What will marketing focus on in 2023?

What will marketing focus on in 2023?

27 Şub 2023

4 dk okuma süresi

As the marketing landscape continues to evolve, businesses face several pressing issues, such as managing misinformation and ensuring effective first-party data collection. These trends are critical to addressing and cannot be ignored by marketers and advertisers. To navigate this challenging landscape, marketers must remain agile and proactive in their approach to marketing initiatives. This requires a deep understanding of consumers' ever-changing needs and expectations and an ability to leverage data-driven insights to optimize marketing efforts.

Marketing leaders must incorporate five predictions into their strategies to succeed in 2023 and beyond. By doing so, they can drive tangible results and earn back business leaders' confidence.

Operational AI for data-driven decisions

According to Gartner's forecast, organizations that utilize AI throughout their marketing functions will have 75% of their staff redirect their efforts from production-based activities to more strategic endeavors by 2025. By incorporating AI into marketing operations, friction, and redundancy can be minimized, enabling marketers to allocate resources and budgets to initiatives that bolster a more flexible and dynamic marketing organization.

For instance, AI can be harnessed in the creative process to automate the capturing, processing, and analyzing real-world images and videos, thus improving image quality and creating digital twins. AI will persist in refining marketing operation processes to facilitate more agile, data-driven solutions for the upcoming challenges that show no indication of slowing down.

Combatting misinformation

As the digital content ecosystem evolves, combating misinformation and fake material has become a critical priority for enterprise marketers. According to Gartner, by 2027, 80% of these marketers will establish a dedicated content authenticity function to address this challenge. The proliferation of generative AI and user-generated content has made it increasingly difficult to manage content at scale and in real time, making proactive reputation management all the more critical.

To effectively combat misinformation, CMOs must rely on a combination of technology and human expertise. While AI and other technologies can contribute to the problem, they can also be critical in mitigating it. Dedicated teams trained to listen, engage, and escalate brand interests across the digital content ecosystem are essential in detecting and addressing instances of misinformation. As these technologies continue to advance, marketers must prioritize establishing dedicated content authenticity functions to maintain brand reputation and ensure the trust of their audiences.

Product placements

Gartner predicts that by 2024, 70% of brands will allocate at least 10% of their media budget toward product placement in entertainment content. Today's consumers are becoming increasingly fatigued by advertisements, and those who can opt out of ads often do so. Specifically, high-income consumers report deliberately not paying attention to ads and multitasking when presented with them.

This trend has become costly for brands seeking to reach high-income consumers through traditional digital advertising. The effectiveness of such impressions diminishes as audiences find new ways to tune them out. Brands that continue to rely solely on traditional digital ad formats will likely reach an audience composed primarily of digital have-nots. Instead, brands that shift towards product placement and sponsored content will likely succeed. Consumers report seeing these forms of marketing everywhere and largely approve of them.

The rise of loyalty programs

According to Gartner's prediction, one in three businesses that do not have a loyalty program is expected to establish one by 2027. This move is aimed at reinforcing first-party data collection and retaining high-priority customers. Loyalty programs are an effective strategy to reward customers and collect critical data for personalization and enhancing customer experiences. Loyalty programs are most prevalent in the travel, hospitality, and retail industries. Nevertheless, there are opportunities in other verticals, such as banking and consumer packaged goods, to adopt loyalty programs. Gartner's analysis of 1,068 brands in 2022 showed that only 36% had a loyalty program.

Effective loyalty content is usually highly personalized and is best utilized to engage high-priority target audiences, improving retention and growth. By 2023, B2B and B2C companies will increase their investments in loyalty programs as a percentage of their total marketing budget.

As more companies launch and revamp loyalty programs, the competition for customers' attention and first-party data will intensify. Therefore, CMOs running best-in-class loyalty programs should elevate their approach beyond transactional benefits and recognize personalization as a critical differentiator.

Accountability for ethical AI

Gartner predicts that by 2025, a significant majority of enterprise Chief Marketing Officers (CMOs) will be deeply concerned with the ethical use of artificial intelligence in marketing, featuring this issue prominently on their list of priorities. The need to comply with privacy regulations governing data collection, economic pressures, and the increasing use of AI and machine learning to improve campaign performance and reduce costs drive marketing teams towards greater dependence on AI technology. However, the potential for AI systems to introduce bias, perpetuate stereotypes, and manipulate consumer behavior in unethical ways has raised concerns. As such, companies must prioritize ethical considerations in their marketing strategies, and CMOs must ensure that the use of AI in marketing aligns with their organization's values and ethical standards.

As AI and machine learning technologies continue to play an increasingly central role in marketing campaigns, the issue of ethical accountability is becoming a top concern for enterprise CMOs. In this context, privacy-related restrictions on data collection, economic pressures, and breakthroughs in AI are leading marketing teams to rely more heavily on these technologies to optimize performance and reduce costs.

However, at the same time, regulators and advocacy groups are raising concerns about AI's manipulative and biased uses. For example, the AI Act in the EU and the AI Bill of Rights in the U.S. reflect a growing awareness of the risks posed by advanced technology. Moreover, several brands have faced criticism over their use of AI in ways that are perceived as creepy or inequitable.

Given these challenges, CMOS must ensure that AI is used ethically and transparently in marketing operations. Doing so will not only help to mitigate legal and reputational risks but also foster trust with customers and support the development of a sustainable and equitable digital economy.

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