Marketing trends have been around since the dawn of marketing. They define what is working for brands, resonating with consumers, and where marketers should invest their time and resources. But as the landscape shifts from traditional advertising to a more dynamic, consumer-driven approach, these trends are accelerating and becoming more targeted.
Today, trends dictate not just broad marketing strategies but also precise actions tailored to specific industries, audiences, and regions. To stay ahead, marketers must determine which trends work for their brand, and how best to leverage them.
2024 Marketing Trends
With the growing use of AI and influencer marketing it can be difficult to know where to even begin, let alone how to get the most out of every available opportunity.
With this in mind, a better understanding of the more popular trends will give you insight as to which ones you can practically incorporate into your marketing strategy.
Influencer Marketing
While nothing new, influencer marketing has shifted away from macro-influencers and their millions of followers. Now, most brands consciously partner with micro-influencers who have a smaller but much more engaged and dedicated follower base. Not only does this ensure that brands are only targeting an audience that is likely to be interested in their offering, but it also allows influencers to partner with brands that align with their personal values.
The result of this shift is that influencer marketing is considerably more authentic than it used to be when one high-profile influencer would endorse numerous brands. The change also allows smaller brands to tap into influencer marketing, something that wasn’t previously possible due to budget constraints.
Value-Based Marketing
Brands are no longer judged on the quality of their products or services alone. More and more consumers are interested in the value a brand adds beyond their product — such as inclusivity or sustainability. In short: purpose matters. Because of the nature of value-based marketing, brands need to ensure that the actual ‘marketing’ is a by-product, and not the main driver.
Consumers are drawn to authentic value action, and quickly see through acts that look good but lack substance. True value-based marketing should be seen as a social responsibility which, when aligned with a brand’s mission and vision, gives consumers a genuine perspective of what matters to them.
Brand Communities
Just like followers on social media, brand communities are a collection of interested individuals in your brand or product. However, unlike social media, brand communities are linked directly to the brand without any third-party involvement. Brand communities can be tough to build and invariably start small, but with traction and buy-in, they can cement a brand’s status in the industry.
Examples of a brand community include the Nike+ Run Club, the Red Bull extreme sports community, the Harley-Davidson Owners Group, or the mCommunity — Meltwater’s very own community, where you can interact with and be inspired by the top minds in your field.
Branded Podcasts
Podcasts are a hot topic in marketing in 2024. They’re a viable way for brands to add value to their audience by giving them entertaining and informative content. Financial service brands, for example, can benefit from producing finance-focused podcasts that showcase both their thought leadership and their care for their audience’s financial wellbeing.
However, not every brand is suited to produce podcast content. It requires creativity, time investment, and a strong understanding of what content your audience may be interested in. In these instances, brands can look to leverage existing podcasts, either with sponsorship or with host-read advertising.
The Experts Have Their Say
Meltwater spoke to five marketing experts across industries to get their insights and trend understanding on topics shaping the marketing landscape today::
- Mike Rich, Group CMO at Aramex
- Lea Karam, Consulting Director at Behave
- Jorne Korzelius, Head of Marketing for Fitbit Northern Europe
- MJ Khan, Head of Group Digital Communications at Sasol Limited
- Katherine McInnes, Head of Digital, EMEA for Meltwater
AI is revolutionising marketing. How are you integrating AI into your marketing strategy?
Mike Rich: ”Without a doubt, AI is the trend poised to have the biggest impact in our industry in 2024. At Aramex, we integrate AI extensively within our marketing strategy, particularly in customer experience and customer service.
“Customer Sentiment Analysis allows us to understand customer feelings in real-time and improve our engagement strategies. Chatbots provide instant customer support and enhance user experience. Route Optimisation ensures efficient delivery routes to save time and resources. Workforce Management streamlines our operations and improves productivity. Voice Bots enhance customer interactions with voice-activated support.”
Lea Karam: ”Our marketing expertise remains critical in crafting compelling strategies, but is now aided by an array of powerful AI tools. AI's ability to perform social listening and thematic analysis on billions of data points surpasses human capacity, enabling swift and nuanced insights that wasn’t previously possible at such high volume. It enables us to discover even more consumer signals.”
Jorne Korzelius: ”We've integrated AI into our workflow, creative process, decision-making, and campaigns, driving efficiency and impact. AI-powered tools spark fresh ideas for campaigns and tailor content to specific audiences. AI-driven analysis of vast data allows for informed, real-time decisions on targeting, messaging, and campaign optimisation. This data-driven approach ensures our marketing is more effective and resonates with customers. We're also integrating AI into our Fitbit products, offering personalised fitness programs and insights, further enhancing the user experience.”
MJ Khan: ”At Sasol, we use generative AI for inspiration, thought-starters and confidence-building when encouraging employee advocacy, especially for those who are hesitant to publish online.”
With AI and data providing detailed customer insights, how can brands implement customer data into their marketing strategy?
Mike Rich: ”By understanding customer behaviour, brands can segment and target the right consumers with the right message at the right time. Start by using customer data to create detailed buyer personas, which help tailor messages to specific audience segments. Leverage AI and analytics for predictive marketing to anticipate future actions based on past behaviours, allowing for timely and relevant campaigns. Utilise data to craft personalised content and offers, enhancing customer satisfaction and creating loyalty. Additionally, continuous analysis of customer interactions provides insights for real-time optimisation of campaigns.”
Lea Karam: ”Recent advancements in AI for audience segmentation highlight the discrepancy between consumers’ expected versus actual behaviour. AI helps in extracting, prioritising and actioning consumer insights through a plethora of consumer discourse, enabling brands to go beyond demographics and build psychographic archetypes from newfound behaviours. Leveraging this data uncovers genuine drivers of consumer experience, and combined with human diligence, addresses their true desires more effectively.
“AI serves as the catalyst for understanding and catering to diverse consumer needs in the evolving landscape of marketing and media – and it needs to feature in every brand’s approach in 2024.”
Katherine McInnes: “Data is so information-rich, and often its value is limited by the inability to fully extract and apply all of that information. For this reason, I find tremendous value in Meltwater’s consumer intelligence solution. It makes the transition from data to insights simple, as customer information is presented cohesively and is easy to understand.
This makes it easier for marketing teams to apply insights meaningfully—whether to enhance personalisation, improve content strategies, or make real-time campaign adjustments. By effectively utilising AI-driven insights, brands can make data-driven decisions, improve customer engagement, and achieve sustainable growth.”
Data privacy regulations are becoming more stringent. How are you balancing data-driven marketing with consumer privacy?
Lea Karam: ”Actually, behavioural insights are growing for this exact reason. We can go beyond the individual consumer, and into common human behaviours between certain audience groups. This enables us to find common signals, taking the actual Personally Identifiable Information (PII) away and aggregating people based on behavioural segments that share similar interests: human biases, trends, and cultural nuances.”
Katherine McInnes: “Balancing data-driven marketing with consumer privacy in an increasingly stringent regulatory environment is a challenge.
Meltwater’s unique advantage lies in the segment-specific data we gather from publicly available online conversations, reviews, and social media. This data is not only anonymized but also aggregated to ensure privacy, while still offering marketing teams real-time insights. These insights are invaluable, as they represent the closest feedback loop to consumer sentiment, allowing marketers to observe optimisation results almost instantly, without compromising individual privacy.
By focusing on large, diverse data pools, we can mitigate outlier biases and make well-informed, privacy-conscious marketing decisions that help drive both innovation and customer satisfaction."
How can brands identify and partner with influencers to amplify their brand message?
Mike Rich: ”While influencer marketing has been successful for many brands, consumers are becoming more discerning and can easily differentiate between sponsored posts and authentic content. At Aramex, we prefer collaborating with micro-influencers and promoting user-generated content. We focus on building direct relationships with influencers as part of our strategy. This approach ensures a more genuine connection with the audience and leverages the authentic voices of real users.”
Lea Karam: ”We have created an internal influencer product within our service offer. It integrates behavioural science, data science and technology in order to drive brands closer to relevant creators and creators closer to consumers.”
Katherine McInnes: “Influencer marketing has transitioned from Big Brands Only club to something sustainable and mutually beneficial. Micro-influencers and brands collaborate on mutual values, offering audiences an authentic experience. Meltwater’s Influencer solution gives brands access to over 30 million influencer profiles that mirror their brand values for targeted reach and maximum impact.”
What tips would you give to a marketing manager starting their role in 2024?
Mike Rich: ”Be curious. Growth happens outside your comfort zone. Make friends with discomfort, challenge the status quo, and dare to be different. Embrace AI: leverage it to maximise and optimise your marketing efforts. And finally, position marketing as a commercial function. Marketing has evolved from a cost centre to a profit centre. Highlight how marketing drives revenue and supports business objectives.”
Lea Karam: ”Become adept with machine learning and predictive technologies. AI won’t replace human creativity, innovation, or traditional research, but it complements them greatly.”
Jorne Korzelius: ”Explore AI resources and experiment with AI tools. Integrate them into your work and routine. Understand how AI can streamline tasks and enhance your creativity, unlocking new insights and making you a more effective marketer. Remember: You're the marketer. AI is the enabler. Lean into the technology and use it to shape your future and the future of marketing.”
MJ Khan: ”Don't measure your content to prove the value of marketing. Measure your content to make sure your marketing decisions deliver business value. And immerse yourself in the business strategy — engage with colleagues in production, supply chain, finance, HR and Information Management. Knowledge is power!”
Our Three Key Takeaways
1. Stay Informed, Stay Current
Not every marketing trend will work for every brand, but keeping your finger on the pulse of what’s hot and what’s not will ensure you can jump on the right trend at the right time. By combining an excellent understanding of your brand and audience with the trends landscape, you can pick up on things with enough time to craft a brand or campaign strategy accordingly.
2. Test, Learn, Implement
Don’t be afraid to try something. Experimentation is essential for any marketing evolution, and will keep your campaigns from stagnating. By testing new things without veering off-brand, you can determine what works for your audience and double down on your successes.
3. Find the Right Tools and Platforms for Your Brand
As marketing trends continue to evolve, the need for the right marketing technology becomes essential. With an increasing focus on personalisation, real-time engagement, and data-driven insights, having robust marketing technology allows businesses to stay ahead of trends, optimise strategies efficiently, and ensure compliance with data privacy regulations.
The Meltwater Suite is packed with marketing must-haves. Get in touch with us by filling out the form below. Request a free demo and learn how to get the most out of your marketing content.
