As marketers, a critical part of our jobs is understanding the demands of consumers in order to deliver the best possible experiences. People are craving a sense of connection, community and authenticity from brands.
As a result, brands must reinvent their ad campaigns to engage consumers. Big-spend, single channel ad campaigns no longer cut it with today’s consumers. Marketers have access to more channels, devices and technology than ever before to interact with consumers. Yet, many brands still view campaigns as isolated tactics.
2022 will be the year that marks the end of marketing isolation. Instead of trying to outspend the competition, we can expect to see brands working harder to outsmart through marketing integration.
Here are predictions on how this will unfold in 2022.
Marketers Will Outsmart, Not Outspend
Perhaps one of the biggest lessons brands can expect to learn in 2022 is that companies who spend more, won’t win more.
According to a Google global visibility study, 56 percent of display impressions are not seen by consumers. Challenger brands should take solace in this — 2022 could be their year, if they activate smart, agile campaigns.
Take Ocean Spray’s viral TikTok moment in 2020. The company saw an opportunity to insert themselves into a conversation and hop on a trend, boosting awareness and engagement with key audiences.
Companies don’t need to spend big to captivate. Audience relevance, created through agile campaigns, is always going to win out over trying to buy consumers.
Creative Expressions Will Live in Concert, Not Solo
Consumers expect a uniform experience across all brand touchpoints. In 2022, marketers who embrace this will overtake leaders by investing in omnichannel creative expressions.
Our recent study with GWI shows the pandemic has accelerated and magnified the way consumers multi-task, multi-hat and multi-screen and brands must evolve to keep pace.
To execute omnichannel campaigns successfully, all facets of the business need to work together – marketing, sales, creative, communications, legal and finance. Consequently, those who continue to implement single-service campaigns can expect to be out of a job by 2023.
Campaigns Will Foster Connection, Not Division
2022 is all about connection, connection across audiences and across teams, to create smarter, more agile and more successful campaigns.
Brands must waste less of their audiences’ time and energy, moving away from uninspired campaigns. They must abandon futile single-channel approaches and adopt clever, connected experiences.
Successful brands can successfully navigate a rapidly evolving landscape to create valuable experiences for consumers by creating audience relevancy and adapting content for use across consumer touchpoints.
Overall, marketers can expect to see innovation as a prominent theme in the industry this upcoming year. It does not take an astronomical marketing budget to engage audiences. Successful marketers will outsmart their competition by working across teams to develop agile, omnichannel campaigns that work harder for them in 2022.
The author, Rex Petrill, is vice president of paid media at TEAM LEWIS.
