Ekene Eyo is the Managing Director of Redwolf Company and former Chief Operating Officer of Noah’s Ark Communications. In this piece, he shares his highlights of the outgoing year and `nine trends to look forward to in the incoming year.
As business leaders in the marketing space, it’s not unusual to review the current year as the curtains drop. This rundown represents my personal views on key highlights for 2023. I’m certain everyone would expect me to start with AI, but my number one item is….
1. Twitter’s Woes and Impact on Advertising: It’s common knowledge that X, formerly known as Twitter, is reported to have lost almost 50% of its advertising revenue due to advertisers’ boycott, leading to its new owner Elon Musk making that now infamous outburst, “Go f@&# yourself,” during a live interview. If this trend continues, it could pose an existential challenge for the platform, considering they have billions of dollars in loan repayments. Many brands have had to restrategise and reallocate their Twitter (X) advertising budget.
2. AI Gives Metaverse a Bloody Nose: 2022 was the year of the metaverse, with big brands launching hubs in the metaverse. However as we ushered in the new year on January 1, the industry turned its attention to the next big thing – artificial intelligence, and as they say, the rest is history.
3. Betting Marketing Is a Headache: Even though many brand managers and marketing directors might not want to agree, the truth is that in 2023, their brands had to compete for a share of mind, and may I add, a share of the wallets of the younger demographic. It’s been a headache.
4. Events and Experiential Marketing Came Back with a Vengeance: COVID-19 stole this from marketing, and I’m glad we saw a full return to activations and events.
5. Digital marketing is still going strong. The budget shift to digital continues even though marketers have become increasingly circumspect of vanity metrics
6. TikTok Almost Downplayed Thread: Thread was the new shiny toy this year, but brands remained infatuated with TikTok. I can assure you that virtually every brand (especially B2C) has a renewed TikTok strategy for 2024.
7. Influencers Went on Steroids: Brand owners will tell you this was a major pain as signing up influencers, especially macro and mega influencers, became extremely expensive. On the back of this high cost was the struggle by brands to show ROI. However, I noticed that it may have been a year for Micro and Nano influencers’ growth as a direct consequence of the cost of macro and mega influencers.
8. Streaming and Podcasts may be a new fishing ground for marketers because those two channels really “blew up” in 2023. TBH I have had to stop subscribing to new Podcast and streaming platforms
9. ARCON Vetting for Digital Ads Kinda Sinks In with Nigerian Marketers: This was a rather controversial topic in 2023, but it seems the uproar has subsided.
Suffice it to say that 2023 has been a very challenging year for brands in Nigeria even the global brands struggled to stay afloat with some exiting the country.
2024 MARKETING OUTLOOK
This write-up is on the back of my last post which highlighted 2023, So it’s time to take a quick dive into 2024 from my POV. Disclaimer these are not predictions.
1. AI WILL SEE OPTIMIZATION: AI will continue to change many things from the way consumers search and purchase to how businesses and marketing departments work, however, I feel we will not see exponential changes in AI, rather AI will be optimized. Tip -acquire the right skills and AI platforms to help you cocreate within defined framework
2. TASTE OF COOKIELESS: Data privacy will come to the fore as Google prepares to go cookieless. Tip – if you do not have a 1st party data strategy already, you have to prioritize it and Strengthen organic and online community-building efforts including social listening. You will have to work with credible Digital Marketing Agencies like The Redwolf Company to deliver contextual targeting, Look-alike audiences and cohort targeting in the meantime.
3. SHAKE-UPS IN SOCIAL MEDIA – Thread as a conversational platform will become more dominant as X goes through its challenges. AI integration into Social media will mean marketers have to keep an eye on new features on social platforms and monitor brands that are doing well. Tip -Brands must maintain a healthy presence on platforms native to their audience.
4. ELEVATED CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE (CX): Many brands were undone by CX despite all the hard work in 2023. As CX takes centre stage in 2024, CMOs will have to invest in technologies and strategies to enhance the end-to-end customer journey so that all the heavy investment in advertising is not wasted.
5. CONTENT REMAINS KING, DATA ANALYTICS ITS CHIEF OF STAFF: TBH this is self-explanatory. Marketers must not only up their content game but must become more adept at data analytics.
6. BRANDS PLANNING TO CUT MARKETING BUDGET WILL LOSE OUT: These are trying times for businesses and one knee-jerk reaction is to cut marketing budget, but history is replete with examples of how this worked against businesses. JUST DON’T DO IT.
7. PROFITABLE GROWTH PRESSURE VANITY METRICS: This again needs no explanation. We can sense it already
8. DIGITAL MARKETING REJIGGING: Core items like SEO and PPC are expected to experience some rejigging as Goggle’s search generative engine matures in 2024, while the same company is expected to roll out further generative AI tools into Google Ads. Simple tip – monitor the space closely
9. SUSTAINABILITY AND PURPOSE: While purpose as a brand strategy seems to be weakening, sustainability is on the ascendency, although not so much in a country like Nigeria. It is expected to gain more prominence in 2024. Quick tip – learn from the green-washing backlash suffered by brands in the West in 2023.
2024 is going to be an interesting and challenging year for marketers. It will be a year you go BIG or you go HOME and the economy will play a great part in outcomes, especially for a country like Nigeria.
#Mytwokobo
Ekeno Eyo is a leadership executive who has amassed over two decades of experience in Marketing, Advertising, Product Management, Public Relations, and Sales as well as brand management on both client-side and Agency side. He has built competencies in Business development, consumer psychology and insights, segmentation and go-to-market strategies, digital marketing strategies for many local and global brands. Eyo has managed and driven relationship with award-winning brands including Friesland Campina WAMCO, Cowbell, Airtel, Peak Milk, Nokia, Maltina, Diamond Bank, Access Bank, UBA, BAT, MTN, MoneyGram amongst many other brands.
