Top Media and Advertising Trends

[Approximate Reading Time : 4 mins]

The year 2017 was a year of strife and creativity for the world of media and advertising, and as we settle into 2018, here’s an attempt at crystal gazing for trends and technologies that will shape that world this year. Here’s our pick for the top five trends:

1. The digital-video market is set to explode
   • The number of digital-video users worldwide is expected to exceed *800 million in 2021. Rentals or subscription-based services (SVoD) such as Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Prime are expected to account for 30% of the total SVoD market share, with forecasted revenues of around USD 16 billion by 2021.
   • More than in demand, videos are now “on demand.”
2. Mobile will continue to rule the roost
   • Seeing the past trends, mobile will be the foremost commanding platform in 2018. The global share of mobile devices in online activity is **6%. Users currently spend 3.5 hours browsing the Internet on mobile devices—a number set to increase in 2018.
   • Mobile places a hefty dependence on data, and this access to user information concerning the user’s habits, browsing data, location, app history, and so on will help ads benefit and capitalize on all the available information, leading to better usage for the end user.
3. Social-media advertising will get more expensive
   • There’s no denying that social media has moved beyond relationships—it now affects governments, economies, and people in an unprecedentedly powerful manner. The number of social-media users is expected to reach #95 billion by 2020. Speaking of social-media advertising, it looks like 2018 will see the end of free reach—a harsh wake-up call for over ##51% of companies that struggle with inadequate social-media ad budget.
4. Influencer marketing will continue its successful reign
   • A staggering ***49% of consumers rely on influencer recommendations to make purchases—a fact that indicates the dominance and power of influencers, despite a few hiccups that we saw in 2017.
5. Artificial intelligence will go mainstream
   • For marketers, individualization is the next level of personalization and ###artificial intelligence is helping them make the cut.
   • Gartner predicts that by 2018, organizations that invest in building AI-enabled personalization capabilities will outperform those that don’t by more than 30% difference in bottom-line revenues.

Digital marketing of the future will be more integrated, transparent, and reach ever more customers in a highly contextual fashion. Is your 2018 advertising strategy in tune with the latest trends?