The Media Trends of 2024: AI, VR and Targeted Content
[Photo above by Google DeepMind]
With the emergence of AI, evermore personalised content, and the growing use of AR and VR, 2023’s trends are set to spill into and dictate much of 2024. Alongside this, the need to better understand and target audiences means that the integration between different facets of the process is now more significant than ever - collaboration, collaboration, collaboration, right?
As the rise of podcasts shows growth within the sector, AI continues to have sceptics (though we wonder how much longer for) and Apple teases the launch of its highly anticipated, mixed reality, Vision Pro headset, here at LBB, we wondered what experts would say are the big trends due to shape this year. So, we asked what we should look out for from brands and businesses alike?
To hear more about this, LBB’s Nisna Mahtani speaks to media experts from M&C Saatchi Performance, Mailchimp, Carat, VaynerMedia, Bam Analytix and VML US.
Jonathan Yantz
Managing partner at M&C Saatchi Performance
The digital marketing industry is poised for another exciting year of growth and innovation in 2024. Some trends we are monitoring include, firstly, an increase in SKAN adoption. With Apple’s privacy manifests being required as of spring 2024, any advertisers still relying on fingerprinting should turn their attention to SKAN. On the web side, Google announced it will begin to phase out third-party cookies in Q1 2024, starting with Chrome disabling third-party cookies for 1% of users to facilitate testing before ramping up to 100% of users later in 2024. These changes mean new measurement frameworks will be required for many advertisers.
Secondly, an area of focus will be the continued adoption of AI in creative tools. Google, Meta, and TikTok are all introducing AI tools to increase the volume of ad versions created and to enable testing. There are pros and cons of AI creative development, e.g. reducing the barrier to entry for creatives is, of course, welcome and opens the door to driving performance. However, ensuring quality control will be essential to ensure the end products are on brand and are finessed and polished.
Katie Potochney
Executive creative director at Intuit Mailchimp
2023 has been a challenging year. But in times of uncertainty, the most important things are clarity and consistency – and nurturing talent. That’s why for me, looking ahead to 2024, creatives would be well advised to invest in their brand and create longstanding efficiencies so that their team can be nimble and ready to act quickly. AI will have a key role to play, helping to drive enhanced digital performance and customer experience—all collectively led by first-party data and personalisation. From our recent Holiday Report, we know that 73% of customers feel more valued when they receive personalised emails, and 87% are more likely to engage with tailored content.
It would be understandable for creative leads to deviate from set strategies in times of turbulence. Instead, I advocate for brands to remain consistent with clear priorities and focus areas to help drive growth and outperform the market. But being customer-obsessed is still essential. Keeping creatives close to the customer to deepen their empathy will be key to ensuring brands stay nimble to meet customers where they are, in any state of the economy.
Jennifer Kohl
Chief media officer at VML US
Media professionals are investment and marketing ninjas. Each media dollar can literally be spent 100,000+ ways. The possibilities keep me waking up each day ready to learn. Some trends I am keeping an eye on are:
AI. AI. AI. Artificial Intelligence is on everyone’s mind including Santa Claus. Whether he uses it to check his list twice or navigate the best route to deliver gifts, AI is impacting everyone on the planet. AI capabilities will grow exponentially in 2024. The challenge will be knowing what to try and what to run away from.
Personalisation. Consumers expect personalized experiences; in their inboxes, ads served, Netflix suggestions, online shopping, or social media. This will manifest through a blend of AI and creative and media collaborations.
Social Media. As a marketer, I am leaning in. As a mom of two gen z-ers, I am on alert. Social Media is NOT just social media anymore. It’s also video, a search engine, commerce, news, and entertainment. We aren’t even close to seeing the full capabilities of paid social.
Presidents and Medallists. 2024 is a presidential election year. That drives pricing, content, and media chaos. It’s also an Olympic year. Marketers will have opportunity for a lot of attentive eyeballs, but also potential for a political circus.
Mega Events. Taylor Swift has changed the landscape for content, entertainment, social, commerce, and news (#Travis). Barbie, Beyonce, and Taylor, all prove megaevents can happen. Theatres are a new playground for marketers. Formula 1 is becoming ‘mass’. Experiential is back.
Chris Davies
Head of strategy at Carat UK
Humanity will save the day.
Growth is a function of seizing the right opportunity at the right time – and in 2024, more will be possible than ever before. From search to creativity and media planning to production, generative AI has the potential to take media effectiveness to new heights.
And yet, more is the same. Enabled by technology, more possibilities should mean endless variety and huge potential for your brand to create a real and embedded point of difference. Yet with a constant drive toward improvement and with experiences optimised by algorithms toward what their users like, platforms where your buyers spend most of their time are creating ever more ' similar’ experiences.
So, in the hope that we use technology to create boundless opportunities for ‘difference’, there’s a substantial risk that the opposite becomes true.
To avoid this scenario, we must strive for the best of both worlds: A relentless focus on human truth forged from a blend of observation and data, but one that’s elevated and made easier, faster and more effective by generative AI.
Assuming most brands will harness generative AI in some way, it’s those that apply and leverage a strong dose of humanity that will stand out.
Jon Morgenstern
EVP and head of investment at VaynerMedia
When it comes to paid media industry trends, the retail media advertising sector is uniquely well-positioned for continued share growth gains in 2024.
We see two core sources for the growth of retail media in particular. First, there is the growth of retail media as the ‘channel’, fueled through continued proliferation and adoption of new(er) partner-owned offerings, e.g. Ulta’s UB Media, Dollar General’s DG Media Network (DGMN), Lyft Media and others.
Second, there is the retail media ‘layer’, where retailer first-party shoppers targeting online/offline measurement advantages are made available across programmatic display, audio, video, OTT/CTV and more. Here, the more tech-forward retailers drive most developments, with The Trade Desk currently near the epicentre as the collective’s Demand Side Platform (DSP) of choice, powering non-endemic programmatic buying for Walmart Connect, Kroger 84.51, Target Roundel among others.
While social platforms showed less progress in 2023 compared to their demand side platform peers, we expect in 2024 there will be deeper alliances forming. Take, for example, Amazon. In the last few months alone, they’ve released Sponsored Products ad inventory integrations with Pinterest and Buzzfeed, as well as native in-app shopping integrations with Meta and Snap. We expect to see a variety of such retail and social ‘alliances’ take shape in 2024.
Brett Channer
CEO at Bam Analytix
Media in advertising lags dreadfully behind the ways consumers behave. Our data shows a significant investment is wasted as a result of using out of date vanity metrics like SOV, CPM or channel specific Meta and Google analytics alongside post campaign surveys. Business metrics are more valuable at informing media objectives but these should not be confused with performance marketing analytics. Click through rates are only a small part of what is required in driving business results. Being more aligned to consumer behaviour by category, region and needs or wants towards clear measurable real time analytics is what is required today alongside ensuring the brand is always strong for optimising efficiencies.
Consumer behaviour analysis should be informing every discussion made towards marketing strategies and investments today, because it is readily available. And the end of 'cookies' is only going to expand this need. Otherwise, we will be back to the shotgun media approach, which is great for the media providers and not so great for advertisers. A clear understanding of how consumers are engaging in paid, earned and owned media working together with the right content towards business objectives is the way to win growth.
