Cathal Melinn
- Orla Stack Digital Marketing Institute’s HR Director.
- Bruce Almack, Wolfgang Digital’s MD
- SEO and copywriting consultant Kate Toon