A new year means a new chance to sit down and carve out the strategy and plans that will take your efforts to the next level. Some people think being strategic means ignoring new trends and sticking to age-old best practices, but it’s actually doing a bit of both!
Doing strategic marketing means taking a holistic approach to understanding both best practices and new ideas, and using that knowledge to align initiatives to your goals to fuel growth.
Pay Attention to Marketing Trends
While best practices have their place in any strategy, keeping an eye on the new trends can help you stay ahead of the curve and the competition. After all, best practices were once just trends people were sharing.
Marketing trends can be anything from a new form of technology entering the market (looking at you, AI!) to a shift in what data matters. But no matter the specifics, trends are one of the best ways to stay educated about the industry and take those learnings into your own strategies.
So, we turned to our team of marketing experts to share the marketing trends for 2025 that you may not be hearing about.
2025 Marketing Trends Driving Business Growth
We know you’ve been hearing left and right about AI, video, changes to organic search, and more, but we wanted to share the trends we’re expecting in 2025 that you may not be thinking about…or that you need to re-prioritize.
Get Buy-In by Proving ROI
“I’ve been hearing from more and more clients about getting C-suite and board buy-in and linking marketing to revenue. Proving ROI of marketing isn’t new, but it seems like it’s now the #1 focus for many.” – Ann Warren, Earned Media and Content Consultant
Marketing teams are often left scrambling to prove why marketing is worth investing in. After all, a lot of marketing efforts can feel nebulous and untraceable, especially with recent privacy and data-tracking changes. As Ann mentioned, this isn’t anything new, but it is becoming a much more important focus for teams.
Having the right marketing goals and tracking all the data you can back to those goals helps you prove the value of marketing to any curious leadership team.
Define the Value of Marketing
“We continue to see a gap between CMOs and other executives. The 2024 Gartner Growth Agenda Survey found that 79% of marketing executives see themselves as the leader for growth in their business. However, only 38% of other C-suite executives view marketing executives as the growth leader.
In fact, non-marketing executives are more likely to say the growth driver in their organization is the CEO, the CFO, the chief product officer, or the chief commercial officer, not the CMO. So marketers have to rethink the value of marketing to the enterprise.” – Nikki Leonardi, Marketing Strategist
Going hand-in-hand with proving ROI, more teams are seeing the need to define the overall value of marketing. That means driving growth, using data to back it up, AND highlighting those wins and learnings to the team at large.
Doing things as simple as sharing your monthly reporting with the leadership team can help to highlight what marketing is bringing to the table. But taking it a step further will make an even bigger impact.
Remember to craft a story around your reporting so the hard data is easier to understand. Consider showing how the leads traveled through the funnel rather than just focusing on the number you generated. Or define the next steps for a campaign that did well. After all…
Storytelling Moves People AND Your Business
“We’ve all been there….listening to a pitch, a presenter, a boss or a colleague share their ideas and perspectives, eyes glazed over and unsure of where this is going. The biggest breakthrough in any relationship (because this is what business is all about) happens with a connection. And, that connection can only be formed if you know your audience.
Once you know your audience and their pain points, it’s about crafting a story to make an emotional connection. It’s about painting that picture, or narrative, in a way that is memorable and one that others can relate to. If done right, integrating storytelling into your business strategy can humanize your brand, spark real conversations, and accelerate growth.” – Lesly Cardec, CMO and SVP of ClearEdge Recruiting
Much like on social media, people want businesses to be human…even in meetings! Yes, you should solve your client’s pain points, but can you do it in a way that’s beyond focusing solely on your features and benefits? Can you drive home the value you would bring with a compelling story?
For example, Lesly recently shared a sales email she received that opened with a reference to her recent LinkedIn post about the trials and tribulations of Elf on a Shelf. While the LinkedIn post had driven comment after comment of parents commiserating and sharing their own stories, the sales email said only, “I saw your LinkedIn post about the elf tradition causing parenting stress,” before jumping into the pitch.
While it’s lovely to reference a personal LinkedIn post when reaching out to someone, that email would have stuck out for far better reasons with a few changes. Take the time to tie that post into something relatable but also spend time researching what keeps Lesly up at night and how your product or service can make her life easier.
So take the time to craft a story. It’ll make all of the difference.
Community over Promotion in Social Media Marketing
“Personal and corporate brands are moving away from self-promotion and focusing on content that educates, entertains, and engages. Building genuine connections is the new gold standard.” – Melissa Thwing, Director of Content Strategy & Social Media
Social media should be exactly that — social. Building community and connection means you can be remembered as the brand that cares about the people behind the business. It helps to build trust and ensure that you come up top of mind when people consider who they want to work for and do business with.
Building that connection doesn’t have to be complicated. Comment on posts (with genuine thoughts, not a random string of emojis), highlight your team whenever possible, tag clients in customer stories, and more. You can even focus on getting your CEO involved in posting because CEO reputation is 45% of a company’s overall reputation.
And remember: people want to work with the people who are fun so don’t be afraid to let your creativity show!
Sales and Marketing Alignment
“One of the 3 biggest challenges that B2B marketers reported in 2024 was sales and marketing alignment. That’s because only 15% say they have aligned KPIs. A straightforward way to bridge this gap is by focusing on lead quality and ensuring that leads are tracked through every stage of the funnel. Because just asking, ‘How many leads did they generate?’ is the wrong way to measure your marketing team’s success.” – Alison Richmond, SVP, Marketing Services
Are you ready for some tough love? Marketing and sales must work hand-in-hand in order to drive growth. If you haven’t taken the time to align your sales and marketing teams, you need to.
Add the following to your reporting: Qualified opportunities, meetings with potential buyers, actual pipeline growth, and revenue per channel (lead source) to help both your sales and your marketing teams understand your funnel better.
From Revenue Obsession to Customer Obsession
“Focus on customer value creation to drive revenue. Know your customer journey inside and out, challenge assumptions, and continue to improve that experience.” – Andrea Morin, Account Manager
In a world of automated replies and AI-powered chatbots, people crave one thing in particular from the companies they do business with — to feel known. Much like building a story or driving community on social media, connecting with people is what is going to make 2025 your strongest year yet.
Focusing on how you drive value for customers could look like customer interviews, surveys, or tracking activity on your content to see what most appeals to your audience. When you focus on delivering exactly what your clients want, revenue follows.
Marketing Trends: Where Do We Go From Here?
These are just a few trends that are at the top of our team’s minds in this new year, but there is plenty more where this came from!
As the year progresses, there will be new trends and new best practices to put into place. As a marketing agency with decades of experience in the talent business, we’ll be keeping an eye on all of it for you.
Sign up for our newsletter and we’ll send you our marketing expertise right to your inbox.