Digital Marketing Trends for 2023
Every year, a combination of technological innovations, consumer habits and societal shifts reshape marketing. To anticipate these changes, Oneupweb brings together various working departments to compile the new trends in digital marketing that will shape the year ahead. From new PPC tools to changing privacy standards, these are the developments worth knowing about.
The Big Picture: Privacy, Robots and Recession
From 50,000 feet, three topics will dominate digital marketing in 2023. Whether you’re a multinational corporation or a mom-and-pop small business, we’re all on the same internet and share many of the same platforms and tools. Google, AWS, Microsoft… When these tech giants make changes or have change thrust upon them by regulators, businesses of all sizes are impacted.
Let’s start by looking at these three big-picture trends before moving into channel-specific predictions.
Internet Privacy
New 2023 privacy laws and regulatory changes are coming. While Google and Meta are the giants of behavior data collection, hundreds of other companies are piling cookies into your browser to track your internet usage. Five states in the US have consumer privacy laws going into effect this year, including California, which encompasses the 94% of Californians with internet access. Businesses should note all the requirements included in the California Privacy Protection Agency draft regulations; California legislation often sets the bench for national laws that follow.
Artificial Intelligence
Technology first used by giant companies gains wider adoption over years or decades. For many companies, artificial intelligence is becoming integrated into almost every marketing channel. Brands of all sizes can examine AI’s role in:
- Serving social media content
- Identifying the ideal customer through paid tools like Google Performance Max
- Getting started with creative ideas, such as blog outlines or design mood-boards
- Personalizing email campaigns
- Reporting
Need help putting AI to work for you? Get in touch.
The R-Word
How many times have you heard “these unprecedented times” during the past three years? Your online success is still predicated on larger forces, including economic trends, consumer tastes and, yes, inflation. Experts boldly predicted a recession in the US sometime in Q2 2023, but history says that recessions don’t always show up on time. Experimenting with your brand messaging, creating value-focused content and rewarding customer loyalty are just a few of the ways digital marketing can help your business weather the storm.
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Focused Trends in Digital Marketing
Online marketing is a cake that slices many ways. Our teams at Oneupweb are always pointing out discipline-specific trends to analyze and implement on behalf of our clients.
Content Marketing & SEO Marketing Trends for 2023
AI-generated content is taking the internet by storm. Google isn’t liking how much spam that’s creating. And Bing is potentially jumping into ChatGPT with two feet. As it stands, content made by people, for people, is still king.
The way we collect and present web metrics is changing. Google is retiring Universal Analytics on July 1, 2023, after more than 12 years of being the industry’s leading analytics tool. Oneupweb has been experimenting, learning and (thanks to our developers) improving GA4 to ensure we’ve collected client data dating back to 2021 on the platform. See what’s new in GA4, and check out our updated Google Analytics glossary, which now includes new GA4 terms.
Words are not enough. Your optimized on-page videos, images and interactive experiences are the cherries on top of the perfect SEO strategy. Watch for brands to include more multimedia to offer users more than one way to discover, research and convert. Most of this content is easily repackaged for social media, email marketing and other channels. Plugging in similar content across multiple platforms can increase brand recognition and awareness.
Paid Marketing Trends
Video ads will be the top priority for PPC campaigns in 2023. 90% of users rely on videos to help them make a purchasing decision. That’s even more valuable when you consider that paid users are 50% more likely to convert than organic users on ecommerce sites. Tools like Performance Max use AI to serve optimized ad formats to users, including video. A deep library of video assets will be crucial to 2023 PPC success. Our PPC team has been working with dozens of clients to expand and optimize videos for paid campaigns – and it’s working.
The State of the Digital Marketing Industry 2023
More Digital Services
Digital marketing agencies as an industry have grown by an annualized average of 15.5% since 2017. Despite concerns of a slowing economy, the digital marketing industry is forecast to grow at a CAGR of 17.6% through 2023. While economic headwinds, changing consumer habits and energy price volatility roil other industries, online advertising thrived during the pandemic recession of 2020. This resiliency is built on two simple realities: First, people are spending more time online than ever before, including American adults averaging 7 hours and 4 minutes per day. Second, digital marketing is accessible; it offers businesses of all sizes access to low-investment, high-ROI advertising solutions to maximize budget.
More Affordable Than Ever
Digital marketing is 61% less expensive than traditional marketing. Mixing email, social media, content and PPC offer brands access to a diverse yet focused audience of interested customers. As privacy requirements changes, digital marketing agencies can help brands capture the zero-party and first-party data needed to keep these marketing channels effective.
Reacting in Real Time with PPC
Experts are forecasting supply chain challenges into 2023 and beyond. While some industries struggle to source raw materials or hire staff to go to market, others are facing oversupply difficulties exacerbated by global warehousing shortages. Brands are already turning to PPC campaigns to move overstock items at the best possible prices to alleviate storage shortages and protect margins.
Industries struggling to deliver product have a longer-term solution with remarketing. In addition to inventory notification emails and text alerts, brands can shape PPC campaigns to target past users who failed to convert on out-of-stock product pages weeks or even months after the initial user session.
What Do You Want to See In 2023?
Meet your marketing goals with a little help. Oneupweb is a vertically integrated marketing agency that lives and breathes digital marketing. From developing a content strategy to auditing your data, we provide mid- to enterprise-sized companies with creative solutions to their most pressing challenges. We’re big enough to do it all and small enough to stay scrappy. See what our team can do; get in touch or call 231-922-9977 to schedule to chat!