Social Commerce & The Future of Social Shopping

The big picture: The concept of social commerce took root during the early days of eCommerce. But it was the mobile revolution, plus the meteoric rise of social media titans like Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest, that enabled this approach to truly disrupt digital shopping.  

Social commerce focuses on convenience and relationship-building, tapping into unplanned discovery moments as consumers scroll through inspirational content. Watching real people interact with products helps shoppers understand and visualize them better, building confidence around online purchases.

For marketers, this shift toward social platforms reflects new expectations set by Gen Z and millennial shoppers who increasingly make purchases directly via social apps. It is an opportunity to maximize reach and nurture lasting brand relationships by organically integrating into the customer journey. Platforms now orchestrate a seamless, trust-based shopping experience where inspiration can instantly lead to purchase.

Why it matters: Despite expectations that eCommerce will surpass 8 trillion dollars by 2027, consumers are becoming increasingly wary of how much of their personal data they share with online marketplaces and brands. Marketers may accidentally push these hesitant consumers further away by pushing hard-sell messaging to audiences who are still considering their product. These tactics are the online equivalent of the over-eager salesperson peppering you with corporate scripts about deals and asking you to open a store credit card when all you were looking to do was casually browse. They’re annoying. 

But casual browsing presents an excellent opportunity for brands to humanize their eCommerce messaging. This shift toward Social Commerce allows for the ease of purchase and speed of online shopping while giving consumers the chance to window shop again. 

How it works: The goal is to remove friction when interest strikes while also organically introducing additional products based on what originally caught their eye.

  • For example, when a consumer admires a product shown by an influencer they trust, social commerce allows them to seamlessly find that item or brand’s storefront to browse and buy. They will be able to find those glasses and discover a range of other items, enhancing their shopping experience. 

Done well, the experience guides consumers through an intuitive path to purchase via content they already enjoy. This allows brands to inspire consideration and visibility of products in authentic contexts rather than disruptive ads. Social commerce puts the shopper first – their organic journey dictates the path, not predetermined funnels.

How to start:

  • Ensure your brand has ‘virtual storefronts’ across online marketplaces and social media platforms, keeping in mind that the virtual aesthetic is just as important as physical store décor. 
  • Create natively social, shoppable content and tap influencers who have an authentic tie to your brand. Small influencers are essential: the recommendations of these content creators drive 86% of purchases — just as strong as recommendations from a trusted real-life friend. 
  • Explore how to repurpose authentic user-generated content (UGC) in your marketing materials. The goal is to facilitate organic community engagement and discovery around your brand versus hard-selling. 

The bottom line: The future of brand loyalty lies in shoppable communities, where shared values and experiences fuel organic amplification. Social content creates better browsing experiences, allowing consumers to discover items at their own pace before being hit with hard-sell messaging. Social Commerce provides an authentic, engaging discovery experience — adding the human touch back to your eComm strategies.

Say No to Lazy Data – How Everyone Can Be Part of the Solution

What is Lazy Data?

Picture this: a chaotic jumble of inconsistent formats, messy categories, and a general disregard for order. Lazy data isn’t just data that prefers lounging on the couch to hitting the gym; it’s the unruly teenager of your business – wild, rebellious, and refuses to conform to a standard.

This laid-back attitude is the root of the problem – a lack of discipline that prevents your data from realizing its full potential. Lazy data isn’t a solitary problem; it triggers a domino effect. One inconsistent entry leads to confusion in reporting, which, in turn, affects decision-making.

Why Did Data Get Lazy?

In the early days of digital marketing, the ease of connecting systems with just a click led to a somewhat chaotic scenario. Imagine the digital landscape as the Wild West, with data flowing freely and connecting without much oversight. While convenient, this Wild West approach allowed lazy data to thrive, as there were minimal checks and balances. The ability to effortlessly connect systems created a false sense of accuracy, like linking two puzzle pieces together without ensuring they fit. 

Inconsistent data entry, neglecting updates, and failing to recognize the importance of standardized schemas have allowed lazy data to infiltrate our systems. The result? Confusion, inefficiency, and missed opportunities.

As privacy regulations tightened, especially in the wake of concerns surrounding user data, businesses realized they could no longer afford a laissez-faire attitude. The emergence of data clean rooms and the imperative for strict naming convention compliance, essential for enabling tools like marketing mix modeling, forced a reckoning. Lazy data, accustomed to a more carefree existence, suddenly found itself in an environment that demanded structure and order.

While the concept of standardized schemas might initially seem bureaucratic, they are, in fact, the essential foundation for ensuring data usability. Consider it as akin to a musical performance without a conductor; in such a scenario, each instrument plays its own tune, leading to dissonance.

How to Solve  

Data should not be viewed as isolated islands or individual pieces. Instead, envision your organization as a harmonious orchestra led by a master conductor. This fresh perspective brings forth a unified approach, ensuring that every fragment of data performs its role seamlessly.

View Your Business as a System: Don’t think of your business data in silos or individual platforms. Instead, adopt a holistic approach, viewing your organization as an interconnected system – an orchestra led by a master conductor. This perspective helps in creating a seamless flow of information and makes sure that every piece of data plays its part.

Embrace the Standard: Establish a standard data schema across your business. Think of it as giving your data a set of rules to live by – no more rebels without a cause – every piece of data should know its role and play it well.

Audit to Insure: Regular audits are the insurance policy for your data’s health. Ensure that the established standards are being followed and identify any areas that might need a little extra TLC. An audit is like a health checkup for your data – catch potential issues before they become major problems.

Mastering the Cookieless Future: Leverage Retail Data for Unmatched Customer Engagement

In the cookieless marketing era, the decline of third-party cookies opens new doors for marketers to leverage retail data, transforming marketing with personalized, engagement-driven messaging. This shift to analyzing customer behaviors and preferences via retail data not only enhances campaign effectiveness and loyalty but also fuels predictive analytics for strategic planning in product development and inventory. As traditional reliance on third-party cookies becomes obsolete, retail data stands out as a vital tool for building deeper customer relationships and driving business success

First-party retail data guides the way for gaining strong insights into customer behaviors and preferences, which are vital for enhancing personalization and developing tailored loyalty programs. Its use breaks through the limitations of traditional marketing, allowing businesses to understand customer segments more profoundly and anticipate future trends. This level of insight is critical for crafting effective, personalized marketing strategies, shifting the focus from mere transactional interactions to building lasting, data-driven customer relationships. In a cookieless future, leveraging retail data is key to staying ahead in areas like product development and inventory management, ensuring that brands not only adapt but thrive in the new marketing landscape.

The strategic utilization of retail data is crucial, going beyond merely recognizing its value. This is supported by a national survey from The Trade Desk Intelligence, which shows 91% of U.S. advertisers plan to maintain or increase their investment in retail data, to drive overall business success.

Unlocking the Power of Retail Data: How Enhanced Insights Lead to Personalized Marketing Triumphs

In today’s marketing world, retail data is crucial for creating highly personalized campaigns that truly understand customer desires and behaviors. It involves deep analysis of various data points, from purchasing habits to browsing patterns, offering a comprehensive view of customer preferences and behaviors.

This depth of insight allows for more than just tailored marketing messages; it enables behavioral and interest targeting. Marketers can segment audiences based on their actions, such as frequent purchases of a particular product category or regular browsing of certain content. Similarly, interest targeting becomes more refined through analyzing data points like search queries, product views, and content interactions. This approach ensures that marketing efforts are not just personalized but also highly relevant to each customer’s unique interests and behaviors, leading to more effective campaigns and a stronger connection with the audience.

This approach results in marketing that feels more like a personalized conversation than a generic broadcast. This tailored strategy leads to higher engagement and conversion rates, as customers encounter content that aligns closely with their individual experiences and needs, striking a chord that transcends mere attention-grabbing. This marks a fundamental shift in how marketers connect with their audience, paving the way for campaigns that are deeply personal and rooted in a thorough understanding of customer behavior.

Forecasting the Future: How Enhanced Predictive Analytics Shape Strategic Marketing and Decision-Making

Armed with a wealth of data like historical purchases and customer interactions, marketers are not just looking at what’s happening now. The spotlight is now on retail data, especially when it comes to predictive analytics. They’re using this data to power models that predict what customers might want next. It gives marketers a peek into future consumer trends and behaviors based on solid, data-driven insights from the past.

Marketers build predictive models on the concrete foundation of past customer data to anticipate shifts in consumer preferences and market dynamics. It’s about staying one step ahead in the game. Whether it’s product development or inventory management, predictive analytics provide invaluable foresight. Marketers can now predict emerging customer needs, ensuring that new products hit the mark and inventory levels are just right – no more guessing games.

Personalized marketing, empowered by predictive analytics, revolutionizes marketing by tailoring efforts to future customer needs, enhancing relevance and engagement. This strategy not only improves marketing effectiveness but also bolsters customer loyalty and guides SEO content strategies to align with future trends. Essentially, leveraging predictive analytics with first-party data equips marketers to create more impactful, forward-looking marketing strategies.

Data-Driven Bonds: Transforming Retail Data into Lasting Customer Loyalty and Trust

Retail data is driving the creation of deeper, more impactful customer relationships. ‘Data-Driven Bonds’ represents a strategic revolution, where retail data is not just supportive but central to forging enduring loyalty and trust with customers.

At the heart of this strategy is enhancing customer experiences through the insights gathered from first-party data, ranging from purchase history to direct feedback. This approach is more than just habit tracking; it’s a deep understanding of individual customer preferences, thereby establishing a foundation of trust and strengthening brand loyalty.

The strategy goes beyond traditional, one-size-fits-all loyalty programs to personalized experiences aligned with each customer’s unique needs. This personalization elevates loyalty programs from transactional tools to key components of the customer journey, enhancing repeat business and fostering long-term loyalty.

Embracing the Future: Navigating the Cookieless Landscape with Retail Data

Retail data opens up a treasure trove of opportunities for deeper customer insights, personalized experiences, and predictive analytics. This shift is a strategic evolution, positioning brands to not just understand but also anticipate customer needs, forging stronger, trust-based connections.

In this new era of marketing, customer-centric strategies define the approach, with personalization and predictive insights actively driving engagement and loyalty. As we navigate this cookieless landscape, leveraging first-party data is not just about adapting. Marketers need to transform every customer interaction into deeper engagement and lasting loyalty. The future of marketing lies in creating not just transactions, but meaningful relationships powered by data-driven insights.

CTV + Live Streaming – What You Need to Know

With the rise of cord-cutting and the 2023 Hollywood strikes delaying content creation, tapping into live-streaming CTV inventory has piqued marketers’ interest with its ability to reach a highly engaged audience. Live-streaming offers brands a valuable space to programmatically connect with consumers at scale to drive awareness goals with the added benefit of flexibility that is not found in traditional linear TV buys. If you’ve been on the fence about testing live streaming in your marketing initiative, you likely have many questions regarding how to efficiently and effectively leverage this inventory.

For this Live Streaming Q&A article, we met with two CTV experts – Stephen Eidelman, Director of Inventory Development at The Trade Desk, and Joel Schaffner, Manager of Programmatic Operations at Coegi. They answered key questions to help inform your planning and activation of live streaming inventory to achieve your brand goals.

Why should advertisers incorporate live-streaming CTV into their strategic plan?

Joel: Incorporating live streaming CTV into a strategic plan is a great way to reach a new set of users at a slightly different angle. The live-streaming viewer is typically more engaged since they’re watching content in real-time, instead of having something on in the background that they can go back and watch later.

Stephen: Similar to the reason they have been historically coveted properties in linear TV advertising, live sports are highly sought after because they draw large audiences that are attentive and emotionally engaged – up through the very last second.  Not only does streaming account for more than 30% of live sports viewership, but we’ve also seen advertisers reach audiences that are completely unique compared to audiences in linear live sports and non-live sports streaming, meaning the only way to connect with that audience is by buying on live streaming sports. 

What has been a key driver of the increase in interest and investment in live streaming?

Stephen: Viewership patterns have shifted, so much so that the majority of Americans are expected to be watching live sports via digital channels by next year. At the same time, top-tier broadcasters like NBC and Disney have continued to shift more of their highly valued properties to be distributed exclusively on streaming apps (i.e. Peacock & ESPN+). Some of the most sought-after content is only available on streaming, and you saw that this year with NFL games exclusively on ESPN+ or Peacock. Fans are a more passionate audience than regular viewers, and they can’t miss a game!

Joel: I think a couple of things have been key drivers in the growing interest of live streaming. For one, the pandemic accelerated the trend of people cord-cutting and shifting to streaming services, making live streaming an avenue to reach a larger, more highly engaged audience.  Another thing is that live streaming inventory is much more accessible now, so marketers can seamlessly integrate it into their plans to test and compare performance with other streaming inventory.

How can marketers measure the impact of live-streaming CTV on brand goals?

Joel: Reach is a primary KPI for CTV in general, but especially for live streaming inventory since it is often seen as a mass reach play. With our partner, The Trade Desk, we can measure the quality of reach by comparing the users the CTV campaign reached to the seed audience, such as site visitors, sales data, and CRM lists. This measures the quality of our reach and helps us optimize media spending toward users that drive brand goals. We can also track offline actions, enabling conversion attribution to a user exposed to our brands’ live-streaming ads. 

Stephen: This is the beauty of live sports in streaming, you can achieve the same goals, and measure the same impact in live sports as you do in the rest of streaming. Whether it’s awareness, incremental reach, or outcome impact, all the targeting and measurement available in streaming is available in CTV. 

What is the impact on user engagement running in live streaming compared to standard CTV?

Joel: Standard CTV user engagement is valuable since media is reaching an entire household on the biggest screen, but live streaming takes this engagement to another level. The real-time factor of live-streaming content means that the audience is more engaged as they set time aside from their day to watch this specific event. 

Stephen: Live sports engagement is highly concentrated because the viewership patterns are usually in a set period of time, either a few minutes or several hours if they’re binging sports all day. The spikes in traffic are larger, so live sports can generate a larger audience reach much faster compared to other genres.

What are some best practices marketers should know for live streaming?

Stephen: Start broader and build your campaigns across all sports and leagues since there are live sports with big audiences all year round. You can also gain flexibility by getting into live sports programmatically without being tied to larger commitments or spending thresholds that are often required of traditional TV advertising. The growth of streaming allows for more and more types of sports to be aired, meaning more opportunities for advertisers as more diehard fans watch live sports via streaming. 

Joel: Some best practices marketers should consider when planning and executing campaigns on live streaming are to: 

  • Plan in advance
  • Plan for higher CPMs than standard CTV due to the high demand of live-streaming content, and 
  • Invest in high-quality and meaningful creatives since these ads will be seen on a big screen with highly engaged viewers

Are there any potential challenges to be aware of when leveraging live streaming?

Stephen: Live sports are unpredictable, and no two campaigns in live sports will be the same. That’s dependent on the sport, the teams involved, the time of day and so much more, so don’t expect that you can replicate the same recipe every live game. Aaron Rodgers getting injured in the first few minutes of the Jets season is a prime example of that – and also why advertisers need flexibility rather than being locked into deals for games that became far less appealing without start power. One thing to be conscious of is league sponsorships and other agreed upon contracts that may limit access to inventory. However, we see so much scale in live sports that advertisers should not be deterred – in fact, we’ve seen over one billion impressions of football-related content in a given weekend. Imagine all of the opportunities just in one weekend alone.

Joel: Of course, there are potential challenges to be aware of when leveraging live streaming but challenges is what makes the programmatic team at Coegi thrive! One obvious challenge can be the seasonality of live-streaming events which causes a high demand for the inventory. You can mitigate the shifts in demand by continuously monitoring the campaign’s bidding parameters and adjusting as needed in order to win in the ad auction.

What criteria should marketers consider when selecting live-streaming inventory?

Stephen: It’s important to approach live streaming with a balance of the marketing initiative’s overall goals (e.g. reach, frequency, outcomes) since regional and national live-streaming content are both available. By sticking to an audience strategy and testing across all live sports, for example, there is an opportunity for unconventional wisdom (sports co-viewing) and to find audiences when they are highly engaged and leaned in.

Joel: When selecting live streaming inventory, marketers should consider what type of event their ad will be viewed during – college sports, professional sports, awards shows, etc. It’s important to consider because each live event draws a different audience with various interests and purchase intents.  

What audience targeting strategies should marketers utilize to effectively reach their core audience?

Joel: Always consider the geotargeting parameters as some regions may align more with the marketing goal. Demographics, such as age, are also important to broadly refine the core audience media intends to reach. When thinking of data-driven audience strategies, try to keep this fairly broad as live streaming inventory is competitive, and efficiently scaling can be a challenge if too many variables are layered on.

Stephen: Advertisers need to understand who their audience is in live sports if they want to provide the best ad experience and use a strategy rooted in precisely reaching the core audience when and where they are watching live sports. Building your strategy around strong, authenticated data so you can see that the avid baseball viewer is also a loyal grocery store shopper requires a cross-channel identifier like UID2. This is especially important since much of the rise in live sports viewership is also taking place on non-traditional TV devices, such as tablets and mobile phones, so you want to connect the dots across viewers and devices for the best ad experience.

And finally, what piece of advice would you give to markets to run a successful live-streaming CTV campaign?

Stephen: Getting in programmatically provides cost efficiency by offering flexibility, control, and access that otherwise would only be available from larger networks or league sponsorships. If a game is a blow out by halftime, you don’t risk wasting budget on the second half that likely had significantly less viewership. Consolidating live sports within your CTV planning will also give marketers better decisioning and frequency management with the line of sight into the rest of the marketing objectives.

Joel: As most live events are scheduled at least a year in advance, it’s never too early to start planning. However, I recommend planning at least one month in advance of the campaign’s intended launch date. One of the first things to consider during the planning period is what kind of live events to incorporate in the strategy in order to reach the right audience. 

To learn more about broader CTV strategies, check out our other Q&A with The Trade Desk or take a deep dive with Connected TV Advertising Guide.

 

4 Digital Marketing Trends Sparking Strategic Growth in 2024

Welcome to the ever-evolving realm of digital marketing, where change is the only constant, and marketers sometimes feel like they’re surfing a wave that just won’t quit. As 2024 quickly approaches, it’s not enough to simply predict the next wave – marketing teams must master the art of riding it. Plan to seamlessly weave them into your strategies and create a digital ecosystem that resonates with your audience. 

The Digital Marketing Revolution of 2023: Strategic Imperatives for Growth and Connection

As we gear up to embrace the trends that will define the upcoming year, it’s equally crucial to cast a retrospective glance at the lessons learned and trends witnessed in the past year; exploring the currents that have propelled us to this point and laying the groundwork for the strategic surf ahead.

Content Grounded in Research and Careful Planning

In 2023, content ceased to just exist – it delivered purpose. Meticulously crafted, research-backed content seized consumer attention, proving quality and relevance outshine brevity. Consumers devoured content across various formats, from extended TikTok videos to long-form articles, reaffirming that quality and relevance surpass brevity. The results are clear – dedicate resources to content that educates, entertains and supports customers.

Consumer Insights Unlock Growth

In 2023, first-party data emerged as the primary driver of marketing success. As Coegi’s President emphasized, harnessing consumer insights from owned properties unlocks substantial value. He even threw in a friendly reminder – having first-party data without a strategy is like having a toolbox without a plan. The time is now to get strategic, tap into the goldmine of consumer insights to personalize experiences. The growth implications are immense.

Retail Media Reshapes Strategy

The emergence of retail media took center stage as a primary driver for digital marketing campaigns. Only gaining substantial emphasis in the past two or three years, its trajectory transformed. 2023 marked its seismic rise from the experimental budget line to the backbone of consumer packaged goods (CPG) marketing campaigns.

We are at a pivotal juncture where it’s essential for brands to adopt omnichannel strategies, placing retail media at the forefront and shifting social media into a more supportive role. The strategic imperative is clear – retail media first.

Breakthrough Digital Marketing Trends Poised to Captivate Customers in 2024

AI is Revolutionizing Digital Marketing

Artificial Intelligence (AI) has evolved beyond a buzzword; it stands as a transformative force elevating your marketing success. Like a strategic genie, AI delivers hyper-personalization, automates rote tasks, and unlocks data-fueled consumer insights on demand. 

With 80% of marketers witnessing a positive impact, it’s clear that AI has transitioned from being a nice-to-have to a must-have. It’s imperative to harness the power of AI immediately and integrate it deeply into your marketing strategies. With AI transforming the marketing field, it’s vital for marketing teams to focus on essential integration areas to maintain a competitive advantage in this dynamic market.

  • Sentiment Analysis for Personalized Experiences: Implement sentiment analysis powered by generative AI into your marketing strategy to craft personalized customer experiences. Employ advanced algorithms to customize content and recommendations based on individual preferences, thereby enriching user engagement and satisfaction.
  • Instant Service Bots: Embed smart AI chatbots to engage customers with responsive, personalized interactions, boosting satisfaction.
  • Strategic Insights Arsenal: Unlock actionable intelligence by unleashing algorithms on unused data to sharpen targeting and segmentation.
  • Automate Routine Tasks: Free up talent by using AI to eliminate repetitive tasks like email workflows and social media scheduling through automation. By automating these repetitive processes, your team can redirect their efforts toward high-impact, strategic initiatives, boosting overall productivity.

By activating AI across these four areas, you not only free your teams to focus on high-value strategies but also unlock the potential for more meaningful interactions with your audience. The result? Immediate opportunity to better serve customers and outpace the competition. 

The First-Party Imperative: Winning Customer Intelligence to Fuel Growth

With the looming threat of cookies getting the boot in 2024, your first-party lists are about to become the MVPs of your marketing strategy. Far beyond lifeless lists, rich first-party data fortifies marketing strategies by enabling immersive personalization and forging enduring consumer bonds.

With consumers increasingly expecting hyper-relevant brand experiences, first-party data serves as rocket fuel – when artfully collected through value-driven relationships. This inside track on customer truth unlocks a multi-faceted competitive advantage. First, intimately understand your customers. Then, engage them in a relationship – not a transaction. With consumer trust earned, responsive audiences readily share information and preferences. 

Activate a systematic first-party data blueprint using these five high-impact strategies to own your consumer connection: 

  • Optimized Website Forms: Ensure that your website features user-friendly forms that encourage visitors to willingly provide information. This could include newsletter sign-ups, account registrations, or surveys.
  • Omnichannel Data Integration: Break data silos by connecting data collected from various touch points – website, social media, email interactions – to build a comprehensive customer profile. This integrated approach provides a more holistic view of your audience.
  • Consistent Data Updates: Establish consistent triggers that encourage users to update their preferences regularly, keeping data current amid evolving consumer needs and preferences.
  • Interactive Content Experiences: Compel users to self-identify through polls, assessments, calculators, and other diagnostic tools woven into the consumer journey.
  • Incentivized Programs: Implement loyalty programs, discounts, or exclusive access in exchange for customers sharing their information. This not only encourages data collection but also fosters a sense of value for the customer.

The rewards are immense for brands centralizing first-party data – enhanced segmentation and targeting, future-proofed marketing strategies, and customer experiences driving satisfaction through relevance. Integrating first-party data into your digital marketing strategy is a strategic move that unlocks a wealth of insights and enhances your ability to connect with your audience on a personal level. Prioritize first-party data collection and usage. Your personalized approach will thank you later. 

Retail Media Reshapes the Digital Landscape

Retail media has solidified its status as a disruptive marketing powerhouse. By engaging shoppers at the point of purchase, retail media delivers hyper-targeted ads without relying on unstable third-party data.

As consumers increasingly discover and purchase products through retailers, these platforms will reshape strategies. Insider Intelligence predicts a noteworthy surge of 28.6% in retail media ad spend for the year 2024, reaching a substantial total of close to $60 million. For marketing teams mapping out 2024 plans, retail media can no longer be an afterthought. Its trajectory as marketing’s predominant disruptor means integration must become a strategic pillar to lift visibility and results.

The time is now for you to lean into retail media’s unmatched ability to connect with high-intent users through relevant ads and premium placement. Integrating retail media into your 2024 strategy is a pivotal step toward enhancing visibility, engagement, and, ultimately, the success of your marketing initiatives. Here’s a few things to consider when planning your strategy.

  • Strategic Platform Selection: Strategically identify and invest in dominant retail media platforms where your audiences are actively discovering and purchasing. Commit resources to owned properties with the most traction. 
  • Point-of-Purchase Activation: Engage shoppers with contextual messaging and offerings to breakthrough the clutter at that crucial instant at the digital shelf where decisions are made.
  • Acknowledge Consumer Behavior: Continually realign efforts to acknowledge where consumers are demonstrating shopping behavior shifts. Tailor your strategy to align with these preferences.
  • Strategic Adoption: Approach retail media as an urgent marketing imperative – not a tactical experiment – fusing it into the very fabric of 2024 plans to lift brand visibility and engagement.
  • Utilize Direct Engagement: Harness retail media’s unparalleled avenues to deliver tailored brand messaging that resonates at the individual level based on each platform’s unique consumer DNA.
  • Performance Optimization: Regularly measure and analyze the success of your retail media initiatives. Track metrics such as visibility, engagement, and conversion rates to gauge the effectiveness of your strategy.

In 2024, marketers are experiencing rapid growth and strengthening their brand’s distinct value by integrating retail media into their strategies.

The Social Commerce Boom

As consumers increasingly take to social platforms to discover and purchase products, social commerce has emerged as retail’s new normal..

With social media shopping revenue expected to surge to $1.2 billion by 2024, brands must prioritize integrated social commerce to effectively engage audiences. The numbers signal that the time has come for social platforms to transform from casual scrolling to frictionless buying destinations. Find several strategies below to embrace social commerce effectively in 2024:

  • Optimize for Shoppable Posts: Break down barriers between discovery and purchase by enabling integrated product exploration and payment functionality for platforms like Instagram and Facebook.
  • Influencer Commerce Alliances: Activate influential brand ambassadors to connect target consumers with products through embedded social commerce capabilities and exclusive offers. 
  • Exclusive Social Promotions: Drive urgency and action by giving social followers unique access to exclusive promotions and discounts available only on owned social properties. 
  • Performance Intelligence Infrastructure: Utilize analytics tools to track and analyze the performance of your social commerce efforts. Measure key metrics like conversion rates, click-through rates, and customer acquisition costs to refine and optimize your strategy.
  • Seamless Cross-Channel Integration: Ensure a seamless integration of social commerce with your overall multichannel strategy. Align your social media efforts with your website, email marketing, and other touchpoints for a cohesive customer experience.

By seamlessly intertwining social media and direct sales, marketers are not only streamlining the customer journey but also tapping into the rich tapestry of trust and engagement woven within social communities.

Key Takeaways for Your Marketing Strategy

The digital marketing landscape is undergoing a paradigm shift powered by disruptive technology and shifts in consumer behavior. As the course ahead is chartered, new frameworks must emerge across five pivotal domains – AI, first-party data, retail media, and social commerce.

Marketing leaders must be able to realign strategies, budgets and teams to activate these trends in order to gain a durable competitive advantage and build future-proofed growth models. Complacency poses grave risk. Effective leadership recognizes the need for bold and decisive action in response to changing circumstances, and with marketing currently experiencing a significant transformation, that moment is undeniably now.

The window of opportunity is immediate; build your vision and begin navigating uncharted waters armed with five navigational pillars able to elevate relevance, engagement and profitability in your decidedly digital future.

The Power of Independent Agencies with John Harris of Worldwide Partners

This Q&A is an adaption of a conversation between Coegi’s SVP of Marketing Innovation, Ryan Green, and John Harris, President of WPI, where they offer invaluable perspectives on the changing landscape of CMO roles, the evolving needs of brands, and the advantages independent agencies have in meeting a brand’s marketing needs. 

The following is an edited transcript of The Loop Marketing Podcast. Click here to listen to the full episode on one of your favorite streaming platform.

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Ryan Green: Hello everybody. Welcome back to The Loop Marketing Podcast. I’m Ryan Green, the Senior Vice President of Marketing Innovation at Coegi, and I’m honored to be joined by John Harris. He’s the president of Worldwide Partners. 

As a little bit of a background, Coegi just joined Worldwide Partners this year. Worldwide Partners is a group of independent agencies, about 80 agencies worldwide that cover the full gambit of marketing services, from creative to production to branding to media and data services. John has done a spectacular job of bringing together some of the brightest minds, a worldwide of agencies and innovative groups, that are really contributing to some breakthrough marketing and advertising campaigns. It’s an honor to join your network and it’s an honor to have you today John. So thanks for joining us.

John Harris: Ryan, Thank you and we couldn’t be happier to have Coegi joining the network. You’ve been a fabulous edition and really contributing at a very high level. So, officially welcome and looking forward to our conversation.

Ryan: Yeah, and it’s a pertinent one as so much is changing in marketing even before the pandemic but certainly afterwards. The value of truly collaborative partners to brands I think, the lens of that has changed – at least the 10 years that I’ve been at Coegi, but certainly recently too. Independents have an interesting strategic advantage in a lot of situations to be able to really integrate with the business goals of the brands that we’re representing and to bring forth the right tools and the right people to cut through a lot of the red tape, to be more quick and nimble. 

I’d love to hear more about the genesis of your involvement with Worldwide Partners. What ultimately led you to found the network? What’s your background?

John: Sure, well, I’ll start way back when, but I’ll be brief because I’m not sure everybody wants to hear my whole history. I first started in marketing working for a radio station in Houston, Texas as the station mascot. So if you think those big old wooden radios that were rounded at the top. The mascot was called the Runaway Radio, it was a red one with a lightning bolt on the top and a slit over my head and had white tights and big red shoes, and had no peripheral vision in this costume.

Ryan: I’m disappointed that you did not wear that today for the podcast.

John: Yeah, well, I thought about it, but my job was to go to station events and interact and dance with the listeners. We would do a broadcast on a Saturday morning at a McDonald’s. We were promoting McDonald’s breakfast and meals.  At the time local radio station jocks were celebrities so people wanted to see them. We’d have 500 people show up while we were doing a live broadcast and at lunchtime we would go to a car dealership and broadcast from there, and another 500 people would show up, and 300 of them were at breakfast with us. Then that evening we would do something in a nightclub and broadcast, and another 600 people showed up, and 300 of them were at the car dealership. So I was just fascinated by a brand’s ability to literally move people from place-to-place and I think that’s where I first got my bug for this very early on.

I first got into the agency business working for Wunderman at a holding company, managing sports marketing for Miller Brewing Company. From there, I moved to Colorado to work at an independent agency that was actually a reverse trend of what we’re seeing now, which was Coors taking their in-house marketing team and then outsourcing it. So a new agency was set up and they recruited those of us from around the country that had beer experience. When I came there, I was fortunate enough to work on Coors, Procter & Gamble and McDonald’s. After that I went client side at a fast casual restaurant chain called Smashburger. Then, I went to the performance marketing space and back to the client side as a CMO. 

Finally, I was on LinkedIn and saw an ad that said Global Advertising Network in Denver, which is where I live. Those words do not end up in the same sentence very often. I explored this and saw that there was an independent agency network out there. I wasn’t familiar with the independent agency network model, and I saw an opportunity to take some of the background that I had at the agency side and at the client side. In both of those, it was really building out service platforms. As a client, I was selecting my performance media agency, I was building a creative team, I was finding the right experiential partner and bringing them together to collaborate, as you talked about earlier. Then, on the agency side, I was building cross-functional, cross-office teams to service clients. So the opportunity to do it at the global level and do it with independent agencies was just a fascinating opportunity for me. So, now you and I are here seven and a half years later having a conversation.

Ryan: That’s a great background and I love always working with people that have an unorthodox background. 

Let’s dive in a little bit about independents, right? I think that’s the one thing that brings us together. When you hear talk about the value of independent [agencies] and the partnerships we bring, maybe to somebody who for the first time that they’re considering picking an agency at all, or getting out of the holding company and into a realm of new possibilities, how do you talk about the value that independents bring versus either in-house teams or holding company agencies?

John: Yeah, I think, what’s been an incredible trend of clients moving more and more towards independent agencies. I think we had this moment, I don’t know, seven or eight years ago, where you were seeing more independent agencies being invited to pitches that may have typically been the territory of the large holding companies. I think that moment turned into a movement because clients are recognizing that independent agencies can bring a level of agility and speed. 

You mentioned the collaborative spirit early on and it’s really an entrepreneurial spirit, right? If you look at a holding company model, these are publicly traded companies. They have an obligation at the end of the day, no matter what, to deliver a positive return for their shareholders. In the independent agency world, you have the freedom to do what’s right for the clients. Sometimes that is investing more in a client’s business. And, when we do that as an agency, that’s not the client’s problem – that’s our problem. It’s our decision to make because we’ve had the ability to do it, but it really changes it from a shareholder mindset to a stakeholder mindset. I think independent agencies always put senior level talent on the business because, let’s face it, clients don’t need just arms and legs, they need heads. You’re a senior representative on the Coegi team and I’m sure you are working with your clients each and every day. So, having the business leadership, the business mindset, and ensuring you’re having the most senior level people working on your business each and every day, is a significant value that independent agencies bring to the table. 

Also with freedom comes the freedom to challenge. Clients will come to us and they’ll say, look, here’s what we want you to do. Independent agencies are always going to say here’s really what we think you should do and challenge, not in an argumentative way, but in a collaborative way without the fear of saying, “oh my God, if we lose this account, then we’re not going to get our bonuses.” You just have people who bring it every day and come with a business mindset, and they’re going to get it done no matter what it takes. I think that’s a very, very unique value proposition that independent agencies have alone. 

Clients aren’t going to hire us just because we’re independent. At the end of the day, we have to bring those behaviors and demonstrate that we can actually move their business forward. That is ultimately what clients are looking for.

Ryan: Yeah, I’ll definitely steal the stakeholders vs. shareholders verbiage. That’s really significant too because a lot of times it is the owners that are still involved with creating the strategy and pushing our clients forward too. A lot of times I think that’s probably pretty obvious with branding creative shops. The work almost speaks for itself, but that’s also true with media.

As an independent media agency that has seen the proliferation of programmatic and automated media buying, I can tell you that that’s not true. In fact, the push for shareholders as the primary focus has hidden a lot of fees and a lot of baggage underneath the surface at holding companies that don’t really exist with independents from the media side. Is that something that you’ve seen? Or am I just painting a rosy picture of why independent media agencies actually do have a strategic advantage by bringing the client’s business first, by bringing senior people who aren’t doing the bait and switch from pitch to execution? 

John: Absolutely. Well let’s tackle it from a couple of fronts. I think on the media front, there is a perception that bigger is better. That this antiquated idea of buying power is what’s driving, what is an extremely democratized digital media environment now. I mean, the programmatic tools that either agencies have, in some cases, have built, or have access to, have 100% leveled the playing field. So this is no longer a story of “what is your media spend?” So I think technology, the platforms, have democratized it. 

I also think that when you look at the upfront side, even on the digital side of it, holding company agencies are buying this inventory. If you’re not their top client, you’re not going to get the best inventory. So that doesn’t happen in the independent space, right? We go at this and put the value of the relationship with the media publishers over the spend. We have agencies that have all of the same level of access to alphas and betas from these major publishers that the holding companies have and we’re not coming in with a pre-packaged solution. You guys are bringing this at a very, very customized level based on what the client needs, not based on what a holding company agency might have to sell. So you’re absolutely right. It’s no longer the case. 

Then the bait and switch that you referenced, we were in a pitch yesterday. A global pitch with a major brand that I can’t share right now. We told them, this isn’t the pitch team. This is your team and it was myself and the senior level executives, and these are the people that are working on the business. So, yes, that’s what you’re going to get from an independent agency. So it’s a big advantage.

Ryan: When you look within independents, what are the things that you look for, especially as you’re attracting and evaluating independent agencies joining your network? What are the things that you’re looking for that differentiate good and great?

John: Let’s start with the customer, the CMO, and why our value proposition as a network is relevant to the CMO and then how that cascades down to the agencies that join us and what separates good from great. 

Change is a constant for CMOs. They are consistently having to innovate, to push the business forward. Resources are limited; we could all use more resources. They articulated that there were some internal gaps in skills that they had with their team that they needed to support with outside partners. There was almost, maybe a level of anxiety around having to constantly prove marketing value. That this is not an expense, but rather, it’s creating value for the organization overall. That’s a matter of driving growth, so this is not an easy job as a CMO. 

There’s a high degree of pressure that comes with it. You are trying to do two things: you are trying to minimize risk and you’re trying to maximize impact. So when you talk to the most progressive CMOs, what they’re doing is, they’re building out these marketing ecosystems. It’s around subject matter expertise. 

So when they are trying to identify the right agency partners that may manifest itself in an RFP, what they’re really doing when they issue an RFP is they’re issuing an RFE, which is a request for expertise. Sometimes that expertise is by market, it’s by industry vertical, it’s by audience, it’s by channel, it’s by capability. At the end of the day, by surrounding themselves with experts, just going back to the CMOs goal, they want minimized risk and maximized impact. That’s how we’ve engineered the network, and this solution can meet the very precise needs and business challenges of today’s marketers and through one of the largest and most fastest growing independent networks in the world. 

What makes this proposition unique is that the agencies [in Worldwide Partners] are 100% committed to collaboration within each other. We’ve talked about the holding companies, we talked about the fact that they’re publicly traded and that they’re using acquisition to create scale and diversification to offer clients and deliver value to shareholders. In our model, we’re actually set up as a reverse holding company. I didn’t “found” the network, right? I don’t “own” the network. The network was founded 85 years ago which is crazy to think about, and the agencies actually own the network. 

My accountabilities are to a board of directors of agency leaders around the globe and we work together to set the goals and the strategies. What happens here is, rather than the network dictating the terms to the agencies, the agencies are actually dictating the terms to the networks. So what that means for clients is, you’re going to get some of the top independent agencies in the world. We have experts in 90 different industry verticals, we have everything from performance and digital media agencies to creative agencies to experiential agencies to PR agencies. 

So let’s go back to what CMOs want. They are saying, I need this in this market with this capability. For example, I don’t just need a pharma agency, but I need a pharma agency in New Jersey that has child oncology experience and a UX capability, and med ed tech capabilities. What we’re able to do is when a remit comes in is say, yes, we have that. Yes, that may sound like a holding company, but what’s fundamentally different is we have not acquired all of these agencies and said, you guys come together, push clients between each other’s offices, cross sell services and make our shareholders all this money. These agencies are working together because they’ve chosen to work together, not because they have to work together. That element of opting in is the only incentive that they need to work together, because every agency has made a personal commitment that I want to be a part of this. We’re going to give you everything you need and nothing that you don’t, right? We’re not here to oversell. 

So, that’s kind of how we’ve shaped the network proposition. 84 agencies in 46 countries, 40 of them are full service, 12 media, 6 creative, and 26 specialist agencies.

Ryan: The brilliance of it is thinking and really tapping into what the CMO needs. You talked about how they’re trying to build an ecosystem, and you’ve built an ecosystem essentially that can cover all of those CMOs needs and be able to pick the three needs that they have to fit their ecosystem. Everything becomes customized to what their brand, their business needs. 

That being said, I think even the title Chief Marketing Officer, is under siege a little bit. There’s Chief Growth officers, Chief Revenue Officers that you’re seeing more. I’ve been to a couple of the ANA conferences that have Chief Media Officers that are separate from the Chief Marketing Officer. There’s always the friction between finance and the CFOs wanting to have an ROI calculation for every single breath that the CMO takes. So being able to sit and understand where they’re coming from, where their challenges are, and what their customer’s challenges are too, goes another layer deeper. We’re able to do that and I’m so thankful to be part of Worldwide Partners because I’m smarter now as a marketer. Because of the collective experience that I’ve gotten from working with such a great ecosystem of agencies that you’ve built.

John: If I might build on something that you said when you were talking about the evolution of the title of CMO. Chief Growth Officer, Chief Revenue Officer, Chief Product Officer, Chief Commercial Officer, it all comes back to what I talked about earlier of the requirement of demonstrating value. I don’t want to make this about myself, but I think it’s important for us to all understand this context. When I became a CMO, I was thrilled. I was invigorated because having been on the agency side for 15 years, where you are consistently trying to uncover the right insight and bring forth strategies, now I was gonna be on the other side of the table. I was going to get to make the call, right? It was on me. So I went into the role thinking that now I’m going to be able to work on the brand of the business and make the decision. 

But the reality of it is, 95% of that CMOs job or Chief Growth Officers job, or whatever you want to call it, has absolutely nothing to do with media and with making decisions on creative campaigns. It is a marketing operations role. It is managing through a matrix organization. It is looking and understanding the impact of adding a different label to one sweater and the cost implications of that on EBITDA. It is doing menu board optimization and understanding what’s more profitable. Do we do a free drink with a burger or a free fried egg with a burger? You are forecasting out the operational component of the marketing implications. 

So when you think about it, if agencies are not focusing on the 95% of what the CMOs job is, you are nothing but a commoditized resource. If you’re only focused on delivering the 5% of their role, then you are replaceable. Not to get ahead of, one of our questions I know we’re going to explore is, what makes a good independent agency a great independent agency. The great independent agencies are saying, I need to be up here in this 95% helping and adding value to my client’s job there. Not just in the, just purely in the media and the creative side of it.

Ryan: Then leading into the question that you know was coming, do great agencies then have a really intimate understanding of the customer, of our clients, and are empowering the brands that we’re working with to have even more astute understanding of those customers to empower the CMO, to bridge those conversations between the spreadsheet and the customer?

John: Without question. I think that with the great independent agencies, quite honestly there’s no shortage of data. But, what the CMO and the CEO don’t need is another dashboard. They don’t need a weather report. They need someone who’s going to extract the meaningful data from the dashboards and say, this is happening, and why do I care? What are the implications of this for my business? What are we going to do differently because of the data? I think that’s where agencies have an opportunity to really, really support clients. The ability to interpret the data into something that’s meaningful and actually contextualize the data. Great agencies are doing that for their clients and really kind of defining your value to the client within that ecosystem by doing so.

Ryan: Makes a lot of sense. So, what are the elements that make the strongest brand agency relationships? Agencies don’t wanna have a two year lifeline either. We wanna be partners for 20 years. What are the elements that make those long lasting, trusting, impactful partnerships? What advice do you have for brands to seek the agencies that are ready to partner for the long haul?

John: Building on the previous discussion about what makes great agencies, I think great agencies understand where they can add the most value. They’re not trying to be everything to everyone. Agencies hate it when I talk about specialization because it feels like it’s this limiting thing. But I actually think specialization can be an advantage in that it allows you to scale. In other words, if you’re the best at x, it doesn’t matter where you are in the world, clients are going to find you because they’re looking for a level of expertise. If you are an expert in delivering that value for clients, you should be able to charge a premium and clients will be willing to pay it because you understand where you can add the most value. 

You talked about trust and that’s an outcome, right? We always say we want to be partners, we don’t want to be vendors. But there’s something that we have to deliver to earn that right. I used to tell my team, when I was running an account group, that our job is to get our clients promoted. Just sit with that for a moment. If your KPI at Coegi was I’m going to get my clients promoted, what does that look like? It looks like, okay, why do they get promoted? They’ve had a high degree of performance in the business. They’re driving growth, they’re innovating, they’ve managed change. If you’re in the mindset of we’ve got to deliver a 10 to 1 ROS, or if you’re in the mindset of, I’ve got to get this person to the next level, you’re going to do everything you can as an agency to understand their world. Let me have a real clear understanding of what your path to performance and growth is and what are the KPIs that you have as an individual and how do I help you hit those? 

We’ve got to push the clients. Clients have to let us in and not be protective of the data and the drivers they’re having in their world. I think if you put yourself in that mindset in service of the client to get them to the next level, you are going to succeed and they’re going to succeed. We’ve been working with 3M for 15 years. We’ve been working with Las Vegas tourism for 40 years. We’ve been working with ActiVision for 17 years. These are unheard of relationships and it goes back to where we started, about the value of independent agencies, how they put the best people on the accounts, and how they’re committed 100% to putting stakeholder, which is the client, above everything else. Trust is an outcome of a behavior set. My belief is if you said that’s my KPI, I’m going to get my client promoted, you’re going to have a very long standing relationship.

Ryan: That’s a great KPI for account people in particular. How can I get you promoted is a more succinct way of getting to that. Are there any other thoughts that you’ve had to wrap up the conversation? Anything else that you’d like to say before I let you go?

John: I would just say the idea of understanding who you are as an agency, I think it’s absolutely critical. I think it gives you the ability to make decisions about every aspect of your business. We are very good at helping clients connect with their highest value customers. That’s exactly how Coegi positions itself. It guides every decision you make. It guides the type of investments you make in your organization. It guides the type of people that you hire. It guides the type of clients that you know you can be right for. That notion of freedom, you’re seeing independent agencies make smarter decisions about the partnerships with clients. They know when they’re right for a client and they’re open with the client if they feel like maybe we’re not the right solution for you and that’s okay because they have the freedom to not have to chase everything. When you know the pieces of business that you have the right to win when you’re going into the new business opportunities, because let’s face it, pitching is a lot of work and it’s a lot of time not just on the agency side, but on the client side of the business. The data has just come out that pitches are costing clients up to a million dollars in time. Independent agencies are saying no to the wrong opportunities, saying yes to the right opportunities, and I think the more that that happens, you’re going to see the partnership between clients and agencies just flourish. I’d leave a collective group of clients and agencies that are on this call to say let’s lean into the partnership opportunity, not treat each other as vendors, and really kind of work together to elevate everybody’s business. I think our industry’s going to be in a greater place moving forward.

Ryan: I love it John. Thank you so much for joining us and looking forward to everything that’s to come from our partnership. Thanks again.

John: Yep Ryan, a pleasure. Thank you.

Navigating the Evolving Digital Video Landscape: 2024 Trends and Strategies for Marketers

In the digital realm, we’ve witnessed firsthand the transformative power of converging technologies and evolving consumer preferences. The intensifying battle for user attention, the ubiquity of smartphones, the proliferation of streaming services, and the growing appetite for immersive, personalized experiences have propelled video to the forefront of content consumption, surpassing text-based alternatives.

2023 saw video marketing become the cornerstone of engagement, revolutionizing business connections. This surge showcases diverse content and devices catering to personalization, authenticity, and educational value, making video king in marketing strategies.

Video & The Consumer Consumption Landscape 

Imagine captivating a global audience of 3.5 billion by 2023. That’s the video revolution unfolding before us, and the screen time speaks for itself: Americans spend over 7.5 hours glued to screens daily, devouring video content with unmatched fervor. Marketers are chanting in unison: video reigns supreme in social media marketing. Over half (54%) have named video as the sovereign ruler, with its unmatched ability to enthrall audiences, educate them, and spur them to act.

 

Smartphones have become the go-to device for digital video consumption, embraced by 69% of U.S. adults. This shift away from traditional television is fueled by the widespread adoption of 5G connectivity, with nearly one in four smartphone owners streaming videos on the go.

 

While mobile video remains significant, connected TVs (CTVs) are poised to take the lead with video accounting for 90% of CTV content. This trend will reshape the digital video landscape by 2025, with CTV video, social video, and YouTube taking center stage. Subcategories like SVOD and TikTok will further solidify the dominance of CTV video and social video.

The Impact For Marketers: Digital Video Advertising Spend & Strategy

The global video advertising landscape is experiencing a seismic shift, propelled by user consumption patterns. With an expected video ad spend reaching a staggering $180 billion by year-end 2023, it’s clear that video is king. The United States leads the charge, with a significant portion of that budget allocated to search and social video ads. Both channels exhibit a strong mobile bias, while their presence on CTV remains limited.

 

But this is changing. CMOs are discovering the undeniable power of video, with a 24.74% increase in brand lift and recall, 21.71% improved user experience, and a whopping 40% boost in brand perception. This translates to a more engaged and informed audience, ultimately driving brand awareness and loyalty. While video’s direct sales impact sits at 15.65%, its ability to nurture leads and build trust makes it a vital tool for marketing teams. This is evident in the fact that 68% of marketers track engagement, and 51% now measure lead generation and conversion rates, recognizing video’s true value beyond just views and likes.

 

2023 witnessed a critical development in this evolution: a wave of CTV adoption across diverse industries, with retail, health & wellness, and CPG leading the charge. By 2027, retail media spending on CTV is projected to reach $8.64 billion. Yet, a crucial challenge remains: our lagging migration to CTV. Despite consumers spending a whopping 25% of their time on the platform, advertisers are underinvesting, allocating a mere 9.5% of digital ad budgets.. Concerns about limited inventory and premium pricing are holding us back.

 

It’s time to overcome these hurdles and unleash CTV’s potential. By collaborating and harnessing its power, we can reach target audiences where they are and achieve unparalleled success in this transformative era. The video advertising landscape is ripe for innovation and growth. By embracing the full potential of video across platforms, we can unlock unprecedented opportunities to engage with audiences and build lasting brand connections.

Trending: AI-Powered Digital Video Creation & Personalization

In the competitive landscape of 2024, AI-powered personalization and audience insights can elevate your video marketing campaigns to new heights of engagement and effectiveness:

Key Takeaways for Marketing Professionals

  • Embrace AI-driven personalization while prioritizing authenticity: Audiences are craving real connections, not manufactured perfection. Refine your content to resonate on a deeper level, but steer clear of anything inauthentic. Micro and nano-influencers who spark genuine conversations are your secret weapon. And remember, transparency is key – be upfront about AI’s role in crafting your message. This authenticity is your golden ticket to engagement, trust, and brand loyalty.
  • Utilize AI for efficiency, not replacement: Automate tasks and gain insights, but don’t let it replace human creativity. High-quality creative content remains essential for impactful marketing campaigns.
  • Craft personalized video journeys with AI-powered insights: Analyze customer data and deliver hyper-personalized video content, tailored to individual interests through dynamic elements, interactive experiences, and customized recommendations. It allows you to lean into using an inclusive approach by going beyond surface-level metrics while driving engagement and fostering loyalty.

Unleashing Innovation through Experimentation

  • Streamline your video production process & elevate your marketing videos with AI-powered platforms, empowering you to easily create engaging videos. These platforms can be used to create videos from text, add AI-powered voiceovers and avatars, and craft captivating social media videos.
  • Harness the power of AI-powered creative effectiveness platforms to revolutionize your campaign planning, video testing, and media planning. These platforms utilize advanced technologies like facial coding, eye tracking, and computer vision to provide unparalleled insights into your target audience’s behavior and preferences.
  • Foster inclusivity by leveraging AI-powered dubbing tools to unlock global audiences, enhance accessibility, and expand your video’s reach by removing language barriers through dubbing, subtitles, and captions.

Trending: Cross-screen, Cross-channel Advertising Solutions

As audiences divide their attention across various devices and engage in multitasking, marketers must reimagine their video advertising strategies to win them over:

Key Takeaways For Marketing Professionals

  • The rise of Netflix and Prime Video’s ad-supported tier: As CTV advertising gains traction and linear TV struggles to find its footing, Amazon’s Prime Video ad-supported tier is set to fuel a surge in ad spending. This presents marketers with a wealth of new diversification opportunities using multi-platform video ad campaigns to engage with a broader audience.
  • Distinguish your brand and engage viewers with premium-produced video ads: UGC’s authenticity and relatability can be highly effective, but its production quality often falls short of premium video content’s polished and refined aesthetic. As streaming TV continues dominating viewing habits, marketers should prioritize premium video content to capture attention and drive results.
  • Fragmented media consumption necessitates a multi-screen marketing approach: With 5G technology enabling seamless video delivery, marketers can now craft engaging ad experiences that adapt to individual viewing habits. By leveraging an omnichannel approach, you can ensure your message reaches the right audience at the right time, maximizing the impact of your campaigns.

Unleashing Innovation Through Experimentation

  • Streamline the shopping journey by incorporating shoppable CTV video ads: Seamlessly integrate product information and purchase options within your video ads, enhancing engagement and driving immediate conversions.
  • Tap into the massive audience consuming live sports online: As digital platforms compete for your ad dollars, unlock premium inventory with NFL Sunday Ticket on YouTube. Reach paying subscribers, traditionally targeted by major brands, with the precision of digital advertising. YouTube’s “multi-view” expands this inventory, offering even more targeted ad placements.
  • Long-form video investments drive exponential returns: Let performance, not production value, guide your video investments. Embrace a data-driven, multi-platform approach, and repurpose the content that truly connects.

Trending: Embracing Interactivity, Live Streaming, and Format Diversity

Marketers should strategically embrace the versatility of vertical and horizontal videos, strike a balance between short-form and long-form video content, and engage audiences in an interactive and immersive modern world:

Key Takeaways For Marketing Professionals

Unleashing Innovation Through Experimentation

  • Incorporate AR elements & VR experiences: Overlay virtual objects and graphics onto real-world scenes to create an interactive and immersive storytelling experience. Transport viewers into a virtual world where they can interact with your brand’s story and products in a fully immersive environment.
  • The Synergy of Branching Narratives and Gamification: By allowing viewers to choose their own path and incorporating engaging gameplay elements, you are enhancing viewer engagement, collecting valuable data, personalizing product recommendations, and fostering deeper connections. 
  • The powerful trifecta: Live shopping experiences, combined with horizontal and vertical video formats, and creator content, can create a powerful video advertising strategy that resonates across platforms and drives meaningful engagement with their target audience.

Digital video has emerged as a formidable force in the modern online world, offering marketers an unparalleled opportunity to captivate audiences and foster meaningful engagement. Marketers who fail to incorporate video into their strategies are forfeiting a valuable opportunity to connect with their target audience.

By embracing the evolving trends and unleashing innovation through experimentation, marketers can effectively navigate the ever-changing digital video landscape, establish deeper connections with their target audience, and achieve their marketing goals in 2024 and beyond.

Avoiding the BS in ABM

Account-based marketing, or ABM (because what’s a marketing term without a corresponding acronym), is a B2B strategy that targets specific, high-value accounts to convert them to a sale. The key differentiator between a traditional B2B approach and ABM is that the strategic focus for ABM is building relationships with specific accounts’ key decision makers that require a personalized experience to generate qualified leads and incremental revenue. 

When initially evaluating how to implement an ABM strategy, you’ll likely be led to believe that you need to onboard specific ABM marketing platforms and measurement solutions in order to be effective. However, there’s a good chance that you already have the necessary tools to be successful – they just need to be reimagined with an ABM lens. Before opting to onboard new partners, read through our steps on how to implement an ABM strategy within your existing tech stack. 

Reaching the Right Audience

The foundation of any ABM initiative is an audience targeting strategy that enables media to accurately reach in-market accounts. The traditional approach to B2B audience targeting through digital channels is centered on driving users to the site to fill out leads forms, which are then the accounts that are manually qualified and followed up on by the sales team. The opposite happens with an ABM strategy, which starts with identifying the core accounts to engage with and nurture to simplify the process of fostering a relationship with the sales team. 

Developing an ABM strategy can feel overwhelming at first since it’s like trying to locate a needle in a haystack in order to reach key decision makers. However, it can be accomplished with strategic data partners that seamlessly plug-and-play within your key media buying platforms to maintain an integrated ecosystem. B2B data partners with ABM targeting solutions, such as Bombora and Dun & Bradstreet, can provide firmographic segments which use data to categorize organizations based on industry, location, technologies used, and more to identify and reach critical accounts. When evaluating data partners, it’s important to understand the methodology used to define audience segments to ensure the audiences are built to reach the intended users. Additionally, if your brand has existing CRM lists, ABM data partners can enrich the data to improve accuracy and scale. 

Scaling with Contextual Targeting

Given the nature of ABM audience targeting being more of a one-to-one approach to reach accounts and their respective key decision makers, campaigns may be susceptible to scaling issues. To mitigate low reach and high expenses, leverage contextual targeting as a complement to the data-driven audience targeting strategy to add scalability to the overall marketing initiative. Using contextual targeting, media is able to reach accounts while they are actively researching content that indicates interest or intent in a relevant product or service offering. Engaging users with relevant messaging while in the proper mindset can capture attention and drive key onsite actions. 

It’s important to note that contextual targeting has become far more intelligent than it was at its onset due to advancements in natural language processing and large language models. Contextual targeting is no longer a mass reach play, but rather an effective targeting strategy when executed with understanding of behavioral intent signals and corresponding keyword and top publishers research. 

Nurturing Leads with Sequential Messaging

Since a key differentiator between an overarching B2B strategy and ABM is a focus on the individual account, delivering a personalized experience from the initial touch point to the sale is critical. Sequential messaging can be leveraged as a lead nurturing strategy that provides the key decision maker with the information they need based on their intent signals and current stage in their buying journey. Utilizing previous ad engagement and onsite actions as data touchpoints, sequential messaging can provide a series of ads to potential customers that tell a continual, highly tailored story to drive users toward conversion. For example, if a user downloads a whitepaper, signaling interest in a product or service but have not yet converted into a qualified lead, targeting them with tailored messaging to drive them back to the site with a specific offer could result in the acquiring of a new account. 

Many programmatic buying platforms that are likely already part of your tech stack have sequential targeting logic incorporated into the audience builder, enabling re-engagement based on exposure to or interaction with a creative message or key actions taken on the brand’s site.

Determining Effectiveness with a Measurement Strategy

The first step to developing a measurement framework is implementing a pixel strategy that captures key onsite actions to both inform campaign performance and enable custom audience creation. It’s important that the pixel strategy complements the media strategy to ensure all intent signals are captured to monitor stages in the consumer journey. Intent signals should be used to better understand your audience and its current needs instead of pushing for leads straight away before they are properly primed. 

That being said, paid marketing alone is rarely enough to fully nurture a lead into an account. But with an effective ABM approach, you can avoid clogging up your Salesforce with people who just wanted a whitepaper. Below are the key stages of the ABM journey and the corresponding key metrics to measure along the way:

  • Educate: It’s important to establish the brand as a thought leader in the industry and showcase the product or service’s value to decision makers in order to break into their consideration set. The initial touchpoint with key accounts should be centered on the education of the unique business application of the brand’s offering, fueled by a carefully curated content strategy. In this stage, measuring metrics such as time on site and scroll depth will indicate that media is reaching a qualified audience and capturing attention with content that satisfies a current interest or business need. Also, measuring cost per unique reach will inform if media is efficiently scaling and introducing the brand to a breadth of key decision makers.
  • Engage: The proper cadence of engagement with accounts is critical to a successful ABM strategy. Utilize intent signals and firmographics to understand the right time to engage with key decision makers, understanding what relevant information they’ll be looking for as well as typical buying cycles. It’s important to remember that each engagement with an account should bring value to aid in the decision making process. In this stage, measuring engagement metrics, such as cost per whitepaper download and cost per completed video view, will indicate if the message is resonating with the core target accounts to drive meaningful user activity.
  • Qualify: The final stage of the ABM journey is focused on acquiring qualified leads that eventually lead to a high revenue sale. It’s important to identify the true value of a qualified lead prior to the marketing campaign launch to establish cost per lead goals that better inform the platform algorithms on the value of lead to prioritize media spend toward. This will ensure media is capturing qualified leads from key decision makers that are indicating intent to convert. In this stage, it’s also important to measure return on investment (ROI) since leads aren’t guaranteed revenue. 
  • Evaluate: While marketing is primarily responsible for marketing qualified leads rather than sales qualified leads, it can still be valuable to measure sales cycle efficiency. This metric determines the effectiveness of media touchpoints at driving key decision makers from the awareness of the brand to the point of sale. This can help inform if the messaging and audience targeting strategies are reaching the right users with the right message at the right time.

Planning and activating an account-based marketing initiative can feel overwhelming since it is presented under the guise of complexity and needing specialized tools in order to succeed. But if you peel back the layers of ABM, you’ll discover that its core components are not entirely different compared to a traditional B2B strategy. Before reinventing the wheel, consider your approach to digital media and how the existing tools within your tech stack can be repurposed to apply to an ABM approach before investing time and money in yet another platform.   

 

Inside the World of Influencer Marketing with Tagger Media’s Peter Kennedy

This Q&A is an adaptation of a conversation between Coegi’s SVP of Marketing and Innovation, Ryan Green, and Peter Kennedy, the founder and president of influencer marketing company Tagger Media, which was recently acquired by Sprout Social. You can listen to the full episode of the podcast here

Read on to hear Peter’s insights on the startup journey, and how he was able to adapt and build a successful company by focusing on customer needs. ______________________________________________________________________________________________

Ryan: I’m happy to be joined by the founder and CEO of Tagger Media, Pete Kennedy. Thanks for joining us today. I know we have some big news to talk about but would love to hear a little bit about your background, a quick elevator pitch, and resume of how you got here today.

Pete Kennedy: Thanks for having me here. I’ve been doing stuff for a long time, but I’ve always kind of started companies. That’s always been my thing. So I’ve started companies in the independent travel space back in the.com era, I started a medical device company, I started a water sports recreational business, and then obviously most recently started Tagger Media about eight years ago.

Ryan: So, I don’t wanna bury the lead here. Tagger just got acquired by Sprout Social, so congratulations. I’m sure that was quite the process. I’d love to hear, and I’m sure our audience would love to hear a little bit about what happens during an acquisition – how do you know that the company that’s acquiring you is the right fit? What was that process like?

Pete: I think selling a company is harder than actually starting a company. Crazy enough. When they say that the deal changes a hundred times a day, it really does. We talked to Sprout probably in December of 2022 for the first time. They reached out and said, hey, we’re kind of looking at this space. The real conversation happened [in the late spring of 2023], and they came out and we met with their CEO, their president, head of business development, and what we were looking for is an opportunity to win in this space. 

Sprout has 30,000 customers and they’re all doing influencer marketing, ’cause it’s such a major part of the media mix and it’s obviously such an important part of the social space as well. What we were looking for is not only a company that we could scale with in a major way, but also the right cultural fit. This team is absolutely amazing. A lot of people are coming from Salesforce at that company, which is interesting. So they have this growth mentality and we have like maybe 10 sellers around the world. They have like 600. So it’s just this machine that we can jump into which is great, and that the entire team is so excited about Tagger and the ability to sell influencer to all their customers. 

Ryan: Let’s step back a little bit to when you first were kind of coming up with the concept of Tagger. Most businesses, and you’ve started a number of them in various industries, we’re trying to find a problem to solve, right? So what was the problem that you were really looking at and where did you see your ability and your team’s ability to find a unique solution with Tagger?

Pete: It’s so interesting, that ideation stage. There’s like five stages of a startup, right? There’s ideation, there’s launch, there’s validation, there’s growth, and then there’s maturity or exit. Ideation stage is so much fun and there’s two ways that you can really do this: One is, which is the smart way to do it, identify a need, and then create solutions based on that need. Or you can create an idea that you think is interesting that might pertain to a market and then you build that. We actually did both of those things when we started Tagger. 

We first started with this idea, and the idea was we wanted to disrupt the music industry. The music industry spends billions of dollars every year trying to find new artists and then promoting those artists. They do that by having boots on the ground all over the world. They have music bookers, they have doormen at venues who are seeing artists that they think are interesting, sound producers, all these different people. A lot of times they’re able to find these people very early on, but what we did is we said, well, let’s listen to everyone who matters in the music space, primarily on Twitter at the time. If everyone’s talking about “Ryan”, we could predict that “Ryan”’s gonna go somewhere. Not surprising. The most popular people early on are gonna go somewhere and it really had nothing to do with listening, likes, or views, which that market had been somewhat gamified. 

So we created this platform where we just tracked all these people, but we had to create databases of all these musicians. We had to create databases of all these people who were talking about musicians. When we turned on the platform, we found, like Dua Lipa eight years ago, we found Billie Eilish eight years ago. I mean, we found all these amazing artists and go to the music industry, right? To validate this concept and they all said, what do you idiots know about music? I was like, nothing, but listen, we’re doing what you’re doing, but we’re doing a million times a day and they said, we’re not interested. (Now, fast forward, most of those music companies are clients, not to find artists, but to find influencers.) 

Then I went to New York and I took 40 meetings in like a two week time period. And every time I was just pitching a new thing because we had this really interesting platform where we could understand audiences and their propensity, and we could find artists and all these things, but we didn’t know what we had and how it might apply to someone else’s business. Gary Vaynerchuk over at VaynerMedia, “Gary V”, his team heard what we were up to. We got a meeting and they heard about these crazy people running around New York meeting with everyone. Gary and his team were like, listen, we love your data, we love how you can understand audiences, but you need workflow around influencer marketing. 

I asked the most important question: what is influencer marketing? Because I had absolutely no idea. And he said we have 30 people running campaigns for these big brands around the world and we’re really doing it on Excel spreadsheets. So if you can take our workflow, and by the way, they were hiring like a thousand influencers per campaign. Absolutely crazy and they said, if you can take our workflow and put it into a platform, we’ll be your first customer. 

So I moved to New York for a month, and I lived with them to really understand what they actually needed. Instead of just making a spreadsheet on a platform, we wanted to take that workflow to figure out how we can make it easier. My development team’s in Poland, so I was going back and forth during that month. But by the end of the month, we were able to deliver them a product that worked for them. 

Then it was really interesting. We then brought on a couple more clients. So we could have gone big and just raised money and hired all these people, but we didn’t, we slowly got another client and then another client. We focused on agencies because they had the biggest pain points. Just like I did with Vayner, we would get a new client and then I would go sit with them for weeks and just go in their office and I’d watch the bouncing ball: Like, you discover influencers, but why are you discovering those influencers? Is there a strategy? Who’s the strategy person saying we need to go do that? I’d go meet with that person and then we would have to go pay these people. I’m like, well, who pays these people? They’re like, oh, that’s, accounts payable. I go talk to them. I’m like, well, what are your pain points? So it was interesting, within like a year, I would walk into every agency or any brand, and I would know more about their business because I lived with all these different people to really understand what their needs were. That’s really how we did it. So I was able to identify a need based off of them telling us “this is what we need,” then really just going in and understanding everyone else’s needs so that you can build a unified platform that works for both brands and agencies.

Ryan: So, continuing on that, what are some of the ways that influencer and content marketing has changed and how have those changes evolved the way your platform has changed? You talked about having a modular concept for different workflows with different agencies in house brands, et cetera. But the marketplace has changed quite a bit too externally, so what things have you seen change over the years and how has your company reacted to those changes?

Pete: Yeah, definitely. There are multiple different ways it’s changed. First of all, what you get from influencer marketing has changed dramatically, right? 

Back when I started this, it was very much a PR focus where it’s just like, let’s get these mentions out there. It kind of was replacing newspapers, magazines, and traditional PR because that had kind of died off and was really being replaced by influencer marketing. So it was very much awareness building KPIs. But that shift, that allowed money to flow into this space, is when agencies and brands started to look at this more as a paid media execution versus a PR execution, right? So we would go into agencies, especially PR agencies and train them about paid media. 

Really, Vayner was the one who kind of got me on this. I mean, the Chris Aldi who was running their influencer business, he works for us now, but he started Gary’s paid media business. He’s like, no, this is paid media. This is what it is. So, even if you’re paying someone or you’re giving them a free product, you’re giving them something that costs you money, it’s paid, right? So I think that was a big change. 

Then the platforms made it easier to report on these campaigns and measure an influencer campaign the same way we measure your other media mix. That was massive. For Procter and Gamble to put $200 million into this business, they need to be able to measure this the same way we measure their other media mix and that was vital. 

Then a big shift that we’ve seen, especially over the last two years, is we’re not selling our platform to the influencer marketing team. We are now selling to the strategy team, the analytics team, the growth team, the new business teams at agencies, the technology team. All these different teams are using our platform really to get a holistic view of what’s happening socially, right? Social listening is important. Sprout has this amazing social listening platform and they’re listening to everyone in the world. What we do is we fine tune that down to the people who actually matter in terms of moving culture and those are influencers or creators. So having that view is helpful when you create that strategy. 

Then I think the last thing that’s changed dramatically is just, AI and, well, I’m sure we’ll talk about this, but AI has just allowed us to really get a better understanding of what’s happening, being able to ingest billions of bits of data, consolidate that down to really specific things so you can be like, okay, yeah, It’s raining, but how do I make it rain harder? Or how do I make it stop raining? You need a platform like ours to do that.

Ryan: When we think about who, what, when, where, why and we’re talking about AI, I think AI has a lot of potential in the first four, and it’s that fifth one that seems to still be the human element of it. I think that’s almost true in your platform to some degree as well. I know you have why definitely covered there but that’s where the humans are spending most attention. Thinking about the, why the marketers behind the screen are interacting in that area, probably the most, if I were to summarize.

Pete: Well, I think that that is actually where AI comes in the most, to be honest with you. Let’s say that your client manufactures pickup trucks. Well, why are people buying your pickup truck versus someone else? How did those customers — marketers always say the customers actually position your brand. Marketers don’t position the brand, right? The consumer positions the brand, not marketers. So if we can take all the content from influencers about pickup trucks over the last eight months, it’s probably a million pieces of content. I can’t actually go through all that content to pull out nuggets, but I can put that through AI.

What AI will do is they will look at all of that content and they will pick out themes like within two seconds: Towing capabilities, technology, interior comfort, all these different benefits. Then you can then stack rank how your brand fits within each one of those based off of mentions. So if your pickup truck is mentioned the fewest times in terms of towing capability and the few times you were mentioned, you have the worst sentiment. Everyone’s saying your towing capabilities are horrible. You as a marketer was like, I think our towing capability’s amazing. Well, the market doesn’t and the people who move culture are actually saying the opposite of what you think. 

So as a marketer, my strategy now on the why could be, oh, towing capabilities important for this industry because it’s the most talked about benefit with all the benefits of the pickup truck and we’re the worst. We probably need to create a campaign around our towing capabilities. Maybe we need to go back to the product team and say, listen, our towing capability sucks. We need to make it better. But I think AI allows you to filter all this data to understand what are the benefits and where do you stack up along those benefits?

Ryan: There’s obviously positive use that Tagger has with AI. Another thing that is a benefit to us is being able to sniff out fake followers and bots and things of that nature too. As AI becomes more sophisticated, as there are deeper fakes, things like that, is there a roadmap that Tagger has to help marketers at scale, identify where there’s nefarious content? Where we’re to avoid certain areas so that when we are looking at a plan with 2000 content creators on it, that we’re able to get the 200 out that may be coming from a negative place to make sure that we’re focusing our spend on what’s gonna move the needle and what matters?

Pete: Yeah, definitely. I mean, I think that fake followers is definitely something that is important but there’s two things that I think are even more important. 

One, it’s content, right? That’s what we’re also seeing. Like I said, we’re selling into all these different departments, but that influencer content is being used across the entire customer journey. So for example, yeah, you’re gonna run a campaign and it’s gonna be an awareness building campaign, or maybe you’re trying to get conversion. But that customer journey, okay, they’re gonna see that influencer content and then they’re gonna start to see other social media ads about that brand. As you know, you have to see something multiple times before you go buy it. Well, what we know is that influencer content performs 300% better than branded content — on TikTok It’s like 3000% better. Why? Because it’s user generated content and does better than branded content. So now we’re seeing all this influencer content being used in paid media ads and then when you go onto these product pages on an e-commerce site, we’re seeing influencer content because again, it does better than branded content. 

Then when we look at like cart abandonment emails, they’re AB testing that with influencer content, it’s actually converting better. So all the way along this customer journey, what you’re seeing is the influencer content. So yes, if your sole purpose is I just want to go out and buy an influencer, hire their audience essentially, and use that as my conversion, yes, fake followers is super important – but to me it’s like, let’s go find creators who make amazing content. Who creates content that’s authentic to themselves and authentic to their audiences because we, through our affinity data, we can really understand, like, do these audiences care about these things? Then let’s go take that content and use it across our entire e-commerce, our entire customer journey so that we’re getting the most outta that content. So fake followers are becoming a little less. 

Then we’re also looking at more in terms of first party data and saying, well, do certain influencers convert better than other influencers do? When you start to be able to get more and more of that data, then it’s like, Ryan, you might have a hundred thousand followers and maybe 50% of them are fake, but you convert better in healthcare than anyone else. I don’t really care. Now, maybe what that means is instead of paying you based off of your a hundred thousand followers, yeah, I’m gonna pay you based off of you having 50,000 followers, but if I know that your conversion is so high, your followers don’t really matter because I’m paying you based off of what you’re gonna convert from me anyways. Again, not always. There’s multiple ways to think about that and I think fake followers are getting less and less relevant and more about, well, what can we do with this data and what’s our ROI on this campaign as a whole?

Ryan: Switching gears a little bit. Thinking about brands that really do well in the content marketing space, there’s obviously some brands that have built the almost entirety of their marketing function around influencers. I have some brands that don’t spend a dime on influencers and that are performing very well for themselves. 

What are a couple examples that you see of brands that are using creators and influencers appropriately, making it part of their bigger ecosystem, but using that to really drive their brand growth, their conversion growth, their sales, all of it? 

Pete: Companies that do it well are finding influencers that are authentic to their brand category, but whose audiences also care about those things. I think Lululemon’s done a really interesting job of this, because yes, they’re out there promoting all of their clothing, which is great. But they’re also partnering with mental health influencers as well because they know that that’s an important part. So when brands are partnering with influencers to, yes, talk about their products, but more importantly they’re talking about things that matter to their audience. Mental health is something that matters to their audience and they realize that. 

So, back in the day, influencer content used to be polished and beautiful and just everything. And now it’s real because people are looking for social connection and they’re kind of rejecting this social comparison, you know? I think that companies like Lululemon have realized that. You’re gonna see every size model in their content, you’re gonna see them talking about issues, not about working out, but about mental health, things that matter to their consumer. 

Then another company that I think did some interesting stuff was Behr Paint. They create paints and they have a bunch of different colors and they partnered with Emily Zugay and she’s this hilarious influencer that basically takes all of her paints and then she destroys the paint colors and renames them. So she might take like, green or something and call it like, cute green or way more clever than what I’m gonna come up with. But again, it’s kind of rejecting this high gloss social comparison and being real and hilarious. Brands are able now to kind of take the polish off of themselves, I think which is kind of interesting as well. Letting an influencer who, this is what she does, and that’s why she has a big audience, literally kind of like destroy the brand in a way because, you know, that that’s what people are looking for. So I think those are two pretty interesting examples. But, there’s hundreds of brands that are doing a great job of promoting their companies, but really bringing in social issues that matter to their audience, which is gonna be different from a brand next door whose audience is completely different.

Ryan: Very brave of Behr to strip off the gloss, so to speak. I think that leads into my next question: what changes do you predict will come in influencer marketing over the next couple of years? You’ve talked about the change from that curated content to a lot of more unfiltered content brands that are looking to partner with longer term ambassadors. Then just one-off activations with individual influencers as I’m sure you’re looking at how your company’s going to grow with the recent acquisition. Where do you see the marketplace going?

Pete: Yeah, again, I think that you’re gonna see more and more influencer content being used across the entire customer journey. I think that’s gonna be a big shift. Honestly, though, I think AI is gonna be a major addition to the influencer marketing process. Again, it’s not gonna replace anyone’s job, it’s just gonna allow them to be better at what they do. 

So a couple examples would be, just sending out communications with creators, being able to analyze that creator’s content and their voice, and then writing emails to these creators. You have to ask these people to work with your brand and not every creator wants to work with your brand. So being able to create a voice that’s gonna resonate with the creator using AI and be able to do this across a hundred influencers at the same time, is gonna make you way more efficient in your job. So that’s one quick example. 

Another example is just to take all of your content as a brand and look across all these creators instantaneously to find that perfect match of tone and thought and content in order to find those right creators. I also love this idea. AI does a great job of summarizing content. What it doesn’t do a good job of yet is to say, hey, here’s what’s happening in my industry. I have a hundred thousand dollars. How should I spend that? It can’t do that yet. I think in the future it might be able to, because again, it can just summarize data pretty well, but it can’t tell you how to spend your money. 

Ryan: So can I surmise that there may be some changes or enhancements to your platform that artificial intelligence is gonna be able to fuel?

Pete: Oh, we’re already doing it right now. So, I’ve already seen a lot of this. Like I’ve seen all this stuff already on our platform. We’re still developing it and we’ll be launching it over the next month or two, but yeah, it’s just gonna make your life so much easier.

Ryan: Coegi’s going to be a beta tester for that.

Pete: A hundred percent. I mean, there are certain agencies that are thought leaders and you guys are ahead of the curve with most of this stuff. So obviously we always look for partnerships with you guys to help us drive that product development. That’s really where our product development happens, is with you guys, it’s like, what do you guys need? What are you guys thinking about how the market’s going and how can we build based on those needs?

Ryan: Well, we’re excited to see what that looks like both, with the quick wins and those longer ones that’s fresh off the press. I’m really excited to continue to partner with you. 

Pete: Amazing. Thanks, Ryan.

______________________________________________________________________________________________

Click here to follow The Loop Marketing Podcast for more marketing insights. 

5 Social Advertising Trends for 2024

Advancements in technology and evolving consumer behavior are continuously shaping the social media landscape, presenting brands with an opportunity to evolve alongside the consumer to meet brand goals.

Users are no longer looking to social platforms as only a way to connect with friends, but rather as a mechanism for shopping, searching, and enjoying entertainment.

So what should your brand focus their social media strategy on? Keep reading to discover our top five social media trends for 2024 and tips on how to effectively incorporate them into your strategy.

Social Media Trend #1: Growth of Influencer Marketing

Investment in influencer marketing is expected to see strong growth in the next few years due to its effectiveness in building trust and authenticity for your brand. In 2024, there will be an increased focus on leveraging short-form UGC videos, testing out generative AI, and mindfully selecting creators that foster a diverse and representative social media community. 

What You Need to Know:

Influencer Marketing Tips:

  • Establish clear goals and measurable KPIs before selecting a content creator. For example, if your influencer marketing goal is to drive increased engagement, select a creator that has a loyal and highly engaged audience.
  • Collaborate with content creators that align with your brand’s tone and have a follower community with interests that match your product or service offering.

To learn more about tap into creators for your marketing strategy, check out Coegi’s guide to influencer marketing

Social Media Trend #2: Paid Subscription Models

Global governments are continuing to hold social platforms accountable for adhering to user privacy regulations. With the increased regulations, social platforms are looking for solutions to maintain an optimal user experience, including offering paid monthly subscriptions for users to opt out of ads. 

What You Need to Know:

Paid Subscription Model Tips:

  • Influencer marketing is going to become important in a paid subscription model since the content will not be categorized as an ad. Use this time to start honing your influencer marketing strategy to learn what works best for your brand.
  • Organic social will be another effective way to reach users in an ad-free environment. Focus your efforts on building your brand’s following across social media platforms and learning what content resonates well with your core audience.
  • While the development of paid subscription models is currently focused on the EU market, other markets may follow. Be sure to keep up-to-date on the latest platform releases.

Social Media Trend #3: Generative AI

AI had a large impact on the marketing industry in 2023 and is expected to continue with increased momentum in 2024 as social platforms continue rolling out AI features. From AI chatbots directly integrated within the platforms to audio generation tools, the way users and marketers engage with social media will be in a constant state of change.

What You Need to Know:

  • Due to strong user engagement with Snapchat’s My AI, the platform is looking for ways to leverage the chatbot to boost advertising.
  • Meta released two Generative AI tools for audio creation – AudioCraft to create audio and music from a text prompt, and Voicebox to assist with editing audio.
  • Meta AI is a virtual assistant – including 28 familiar individuals, such as Snoop Dog and Kendall Jenner, that users can interact with across Meta platforms.

Generative AI Tips:

  • Generative AI is going to elevate the importance of brand’s maintaining authenticity. As deepfakes and AI assistants circulate across social platforms, users will look to brands to be a source of truth and familiarity.
  • Create internal guidelines and policies for the usage of AI to ensure it is being used ethically and responsibly.
  • Read our article – Do’s and Don’ts of Using Generative AI for Creative – for more information on how to effectively use AI.

Social Media Trend #4: Social Platforms Utilized as a Search Engine

Social media platforms continue to serve a dual purpose, namely among younger users, to connect and engage with friends and to utilize as a search engine for finding products and services. This shift in consumer behavior should be accounted for when planning your marketing strategy.

What You Need to Know:

Social Search Tips:

Social Media Trend #5: AR/VR Advancements

Gone are the days of one-dimensional internet usage as augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) technology advancements are spurring an “immersive internet.” Users are seeking a more engaging experience across the web and social platforms, giving brands an opportunity to better meet their audiences’ needs and preferences.

What You Need to Know: 

AR/VR Tips:

  • Leverage Pinterest Try on product pins to enable users to virtually try on products wherever they are, increasing engagement and attention.
  • Meta augmented reality ads create an engaging and unique experience where users test out products and interact with your brand.
  • It’s important to keep your brand’s product catalog on social platforms updated so users can virtually engage with your brand and build affinity.

If you want to discuss how to apply these trends and tips to your marketing strategy in 2024, reach out to schedule a discovery call with the team at Coegi.

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