As customers become more discerning about the products and services they buy, there’s also a global cost of living crisis that brands will need to plan for in 2023.
That means it’s more important for brands to be transparent and think about their messaging and research or tweak their strategy in the coming year. It also means that marketers need to know the trends coming down the line so they can plan and take advantage of any new developments.
To help you kick 2023 off with a bang, we’ve talked to industry experts on our podcast to identify the most important trends. You might also like to watch our Trends webinar on more key points to watch in 2023.
Read on to find out the 2023 trends for
- Within social media and influencer marketing we look at TikTok and business, the rise of creators, and also of SuperApps.
- In B2B marketing we hear about the value of video content, how to conquer social selling, and curated content.
- Content marketing looks set to see more connections, creator + brand partnerships, and the evergreen need to create valuable content.
- You’ll hear a lot about marketing automation in 2023, not least in available tools and the much-anticipated GPT-4.
- Martech is also set to keep growing, CRO will take a further lead. And the metaverse will not be going away.
1. SOCIAL MEDIA AND INFLUENCER MARKETING TRENDS
There are some really interesting trends down the line in 2023 for social media. In fact, it’s an area of marketing that will see significant change and brands need to keep up to have a presence and use the platforms effectively.
TikTok continues to evolve and dominate
TikTok has become a big player in the social media marketing realm. And that’s not set to change in 2023. TikTok generated $4.6 billion in 2021, a 142 percent increase year-on-year with 1.8 billion monthly active users predicted by the end of 2022 reported The Business of Apps.
It’s not just for consumers or creators that TikTok is making inroads. The platform is focusing on usability for businesses and improving targeting options for advertising which will make it a bigger and better platform for brands in 2023.
Decentralizing social media to create a ‘super app’
The changes at Twitter have shone a lens on the vulnerability of social media platforms. Customers are moving away from wanting to engage with billionaire-led platforms and instead have control over their content and data.
The ‘creator economy’ will grow and change
As brand awareness becomes more of a focus on social media (as opposed to pure lead generation), marketers need to find creators that have a voice and fan base (small or otherwise).
It can be a challenge for brands to create content that engages customers in a time-starved world. That’s where content creators come in and that doesn’t mean high-level influencers. It can mean employees, customers, or even subject matter experts in a niche area.
The emergence of content creator funds on TikTok, YouTube, and Twitch means there’s an incentive for creators to put time into creating content a brand could take advantage of.
2. B2B MARKETING TRENDS
B2B marketing can be seen as boring or at least less exciting than its B2C counterparts. But that need not be the case. As a B2B company, it’s important to be creative in your marketing and use the channels and tools available to be memorable.
Video, video, and more video
As marketers, we all know the power of a great video campaign as a way to inform and connect. After all, 86 percent of businesses use video as a marketing tool, and 92 percent value it as an important part of their strategy (according to Wyzowl research).
The same research showed the variety of reasons businesses use video with the top being explainers followed by social media videos and presentations. The top three channels companies use are YouTube, LinkedIn and Instagram.For B2B companies, video can play an important role in the sales and marketing cycle. This is particularly true on LinkedIn as video has become more popular on the platform and offers a way to connect with and influence customers.
Empower teams to use social selling
Social media is an effective way for brands and their sales team to connect with customers. This is particularly true for B2B companies that have longer sales cycles and rely on digital channels to provide useful and relevant information.
But there’s a difference between posting content that pushes a sales message and using content to engage and create connections. Social transformation expert and author, Julie Atherton believes that’s what will drive success for businesses in 2023.
3. CONTENT MARKETING TRENDS
The Content Marketing Institute found that while 78 percent of marketers have a strategic approach to managing content, only over half have a documented content strategy in place to reference. That’s a mistake in today’s content-hungry society.
Use content to drive connections
We know as marketers that content can be used at all stages of the marketing and sales funnel to provide information and solutions. But content can do more than that.
In 2023, you should use content to make connections and build communities. As customers become more interested in the value and ethos of brands, it will be companies that foster and seek out connections that will succeed.
Refine and define creator/brand partnerships
There’s a lot of noise online, which equals a lot of content. aSome of the content out there is great, but a lot is aligned with the wrong influencer or not targeted at the right audience. That’s where a good content creator/brand partnership can come into play.
Many creators want to grow and expand in 2023. This means they are looking for brand partnerships (rather than just sponsorships) that align with their content so posts feel natural and companies offer guidance and support, not just leave them to it!
Balance your content to offer value and not just sell
Over half of marketers cite a large increase in the demand for content according to marq’s ‘Content Effectiveness’ report in recent years. But it’s not just about having more content, it’s about having content that provides value to prospects and customers.
4. MARKETING AUTOMATION TRENDS
As companies collect more data and need to execute more tasks to implement effective marketing campaigns, automation tools offer a way to automate routine and repetitive tasks at scale.
A shift to signal-based marketing
In 2023, there’s going to be a shift in mindset from technical-based marketing to anticipation marketing. This will enable marketers to anticipate what customers want and then feed it into automation processes.
This new mindset will now only make things more efficient but will enable personalization. This applies to platforms like Google Ads and also seems to be where Facebook and other social channels are heading.
Importance of automation tools
Gartner predicts that by 2024, organizations with IT teams that understand the needs of customers will outperform other organizations’ customer experience metrics by 20 percent.
This understanding will rely on automation tools for internal processes and to enhance customer experience. These include marketing tools for CRM, social media, advertising, lead management or email.
Artificial Intelligence and the launch of GPT-4
You may not have heard of GPT-4 (Generative Pre-trained Transformer 4) but it’s a cutting-edge tool that can help marketers automate many tasks.
Developed by OpenAI it is a text-generation deep learning model that is trained through content available online. It’s used for questions and answers, text summarization, machine translation, classification, code generation, and conversation AI.
5. MARTECH TRENDS 2023
Marketing technology – Martech – software is used to create, execute, manage, and measure the performance of content (online and offline), campaigns and experiences. It’s an effective way to streamline customer journeys and implement omnichannel marketing campaigns
Martech spending will keep growing
Martech spending in the U.S. will pass $20 billion in 2022 for the first time, up 15 percent year-on-year according to eMarketer. This spending is due to companies investing in technology that will enable them to gather and store data, use this data to make decisions, and implement those decisions.
Interestingly, B2B companies account for more than 30 percent of that spend, and this share is expected to grow moderately over the next couple of years to $8.5 billion in 2024.
2023 Marketing Trends Wrap-up
2023 is going to be an exciting and challenging year for marketers! External circumstances mean that brands need to think carefully about their messaging to engage their audiences and align with creators and influencers that have the same values.
These developments show the constant evolution of marketing both in terms of technology and strategies. Check out ‘The Next Big Digital Marketing Trends in 2022’ blog to see what we predicted for this year.
You have time to think about which trends matter to you and what ones you can take advantage of in 2023. Happy planning!