The JPL team joined with the advertising world’s best and brightest again at AdWeek New York 2023. We dove into a premier lineup of content tracks that covered the latest in marketing, advertising, tech and creativity. As we collectively close the books on 2023, here’s our take on the most impactful themes as we head into 2024.
Open collaboration between media and creative teams.
The most effective campaigns continue to be a result of centralized resources who are empowered to navigate a fragmented media landscape and make decisions that align creative and media efforts. Creative teams know their success extends beyond mere ad placements. And media buyers know their success involves more than acquiring inventory slots. Factors such as atmosphere, timing, positioning and relativity all need to come together upfront to establish a perfectly timed, perfectly messaged connection with potential consumers. The last part of this equation must be robust and strategic measurement. As these two sides come together more closely than ever before, measurement must play a pivotal role in driving optimization decisions.
Embrace the streaming-first world.
The rise of digital streaming services brings more good news for advertisers. It’s become a solid solution to the problems surrounding the fragmented market of television and traditional linear buying. Streaming is the place to get your message in front of consumers, as the changes in our population demographics can be directly tied to the rise and widespread use of Netflix, Hulu, Disney+, Peacock, Paramount+ and more. We can continue to benefit from combining third-party data with contextually relevant content to reach consumers while they’re enjoying their favorite programming on demand. We’re also all watching to see what shakes out from the streaming sports realm in 2024 with the acquisition of NFL Sunday Ticket by YouTube TV (Google). 95 of the 100 top-rated shows are sports, so the door is wide open for brands who want to reach their audiences in a dynamic way with sports programming like never before.
Break into Gen Z’s consumer behavior and influence.
Gen Z is, and will continue to grow into its own as, a significant consumer group with preferences that shake up every area of marketing and advertising strategy. Bright colors, trendy aesthetics and the influence of TikTok-style content are just a few of the ways to tap into what attracts and converts them. This also includes the increasing influence of product reviews, authenticity and endorsements from influencers, including TikTok influencers. Gen Z consumer preferences will reverberate across every industry more and more, so getting to know them isn’t an option – but a must – in 2024.
Transparency and trust remain front and center.
From data- and privacy-centered advertising to transparency in ad buying and data management, trust remains center stage. Know that the advertising industry is adapting to privacy concerns, focusing on data standards, trust-building and data quality. Look to hear more about the use of data clean rooms to ensure privacy-compliant data matching. Standardization is also trending as the need for robust systems to identify and correct human errors in data management rises.
Integration and collaboration across ad formats drive stronger performance.
Speaking of transparency and trust, they become even more important as campaigns continue to be held accountable to drive clients’ business objectives while providing more cross-platform integration. By integrating strategies across various advertising formats, brands can finally deliver truly cohesive ad campaigns that direct people even to location- and time-relative areas. A robust measurement strategy must play a pivotal role in the proper activation of integrating across platforms.
AI empowers advertisers and marketers to reach new levels of creativity – faster.
AI is transforming how advertising is created. Those who are incorporating AI into their creative processes are finding real benefits and time savings. Think of AI as enhancing rather than replacing. AI speeds up the path from ideation to execution. It is quickly becoming the industry’s go-to resource for idea starters, variations and speeding up the process of creating content. To realize AI’s full potential, marketers and advertisers should look for ways to integrate the benefits of AI and its time-saving capabilities across the spectrum of business processes we do every day.
Platform-specific marketing must deliver context.
The idea that one-size-fits-all marketing and advertising strategies don’t work in today’s diverse digital landscape isn’t breaking news. But it doesn’t take long to catch this approach still in practice when observing a campaign executed across different platforms and channels. The industry needs to do better here and challenge the status quo. Brands need to be challenged to adapt messaging and creative to the context of the platform. This means considering the context of the landscape that your advertising will be placed in and adjusting it to the user expectations and culture that’s present there. Contextual marketing is key to engaging people authentically, and it also will strike the right balance between your brand’s organic and paid efforts. To make platform-specific marketing happen, prepare for different planning processes – but it’s clear the results are worth it.
