Trends and Technology

Google's latest delay to shut down third-party cookies until 2025 presents another reprieve for marketers who are scrambling to develop fresh data strategies. One hurdle is whether companies will be able to dismantle their silos and share more first-party data across the organization.

Agency consolidation continues to shake up the advertising industry. Rachel Barek, CEO and co-founder of Said Differently, says changes are brewing, as the current agency model does not meet marketers' needs.

Agency-client relations can be problematic for SMBs (small-to-medium sized businesses), which have fewer resources than larger brands and less margin for error when hiring creative services firms. Yet despite the inherent challenges, SMBs increasingly see the value of marketing to fuel growth, with 94 percent planning to maintain or increase their investment in digital marketing spend in 2023, per a study by Taradel.

To combat cybercrime, a growing number of companies are developing red teams, or in-house groups designed to evaluate the effectiveness of an organization's cyber defense. As these groups start to proliferate, marketers may be recruited to assist in the endeavor and educate employees about the role they can play protecting the company against bad actors online.

A vast majority of marketers (87 percent) say they plan to maintain or increase their email marketing investments this year, according to a recent study. Part of that spending will need to go into strengthening their email safeguards amid a growing number of state laws designed to protect consumer privacy online.

Social media and influencer marketing have started to blur the line between celebrity athletes and brand ambassadors. The challenge for brand managers is how to harness the new constellations of stars without putting the company in jeopardy or alienating people.

Human influencers, move over. Nearly two-thirds of marketers said they are open to teaming up with AI-created virtual influencers, according to a new study. As the trend gains momentum, marketers need to ensure that their AI-driven partners are tightly controlled and sync up nicely with the brand.

While damning, the widespread and growing accusations against social media companies have not been a deterrent for brand advertisers. In fact, they're boosting their spending on most of the major social channels, with beleaguered X as an exception.

Despite being the majority in the U.S., small- and mid-size companies have long played second fiddle to their larger competitors. But cloud computing, digital platforms, and social channels have enabled smaller players to break down barriers and punch above their weight.

While animation marketing enables marketers to create places, situations, and characters that transcend the real world, it also provides brands with the ability to suffuse their messaging with a kind of clarity that can often be elusive in a physical environment.

While not all brands have the ad budgets to be global sponsors of the Summer Olympics, companies of all sizes can get involved with this year's Games as well as peripheral events.

The ongoing predilection among major brands to jettison the CMO role altogether and reassign marketing duties puts a major crimp in agency-client relations and makes it harder to foster meaningful partnerships.

SMBs have struggled with content marketing for years. Can generative AI help them embark on a different and more profitable course?

In-game advertising is going exceptionally well. Retailers and major brands are expected to pour $7.9 billion into mobile gaming advertising in 2024, up from $5.5 billion in 2021. To maximize ROI, marketers will need to max out their user experience stats.

Change management — rather than a reduced emphasis on marketing — may explain why some top brands continue to get rid of the CMO role altogether. But new technology — like artificial intelligence — may be able to help improve the role's value as chief marketers feel the squeeze.

Experimenting with generative AI should be controlled and guided by clear and transparent policies, which are sorely lacking. Only 22 percent of companies have generative AI policies, and only 21 percent have an AI ethics policy or responsible AI principles, according to a recent survey.

As generative AI becomes a more integral aspect of brand marketing, the onus grows on brand managers to reduce and/or eliminate AI bias. Tech giants are quickly filling the void and building their own AI bias safeguards. However, the onus on combating AI bias ultimately falls on individual brands, which need human oversight to ensure the algorithms don't go rogue and the company doesn't end up in a reputational hole.

WPP merged VMLY&R and Wunderman Thompson to meet a market need, according to Jon Cook, global CEO of VML. Cook talks about what sparked the mega merger, the logic behind the agency's new name, and whether the ad industry is in for more consolidation.

Will generative AI spur a creative renaissance among ad agencies? Time will tell, but initial use shows value for clients.

A new report from McKinsey & Co. reveals some sharp differences when it comes to how CEOs and CMOs understand the role marketing plays and how it contributes to the company's overall goals and objectives. There are several steps CMOs can take to bridge the divide, facilitated by strengthening communication and sharing a customer-centric vision for the company.