With 2024 fast approaching and 2023 slowly fading in the rearview, we’re taking a look back at some of our favorite blog posts from the year that was. Read on to get a taste of our advertising and marketing industry coverage from 2023—and check out the Basis blog for all the rest (including our most-read posts of the year).
Who doesn’t love love? On Valentine’s Day, we decided to give our readers a little gift: Three tips to help digital advertisers show their customers how much they care. Check it out to peruse a few strategies that will have your customers crushing on you like it’s night one of The Bachelor.
Basis Technologies:
Hey, ChatGPT? Why should people read this blog post about how AI is set to transform SEM?
ChatGPT:
“Advertisers should read this blog post because it provides a comprehensive overview of how analytical, action-oriented, and generative AI are already shaping search engine marketing. The post delves into real-world applications, from enhancing ad targeting to automating campaign tasks. By understanding current AI use cases, advertisers gain insights into future developments and can proactively prepare for the evolving landscape. Practical tips, such as staying informed on AI developments, fostering a data-driven culture, and anticipating chatbot-driven search engines, offer a roadmap for marketers to navigate and capitalize on the transformative impact of AI in SEM.”
While Swifties are enjoying their hero’s recent anointment as Time’s Person of the Year, digital advertisers are busy grappling with signal loss. And though many marketers undoubtedly wish they could just shake it off, the need for new, privacy-friendly advertising solutions isn’t going anywhere.
If, like TSwift, you know this challenge all too well, then this post is for you. It dives into all the ways automation can help advertisers overcome the identity crisis—as told through a collection of Taylor Swift lyrics, song titles, and gifs.
It can produce music, create digital art, and even compose text in the style of famous writers. But since its public debut back in late 2022, generative AI has been (understandably) met with skepticism from both within and outside of the digital advertising world.
However, with 86.6% of marketing and advertising professionals believing AI will radically transform the industry in the next three to five years, the one thing we can’t afford to do with generative AI is ignore it.
This post digs into everything an AI skeptic should know about the emerging tech’s impact on advertising: What the risks are, how to address them, and how advertisers can embrace (or at least dip their toes into) its possibilities.
Remember when Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg were going to fight each other in a cage match? Yeah, 2023 was weird…
Anyway, the feud got us thinking about what social media marketers are currently in the ring with—namely, a dizzying and ceaseless swarm of brand safety threats, including hate speech, misinformation, and disinformation. This post explores the ongoing cage match between advertisers and social media’s brand safety risks, as well as the tips and tricks marketers will need to emerge victorious.
Just like brewing an award-winning beer, crafting a standout digital marketing campaign takes quality ingredients, tons of creativity, and a test-and-learn approach. Inspired by Munich’s 200-year-old annual celebration of beer, this post lifts the lid on how advertisers can stand out from the pack with gold-medal digital advertising campaigns.
Prost!
Oh, agencies. What hasn’t the world thrown at you lately? After a three-year stretch with seemingly non-stop changes—from a pandemic, to the Great Resignation, to new regulations, new technology and signal loss, to name just a few—running an agency can feel like a never-ending game of Whac-A-Mole.
How can agency leaders approach these rapid-fire changes thoughtfully and strategically? To find out, we spoke with five industry veterans to gather their insights into what agencies need to know about this moment and identify how they can situate their organizations to not only adapt as the industry transforms, but to lead the way towards positive change.
For much of its history, the digital advertising world has been something of an iceberg: its surface shiny and bright, lighting up internet users’ screens and powering both organizational growth and the digital economy, while the adtech that supports it all ran largely out of the public’s sight. However, in recent years, new demands for data privacy, coupled with a new batch of lawsuits targeting many of the digital ad world’s biggest players, has pulled digital advertising into the spotlight.
But with change comes opportunity, and this piece explores how the new focus on our industry could be a catalyst for advertisers to take a step back and ensure their practices are aligned with consumers’ expectations and support marketing goals—and how it could potentially even usher in a new era of innovation.
2024 is shaping up to be one of the most hotly contested US election cycles in recent memory—and the most expensive in history. Led by a presidential race at the top of the ticket, the combination of high-profile races, major cultural and economic questions, motivated cause-based outside groups, and emotionally invested voters is likely to fuel high turnout and even higher ad budgets.
With so many political (and non-political) advertisers looking to grab their share of voice and motivate their audiences to action, having the latest and greatest tips, tactics, insights, and strategies will be essential to ensuring a successful campaign. This post is the perfect place to start (and is worth bookmarking, as we’ll be updating it regularly in the months leading up to Election Day on November 5.)
The emergence and growth of made-for-advertising websites (aka MFAs) was one of 2023’s biggest digital advertising controversies. One study earlier this year even found that advertisers were spending an average of 15% of their programmatic ad budgets on MFAs. But do these sites help advertisers reach their business goals and hit campaign KPIs, or are they simply generating revenue for the people who build and manage them and wasting valuable ad dollars in the process?
To help advertisers sift through all the MFA messiness, we spoke with an expert to break down how MFAs work and gain insights on how to avoid low-quality inventory before a campaign starts.
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Want to check out more digital advertising content to keep you at the top of your game, but don’t know where to start? Discover the perfect read for you with this fun (and helpful!) quiz.
There were a lot of things to obsess over this past year, from “Barbie” to “Oppenheimer” to Pope Francis and Snoopy wearing (or not wearing) puffer jackets. And don’t get us started on Beyoncé’s Renaissance tour or Taylor Swift’s Eras tour, both of which were as in as #GirlDinner on TikTok.
Practically equal in their popularity: The following Basis blog posts, which, thanks to your viewership, proved they have a ton of rizz. You were particularly interested in data privacy, artificial intelligence, and convergent and connected TV—all topics that will undoubtedly maintain their relevance in the new year. So, set yourself up for success by joining us for this walk down memory lane:
Staying up to date on digital advertising regulations and their implications for advertisers isn’t easy, so when you found information on privacy-first marketing, you opted in.
New regulations on digital advertising continue to pop up in the US and around the world, moving the digital advertising industry in the direction of privacy-friendly advertising. Here, learn the latest on these regulations and their impact on the advertising industry.
Since passing the California Consumer Protection Act (CCPA) in 2018, California has established itself as a leader in consumer privacy and data protection in the US. And with the recent passage of the California Privacy Rights Act, those protections have expanded. Learn how these laws protect consumer data and how advertisers can stay compliant in this piece.
Noor Naseer, Basis’ VP of Media Innovations and Technology, traveled to the hub of all things digital, South by Southwest, in Spring 2023. There, she shared insights on cookie deprecation, identity solutions, and consumer expectations. Find the video of Naseer’s presentation—as well as a download of her jam-packed slides—right here.
Artificial intelligence was as hot as UGG slippers in 2023, as more and more advertisers began to adopt generative AI. Your favorite posts focused on the technology’s potential impacts to the future of digital advertising as a whole, as well as on search engine marketing specifically.
This Q&A with three AI thought leaders addresses recent developments in the industry and explores AI’s potential impact on media, marketing, and digital advertising.
Search engines are awfully smart, and that intelligence—artificial or otherwise—will only continue to evolve. Here, an expert on paid search discusses how AI impacts search engine analysis, results, and generative content—and outlines how advertisers can prepare for an even more AI-driven future.
2023 was a big year for streaming and convergent TV advertising, with linear TV usage dropping below 50% of all TV viewing for the first time ever in July 2023. You spent the most screen time with these two posts:
With more and more people owning connected TVs and streaming their video content, the CTV advertising opportunity is booming. Here, we tune into best practices for strategic planning, precise targeting, and measuring success on this ever-evolving and impactful channel.
One of the biggest movements away from linear and into streaming comes from the live sports arena. This piece takes a closer look at how advertisers can reach live sports viewers given this shift, and explores the omnichannel advertising opportunity that comes with it.
In addition to posts on digital advertising regulation, AI, and convergent and connected TV, you were a big fan of posts that cover everything you need to know about specific digital advertising topics. Makes sense to us—if you’re going to learn about something, why not go all in?
When you add the targeting, optimization, and trackability of “digital” to the real-world impact of large-format out-of-home, you get a powerful and increasingly popular advertising platform. This piece on digital out-of-home (DOOH) dives into the channel, reviews its formats, explores its capabilities, and illustrates its benefits for advertisers.
What’s in a name? In the case of the “guaranteed” in “programmatic guaranteed”, quite a lot—including locked-in impressions and CPMs through an automated DSP. Check out how PG works, how it compares to direct buys and PMPs, and what steps are needed to run a programmatic guaranteed deal.
The transparency and control afforded by programmatic in-housing is attractive for many brands. Indeed, many big players, like Procter & Gamble and Coca-Cola, have brought media buying inside their walls. For advertisers who aren’t sure whether—or what type of—programmatic-in housing makes sense for them, this piece breaks down all the key considerations.
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Well, that’s a wrap on your top blog posts of 2023! You prepared for big policy changes, turned your interest in artificial intelligence into real intelligence, made a connection with convergent and connected TV, and went in-depth on DOOH, programmatic guaranteed, and in-housing. Here’s to a year of learning and improvement, and more to come in 2024!
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The past few years have been a wild ride for advertisers and consumers alike. Coming out of the pandemic, a flight of buzzy trends emerged—each promising to usher in an exciting new future for digital advertising filled with transformation and potential. Unfortunately, most of these so-called trends quickly fizzled out, leaving disappointed marketers wondering how we can separate the true “trends” from what’s merely “trendy.”
This webinar takes a realistic approach to the trends set to shape 2024. Basis Technologies’ VP of Media Innovations & Technology Noor Naseer shares insights on what lies ahead so marketers can tune out the noise and instead focus their attention on the most important, proven trends that will shape the year to come.
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Looking for more trends content? Check out our Trends Hub and our 2024 trends report today!
Over the past few years, a slew of buzzy marketing trends has emerged—each promising to usher in an exciting new future for digital advertising, filled with transformation and untapped potential.
Unfortunately, most of these so-called trends quickly fizzled out, leaving marketers disappointed and wondering how they can separate the true “trends” from what’s merely “trendy.”
So, how can advertisers tune out the noise and focus their attention on the most important, proven trends that are set to shape the year ahead? Find out in our 2024 digital advertising trends report.
Ready to discover the trends that will shape digital advertising in the year ahead? Download Future in Focus today!
“Remember These Child Actors From The ‘80s? You’ll Never Believe How They Look Today!”
If you’ve ever clicked on a link like this, you’ve likely found yourself transported to a digital space that looks more like a carnival midway ride than a normal website: ads flashing, inventory refreshing, and call-to-action buttons leading you to other websites with even more pop-up ads. Worst of all, it takes dozens of clicks to find out what happened to those child actors!
These digital spaces are called made-for-advertising sites (MFAs), and a recent study found that brands spend about 15% of their programmatic ad budgets on them. But do MFAs help advertisers reach their business goals, or are they simply generating revenue for the people who build and manage them?
To help advertisers break through the clutter, we spoke with Ayse Pamuk, Manager of Platform Operations at Basis Technologies. Below, Pamuk breaks down how MFAs work, and shares insights on how advertisers can avoid low-quality ad inventory before a campaign starts.
Ayse Pamuk: An MFA is a generic website that is not the result of any quality content creation or journalistic effort. These sites are built just to generate traffic: They usually pay for traffic to their site and then generate multiple ad impressions on each page. So, good old arbitrage (buying website traffic for a low cost and monetizing it via higher-paying advertisements).
It starts with a clickbait headline. Once a user clicks on that headline, the site tries to make them scroll down or click through a slideshow to reach the promised content, thus generating even more ad impressions. In the end, the user gets almost nothing out of the content, so they often leave frustrated.
AP: Technically speaking, an MFA is a real website and there are real ad impressions being served—so they don’t necessarily fall under the category of ad fraud. However, MFA sites are definitely low quality, and they certainly don’t drive any actual performance. Just because ads served on these sites are displayed on the screen for more than five seconds and people technically see them doesn’t mean those ads create awareness for a brand, or that they drive sales or anything else an advertiser would want from an ad placement.
AP: Wasted budget is the biggest risk associated with spending on MFAs. Again, it’s not fraud, but it could pose some brand safety and brand suitability issues. This is an especially important topic to understand now, because with more and more digital content being generated by AI, we are going to see MFA sites popping up by the dozen almost every day. And when money gets funneled to them, that’s money wasted on websites and inventory that aren’t helping brands meet their campaign goals.
AP: I think it’s about understanding the real mathematics around this, and using those insights to set the right goals and KPIs. As an advertiser, I can either try to achieve very low CPMs and generate a substantial number of impressions, but get low to no action as a result; or I can spend the same amount of money and generate fewer impressions, and get much better performance and much more beneficial action.
If you only care about spend and how many impressions you generated, then maybe you do want to spend on MFAs. But if I were a business owner working with an agency, I would ask, “OK, you generated this many impressions, but what impact did they make?” I would want that connection between objectives and KPIs to be clear.
AP: Not surprisingly, since MFAs’ only goals are to make money from advertising, they include some distinguishable characteristics, like having a large number of ads on the screen, ad inventory that auto-refreshes at a higher-than-average frequency, and numerous links to other MFAs. By working with partners who prioritize strong brand safety protocols and tools, advertisers can avoid having their ads end up on these sites. For example, Basis Technologies’ partnership with Jounce media gives users the ability to use a dynamic MFA block list to avoid serving ads on those sites.
AP: One responsibility of adtech providers is to give advertisers access to high-quality inventory. The advertiser should be able to get the most out of their budget: They should be able to spend one dollar and generate a thousand. So, their money should be spent on ads that will show up in places that provide the outcomes advertisers want.
Adtech providers also have a responsibility to create an efficient environment for clients and to seek out solutions that help advertisers more easily avoid MFAs. Getting the best impressions for advertisers takes historical data, machine learning optimization, and algorithmic optimization. Those tools allow advertisers to spend less time, effort, and energy to create high ROI.
I always say it takes a village to combat industry problems like MFAs. Advertisers, data and inventory partners, and adtech providers should keep each other informed because each new topic presents new avenues for fraud, or gaming the system, or other shady practices. It’s an ongoing battle. Everyone involved must be proactive to prevent these things from becoming bigger issues.
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Need help navigating the world of MFAs and avoiding low-quality digital ad inventory? Connect with our experts to learn how to build your most efficient and impactful digital advertising strategy.
Abrupt stop to nearly all travel during the pandemic? Check. Rapid return to travel in 2022? Check. Economic downturn that throws a wrench into said rapid growth? We’re three for three here, folks. It’s safe to say the last few years have been quite the trip for travel and tourism marketers (see what we did there?)
The good news? Inflation in the US has begun to ease, and even though its effects have lingered, demand for travel has remained robust, fueled by consumers who continue to prioritize experiences and connection over material things. Case in point: 64% of global travelers report that they plan to reduce personal spending in other areas to prioritize travel in 2024. This is especially true for millennials and Gen Z.
So, how can travel and tourism marketers position themselves to make the most of this increased demand for travel in the year ahead? Read on for three key trends to know to stay ahead of the curve in 2024.
Though many consumers report they’re planning to spend more on travel in 2024, they still have lingering price sensitivity from the economic uncertainty of the past several years. As a result, people aren’t necessarily searching with one destination in mind, but may in fact be considering a variety of places to travel and/or experiences—and their decision will likely be based on the value they perceive each option to provide.
For travel and tourism marketers, this combination of increased price sensitivity and willingness to explore multiple travel destinations makes it critical to lean into the value that a specific brand, service, or product can provide. Take, for example, a hotel near a bustling beach town: If that property’s pricing is already competitive with other nearby hotels, they’re going to have to find alternative ways to highlight their value. If they offer certain amenities (i.e., free beach transport, complimentary umbrellas and towels, location within walking distance to popular restaurants), their marketing team should emphasize these benefits through their messaging to show customers the added value they’ll get by choosing their hotel over another that’s comparable in price.
Today’s travelers are multi-faceted and fit into many different buckets—in other words, there’s significant overlap between different traveler “personas.” For instance, someone who used to never mix travel and work might now be a “bleisure” traveler since they work a mostly-remote job but have to travel to on-site meetings several times a year. And that same customer might also be interested in international travel, which they enjoy during their non-busy season.
So, what does this mean for travel marketers? First, it means that most pre-packaged audiences (think: “people interested in traveling to Phoenix”) aren’t cutting it anymore. The solution? Travel marketers can action their brand or property’s first-party data for customization. Going forward, the most successful audience segments will be dynamic and modeled off a destination or property’s owned website traffic. First-party data is more reliable, since it comes from customers themselves, and will allow brands to better craft intentional, personalized advertising experiences to better connect with (and convert) audiences.
It has long been a practice in the travel and tourism industry to show audiences the experience they’ll have with a product, brand, or service, rather than tell them about it. Competition is high between travel brands, and providing an immersive advertising experience to prospective travelers is one way for travel marketers to set their brand apart. Leveraging digital video is a key component of this, especially when long(er) form content (such as CTV) is paired with short-form, less polished content (i.e., user-generated content on social).
And, with new and exciting technological innovations available (such as AR, VR, and AI-generated content), there are even more opportunities for travel marketers to craft compelling creative that motivates audiences to take action. For instance, hotels can leverage AR/VR to offer a “look inside” to prospective guests, ski resorts can utilize these technologies to allow avid skiers to explore their terrain prior to booking, and tour companies can use these tools to preview the experience travelers will have with their company.
With many consumers planning to prioritize travel in the year ahead, marketers in the travel and tourism industries are well-positioned to make the most of this opportunity for growth. By leaning into value-based messaging, leveraging first-party data effectively, and showing exactly what travelers can expect from a certain trip or experience, savvy marketers can grow their brands and forge meaningful—and profitable—connections with key audiences.
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Hungry for more 2024 trends? Check out our 2024 Trends Report for everything digital marketers need to know for next year.
Digital health innovations and technologies are evolving at a rapid pace. More and more interactions are taking place digitally rather than in-person, and individual health consciousness is at an all-time high. Further, health and pharma advertising is undergoing some substantial digital shifts: In 2023, the health and pharma industry spent $17.8 billion on digital advertising, and that number is projected to hit nearly $20 billion in 2024.
In addition to adapting to these factors specific to the healthcare industry, advertisers in the space are making substantial changes to meet the demands of the digital advertising world, including Google’s long-delayed deprecation of third-party cookies in Chrome in the second half of 2024. Considering these complexities, it’s no surprise that the advertising strategies health and pharma brands and agencies use to connect with consumers are transforming at a remarkable rate.
With the increasingly digital nature of the healthcare ecosystem, marketers in the space must be flexible and adaptable. And in this ever-evolving landscape, staying ahead of the curve is not just a strategic choice—it’s a necessity. To that end, read on for three key trends that should be top of mind as we head into 2024:
Beyond the increased privacy and regulatory demands that all digital marketers are encountering, health and pharma advertisers face additional challenges to ensure all their communications adhere to HIPAA regulation. And, thanks to a 2022 Office for Civil Rights (OCR) policy, IP addresses are now considered protected health information under HIPAA. This can make it difficult (if not downright impossible) to use pixels for targeting and measuring while maintaining legal compliance.
This is especially meaningful when it comes to performance marketing, and more and more healthcare brands and agencies are shifting away from these types of tactics and relying, instead, on mixed-funnel media strategies. Moving forward, there will also be an increased focus on awareness-based media, since it can be tracked with third-party brand lift studies while maintaining HIPAA and OCR compliance.
“OK, great,” some healthcare marketers might say. “Does that mean I should throw my lower funnel activities out the window?”
Certainly not! Even when brands can’t accurately measure attribution on their mid-to-lower funnel channels, they nevertheless remain a critical piece of a holistic marketing mix. For example, since brands know that most consumers start their health journeys online, they might focus on search ads and using contextual targeting to ensure such ads are in places where relevant patients are likely to encounter them.
And even though lower funnel attribution is a sticky point when it comes to healthcare marketing, there are ways to evaluate campaign performance to inform future marketing strategies:
Within that larger context of increased regulation and consumer privacy demands, savvy health and pharma marketers will also benefit from auditing past campaigns and applying key learnings to future campaigns in the year ahead. This is especially true when it comes to those aforementioned lower funnel tactics, where attribution can be particularly tricky.
For example, if a brand uses paid search ads to promote their telemedicine offerings to new patients and notices an increase in these types of appointments, they can use that historical performance data to continue to prioritize investment in the channel. Alternatively, if a brand invests in social media ads aimed at getting audiences to opt-in to receive more information about specialized treatments and doesn’t notice an uptick in conversions, they might choose to re-allocate investment in that channel—or reapproach their creative and/or messaging.
Given the increased demand for (and regulations around) patient privacy, 2024 is likely to bring a greater focus on marketing to healthcare providers (HCPs), rather than directly to patients. HIPAA protects individuals’ personal health information, meaning they can’t be targeted based on conditions, IP address, etc. But that doesn’t mean that HCPs that treat specific conditions can’t be targeted. As such more and more health and pharma brands are focusing their efforts on targeting HCPs rather than trying to connect with patients directly.
For example, if you’re a pharma brand whose drug treats a specific type of disease, you can’t target patients with that disease, since that’s protected healthcare information. And, thanks to the new OCR guidance, you’re even limited when it comes to targeting IP addresses within a certain location of a treatment center for that disease. So, what you can you do? Use job title-based targeting to reach HCPs who treat that disease. Once they have a greater awareness of your drug and its benefits, they may then be more likely to turn around and recommend it to patients.
It’s clear that the healthcare landscape today is complicated and that brands and agencies in the space face distinct challenges. By leveraging mixed-funnel media to connect with audiences, leaning into historical data to inform future campaign strategies, and shifting focus from patients themselves to their healthcare providers, health and pharma marketers can find success in 2024 and beyond.
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Hungry for more 2024 trends? Check out our 2024 Trends Report for everything digital marketers need to know for next year.
During the early stages of the pandemic, consumer shopping behaviors migrated online out of necessity and convenience. Today, while pandemic restrictions have loosened and in-store shopping has now rebounded in some areas, e-commerce is still on the up-and-up across nearly all retail categories. The online retail and e-commerce space has truly come into its own, with consumers increasingly shopping websites and apps for items ranging from luxuries to necessities.
As part of this online shopping boom, and in preparation for cookie loss, retailers are learning how to collect more first-party data from customers through promotions and loyalty programs. This, in turn, is resulting in new opportunities to monetize, analyze, and diversify how they activate this wealth of valuable customer information to drive both online and in-store sales.
Meanwhile, technology has continued its rapid advance: Artificial intelligence, which is forecast to grow globally in retail market size from $10 billion to $45 billion in the next decade, is powering retail data analysis and subsequent recommendation engines. At the same time, consumers’ screens, big and small, are becoming more interactive, actionable, and attributable to sales in real time.
Looking to make the most of all the new opportunities available to retail marketers in 2024? Read on for three key trends:
If first-party data is gold for marketers, then retailers and e-commerce brands that successfully collect and activate that data can be considered retail royalty. And retail media networks (RMNs)? They’ve quickly created a kingdom of their own. In fact, it was that inherent value of first-party data—opt-in, great for targeting and attribution, and future-friendly in a cookieless world—that created a catalyst for the explosion of RMNs, which are forecast to reach $55 billion next year.
RMNs allow retailers to monetize first-party data by providing targeted, attributable advertising inventory on their websites and apps, as well as in stores. For instance, Walmart.com can activate a logged-in user's first-party data and analyze their shopping patterns to target them with relevant product ads to drive future sales. This could look like displaying ads for baby food to someone who purchased diapers, or showing a shopper who almost bought a certain sweater an ad for an alternate knitwear brand.
Right now, RMN data is very siloed and lacks standardization. This makes it difficult for advertisers to assess which networks are driving strong performance, incremental sales lift, and ROI across all their chosen RMNs, which hinders informed budget allocation. And the biggest players, like Walmart and Amazon, don’t have much incentive to share their data outside their own walls. So, it’s in the best interest of retailers and e-commerce businesses to take a balanced approach to the visibility of RMNs—remember, your own first-party data is king.
While certain aspects of artificial intelligence are still evolving, there are already numerous practical applications in use. These include personalization opportunities, customer service capabilities, and the ability to analyze data to forecast product demand.
As customers call for more personalized shopping experiences, AI will enable retailers and industry marketers to deliver on expectations in key ways. Data analysis will continue to improve as AI matures, and retailers and e-commerce marketers will consequently be able to utilize AI-powered tools to better segment and target audiences and tailor the advertising they see across the web.
Post-purchase, generative AI tools are evolving to be head and shoulders above previous iterations of simple chat-based customer support. Pairing owned data with GenAI can help retail marketers with tactics like targeted and relevant promotional messages based on past purchases, up-sells or re-sells (if a prior purchase is getting old), cross-sells (say, a deal on golf shoes for a customer who just bought a new driver), or creating content, talk tracks, and dynamic offers or webpages within a more controlled customer service environment. Of course, retail brands will want human team members to review content generated by AI to ensure accuracy and brand authenticity.
Shoppers have continued their shift to smaller screens—smartphones, tablets, and laptops. Still, with the growing addressability and connectedness of the large screens in our homes, retail marketers are increasingly able to advertise their goods cohesively across devices. Even better, those devices and platforms have evolved to let customers scan, click, or tap to shop directly from the ads they display.
There are many ways to create shoppable videos, including adding product links to video descriptions, using overlays to display product information, or displaying QR codes that link viewers to product pages. For example, QR codes in CTV advertising allow highly targeted consumers to navigate to retail or e-commerce sites, an action that can be directly attributed to the advertising campaign. It’s an opportunity to get the best of both worlds: the lean-back, immersive experience of traditional TV plus the granular targeting and measurement capabilities that come with digital advertising.
On smaller screens, platforms like Meta, TikTok, and YouTube are developing technologies that let consumers purchase products within videos on their platforms. This trend was accelerated in no small way by Apple’s App Tracking Transparency, which made it difficult for platforms to track user behavior outside their own ecosystems. Social media channels are rewarding retail advertisers with greater visibility for creating shoppable ads, as they keep users on the platforms, and they offer a chance to collect valuable user data from purchase activities—a win-win for platforms and for retail marketers.
Overall, as pandemic-era online shopping behaviors have maintained and evolved, competitive retailers and platforms have adapted to those behaviors in ways that turn data into dollars. Marketers in the retail and e-commerce industry who strategically tap into retail media networks, artificial intelligence, and shoppable video will meet customers where they are and how they expect to transact, in ways that foster sales and longer-term loyalty.
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Hungry for more 2024 trends? Check out our 2024 Trends Report for everything digital marketers need to know for next year.
As restaurant and dining businesses recover from the era of peak pandemic restrictions, the industry continues to show signs of improvement. As an example, for most of the past year, restaurant operators more frequently reported higher same-store sales than lower same-store sales on a year-over-year basis.
Plus, the impacts of macroeconomic headwinds—inflation, increased food prices, the labor shortage, and supply chain disruption—seem to be easing. The forecast of continued (albeit stabilized) revenue growth, combined with the valuable experience of running leaner operations that restaurant and dining institutions gained during the early years of the pandemic, suggest that, while challenges still exist, there’s room for growth in the year ahead.
How can restaurant and dining industry advertisers whip up marketing recipes for continued success? Read on for three key trends to keep top-of-mind in 2024 to achieve greater visibility, provide more value to customers, and craft an enhanced dining experience.
The restaurant and dining industry was hit hard by economic downturn in recent years, as were its customers. Inflation has driven up food costs, which has affected the pricing strategies of restaurants, as they strive to maintain profitability while keeping prices competitive. Those prices have caused lower-income consumers to spend less on dining out and to visit restaurants less frequently—although the wealthiest diners are actually spending more.
Food service businesses are adopting strategies to up the value they provide, and then investing in marketing those approaches. For instance, some restaurants have lowered prices but adjusted portion sizes to match; others have provided discounts on slow days or at off-peak times; and others still have found that “more” is actually the way to go—Olive Garden’s famed “buy one, take one to go” option during the pandemic allowed diners to stretch their order beyond one meal.
“Value” can also extend beyond the price tag. Businesses that sell or serve food that’s healthier, more functional, or more sustainably sourced should highlight that connection to the values held by their diners. Instituting loyalty programs with incentives can also result in higher and more frequent spending over time, something 8 in 10 adults said that they’d likely join if offered by a favorite local restaurant.
Though the economy shows signs of improvement, emphasizing value will continue to remain key in 2024. Marketing messages that highlight promotions, special offers, affordable dining options, and non-monetary value will resonate with discerning consumers.
The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated the adoption of contactless and tech-driven dining experiences, as evidenced by the boom in third-party delivery services like DoorDash and Uber Eats. Today, consumers have come to expect, if not rely on, that level of convenience. As such, it’s no surprise that the food delivery market size is projected to grow.
Part of that growth is due to the growing number of restaurants that plan to offer food delivery directly. Benefits to the food establishment include not paying fees to third-party delivery apps, and, in turn, passing those savings onto the customer by not marking up menu items; and building loyalty to the restaurant brand instead of the app. Plus, app downloads and associated loyalty programs have inherent marketing implications, such as the opportunity to own customers’ opted-in data and activate it through advertising and one-to-one marketing (like email and SMS), pushing promotions more directly to customers.
Embracing partnerships with third-party delivery apps also provides opportunities to create new revenue streams and relevant marketing touchpoints. Restaurants that aren’t leveraging the popularity of apps like DoorDash or Uber Eats may be missing critical visibility at key moments—last-minute supper plans, additional hungry party guests, or late-night snack attacks—as well as a chance to generate goodwill (if not repeat business) with app users. Once those valuable partnerships are forged, industry marketers can consider in-app advertising or app listing optimization tactics to reach and speak to customers who are hungry for convenience.
From birthday dinners to boozy brunches, consumers are continually seeking dining experiences that go beyond the food itself. These outings are often occasion-based, but sometimes, the allure of a hands-on cooking demo or a class on cocktail mixing can be the reason why people choose to dine out—and a memorable, shareable experience might result in repeat visits and word-of-mouth recommendations.
It took a few years, but the experiential dining trend is finally catching up with consumers’ desires for a unique dining experience. In that time, the a la carte menu of experiential options has exploded: Dinner theaters, multi-sensory dining, immersive environments, and augmented and virtual reality have all provided noteworthy nights out for the current generation of foodies.
Given that food is inherently visual, restaurant and dining advertisers can add this “experiential” layer to their marketing to tease the tastebuds of today’s experience-seeking customers. Faux out-of-home creative has become a popular way to attract attention, by simulating (or wildly exaggerating) a digital food or dining experience (Popeye’s and Burger King are two recent FOOH practitioners). Augmented reality for this industry has evolved past QR code menus to include interactive food visualization and immersive environment exploration.
Advertisers who present enhanced creativity by leveraging emerging technologies, high-speed data networks, mobile accessibility, and consumers’ desire for an innovative dining experience will whip up a marketing recipe that satisfies and delights.
While consumer dining behavior can change more drastically than a seasonal menu due to factors like the economy, technology, and social influences, there are a few things restaurant and dining marketers can focus on to drive success in 2024. By centering their messaging on value and dining experiences, and by tapping into the opportunities available in the delivery realm, marketing teams can gain and retain hungry customers in the year ahead.
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Hungry for more 2024 trends? Check out our 2024 Trends Report for everything digital marketers need to know for next year.
