Digital Marketing Strategies 2024: the Old and the New
Every year it’s the same story: in the early months, all specialized blogs are talking about trends for digital marketing strategies.
And this year is no different: with a simple search, you’ll find dozens of articles. And they all look very similar.
They say it can’t be so different since marketing trends aren’t infinite, right?
But at the same time, what they call “trends” in digital marketing strategies isn’t so trendy. And many end up repeating the same points year after year.
I wanted to do something different in this article. I brought real trends, informed by the top authorities in the specific areas we’re going to discuss.
And at the end of the article, I also brought some old trends that have become consolidated and others that are in the process, to remind you to never stop investing in them.
Let’s start because the topic is extensive. Come with me:
The Best Marketing Strategies in 2024
Let’s go straight to the point?
Digital marketing strategies in 2024 are heavily converging towards Artificial Intelligence. This is what you’ll find most at the top of articles talking about this subject on the internet.
But at the same time, we need to consider that Artificial Intelligence is just a symptom of what is truly trending in marketing for 2024 and beyond: personalization of experience and the power of content to advance the Marketing Funnel.
Personalized experiences have never ceased to be a trend. But now, with AI, it is becoming increasingly accessible to all types of businesses — from small to large ones.
The debate about the ethical uses of AI is ultimately a debate about content.
And 2024 is the big year for this conversation. We’ve never been so concerned about the quality of content being created for Google, YouTube, and Social Media.
Of course, this conversation touches on ethical points, but 2024 can be seen as the major milestone for this concern with content.
What was once a conversation for marketing and SEO groups is now a topic on prime-time TV. Google’s updates are being discussed at coffee breaks.
So, let’s start the list with this rhythm: AI and content, content and AI.
Shall we?
Artificial Intelligence (especially in video)
Artificial Intelligence certainly takes the cherry on top of the digital marketing trends in 2024.
It can be present in virtually any marketing strategy today, improving all its aspects.
In fact, we’ve already broken down here on the blog its most common uses in digital marketing material production. Check out some articles we’ve written about it:
➡️ AI in Digital Marketing – 30 useful examples
➡️ AI in business: what’s real and what’s not
➡️ 18 artificial intelligence tools to create images
However, while most of the discussion in 2023 revolved around Generative AI to produce text and images, 2024 brings a new possibility: video production.
AI-powered videos have been around for some time, but now there’s the possibility of creating videos with just a prompt, something that was exclusive to text and images.
We’re talking about OpenAI’s Sora. Check out the examples they offer on the site, all compiled into a single video:
But at the same time, we need to understand that Sora’s work is entering a very mature market.
Platforms like Envato Elements, for example, offer thousands of high-quality stock videos without any glitches, all for a plan that will probably be cheaper than OpenAI’s.
What Sora offers is the possibility of creating any type of video with absolutely varied configurations. It’s a new frontier being inaugurated in marketing, and we’ll see its development and adoption throughout 2024.
The debate between AI and human-generated content
At the same time, there’s an increasingly strong debate about the type of content Artificial Intelligence produces, and whether this is really the content our target audience wants.
A Pewsearch survey from 2022 measured the level of acceptance of AI in its early stages, still during the pandemic, in the US.
Its results showed that most people are on the fence about its use in daily life: 45% of respondents are excited and cautious at the same time about its use.
Throughout 2024, we can expect an increasingly larger debate on this topic. We already find various publications across the internet, between blogs and social networks, that make it clear that all their content is made by humans.
➡️ The Positive Aspects of Artificial Intelligence. And the other ones.
AI does have the potential to replace people in content creation. But this year’s debate revolves around the need for this to happen. And the results that AI brings versus the results that human-generated content brings.
The answer, of course, lies somewhere in between.
But stepping away from AI for a moment, let’s talk about a topic that gained a lot of traction in early 2024: delivery.
Free fast delivery
Marketplaces are becoming increasingly aggressive in their fast delivery tactics.
Amazon Prime deliveries ensure delivery times ranging from 1 to 2 or 3 business days in metropolitan areas as well.
Those working with e-commerce need to keep an eye on this trend, knowing the delivery plans of marketplaces and ensuring that your store is eligible for these deliveries.
And those working with their own sites also need to reduce both delivery costs and time.
Those looking to stand out in the area need to pay attention to deliveries. This is one of the biggest success factors in the current Shopping Journey.
Community Marketing
There have never been so many simple resources to work on Community Marketing as there are today.
Think back to the 2000s: you could only build real communities through events, newsletters, and profiles on very limited social media platforms.
Today, you can create a Discord channel for your brand in 5 minutes and engage your most loyal users, literally making audio calls with them for as long as you want.
You can create groups on WhatsApp and Telegram. You can create newsletters and groups on LinkedIn, create groups on Facebook without your brand’s branding to attract more people, create profiles on Twitter, and so on: the possibilities are enormous.
Community Marketing is one of the most interesting strategies for 2024, as multichannel integration technologies are becoming increasingly advanced.
Differentiated and Personalized Content
There is a great saturation of content on the internet today. And it will only grow larger in 2024.
This is my prediction, but with the advancement of AI in the world, I find it very difficult to be wrong about it.
Everyone is creating content in the standard way we were taught back in 2008-2010 with the emergence of Inbound Marketing.
But that standard way worked for that time, when few people were investing in digital marketing with a focus on content.
Today it doesn’t work anymore. Everything is so optimized that the path being taken by major brands is the opposite: eliminating optimization for the human element.
Look at this example of a post from Droga5, one of the most creative agencies in the world:
This is a post to celebrate the end of 2023, made on Instagram.
Smaller agencies, businesses that don’t care much about content, or those that follow the same logic of canned and quickly produced content would make a post in the style of “Thank you 2023,” with resources from Freepik, and that’s it — everyone’s happy.
Droga5’s case was different. They opened an internal contest and published the winner.
This is storytelling, and storytelling is interesting. And the result of this initiative will always be better than posts made just to check a box — the designer is motivated to create, not just to deliver.
This trend is very strong in 2024, also due to the advent of AI itself. In a world full of low-quality content, those who do things differently get ahead. Always.
And with that rhyme, let’s move on to the next item.
No-code and drag n’ drop platforms
The year is also very conducive to SaaS platforms that make tasks that used to require a programmer, at least, much easier.
Platforms like Salesforce, for example, allow you to create small organizational apps using simple logic and the drag n’ drop model.
Canva is another great example of this, making life easier for people who need quick design but don’t have designers available on the team.
These are just two examples of this trend that is taking over everything.
We have an article here on the blog, for example, that shows how to create ads using AI (linked above), without needing a designer.
Wix is another example — you can create websites without typing a single line of code.
This movement intensifies even more in 2024, as we are in a new boom of digital marketing, especially for laypeople who have never even seen a programming language in their lives.
ESG
This trend is more about the brand’s posture in the market and the preferences that people have regarding what they consume.
Conscious brands are leveraging ESG to generate content, showing how they operate within their different precepts and recommendations.
ESG is quite broad. You can check its 17 transformation pillars directly on the United Nations website.
Certifications are mainly obtained through specialized consultancies, which apply the points in your company and also certify through the appropriate channels.
There are points for all types of companies, not just those directly involved with the environment.
ESG is bringing a great wave to content, as it is an implementation that transforms the entire company.
Every transformation has a story. And as we’ve seen, in every story, there is the possibility of activating marketing and turning it into results.
AI in data structuring
We spent much of the decade collecting data from our target audience, clients, and the market in general.
The issue is that when we see what the internet has to say about this, very little is said about how to organize this data.
Marketing data, for example, is primarily organized on platforms like HubSpot or a sales CRM.
The problem is that, as they say in marketing, the medium is the message. By using only these platforms to organize your data, you are automatically determining which data is most important — the data that the platform deems most important.
Now, with the end of third-party cookies and the advent of LGPD, data is becoming increasingly scarce, which compels us to rely even more on these platforms.
2024 is the year when many people will understand this danger and capture their own data.
And with this large data capture, AI trained to organize them is also emerging.
Data structuring is also a trend. It is very important to generate data, but organizing it is even more important.
This ensures that you have control of all data generated about your ideal customer profile. Something fundamental for post-LGPD marketing.
Remote work informing the B2B market
To close the topic, we need to talk about one last point: the revolution in the work model.
There are several points of contact between a company and a brand.
One of these points is the great invisible work that marketing strategies do. The conversation about a brand’s new launch over coffee, the new commercial, the course that brand X launched…
All of this doesn’t generate data, but it’s a determining factor in purchases.
This dynamic is changing with remote work. As companies migrate to this sector — something that won’t be universal but is gaining many adopters across Brazil — the focus of B2B Marketing is changing a bit.
The focus is on easily consumable content and simple to share digitally. This is a major trend that, although easy to understand, is not so easy to implement.
By the way, talking about implementation, we need to discuss this point now in the article. Let’s dive in:
Guide to Updating Your Strategy from 2023 to 2024
Alright, so we understand what the trend is for 2024, right?
But now we need to understand a point as important: what about the strategies started in 2023? Can they be updated?
The strategies you’ve been running since last year need some small updates to take all these points we’ve mentioned into account.
Actually, “need” is a strong word. Every time trends lists come up, the FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out) light starts flashing in the heads of marketing professionals.
The truth is that the vast majority of strategies you’ve been following since 2023 will continue to work in 2024.
But for how long?
So, if your strategies don’t take any of these points into consideration, it’s very worthwhile to update them now to be more successful throughout the year.
And to arrive in 2025 with a new, fresh, and long-lasting strategy.
Let’s better understand how to make this adjustment? Come with me:
What worked and what didn’t
First, you need to analyze which of these trends you have already started to apply, even unintentionally, throughout 2023.
Some are impossible, as is the case with OpenAI’s Sora that did not exist yet.
But aside from that, all these other digital marketing strategies for 2024 have very old roots.
The shipping issue, for example, is developing much more now, but Amazon Prime has been around here in Brazil since 2019.
ESG and its implementation strategies have been a topic since the pandemic. Community Marketing has been around since Facebook revolutionized group technology, and so on.
These trends are related to the traction these digital marketing strategies are gaining in 2024, and they are not exactly new, making their debut this year.
So, seek to understand in your overall marketing strategy what is already applied and what has been successful for both your brand and your customer.
And then, move on to the next step:
Finding new channels for promotion
Based on the trends we’ve discussed here, it’s interesting for you to look for different channels to promote your content, taking into account these main trends.
Community Marketing, for example, doesn’t need to be an isolated marketing strategy in 2024.
In fact, it is informed by the very platforms of promotion. A link in your Instagram bio to a Telegram group, an exclusive Newsletter on LinkedIn, a link to the brand’s Discord: all of this counts.
To update your strategy, you need to analyze if your content aligns with these trends and seek other ways to position yourself.
Updating the entire team
The efforts to update the marketing strategy in 2024 are collaborative.
One person alone cannot do anything. Think of innovation leadership positions in companies, such as Chief Innovation Officers: they all require a complete team to start working.
Not all businesses have enough capital to invest in such professionals. So, the whole team needs to research and apply innovations wherever possible.
Seek to update your work routine to allow your entire team to research and list innovations that make sense for 2024 and beyond, for at least an hour every day.
And strive to keep an updated database with all this acquired information.
It’s also a great idea to hold meetings to discuss these innovations, seeking to understand what can be applied within the company’s reality, what is worthwhile, what efforts are needed, etc.
Identifying the best content opportunities
Now, speaking more specifically of Content Marketing, you will need to think of formats that go beyond good or bad.
Good content is great, don’t get me wrong. But it alone no longer works miracles.
Gone are the days when a simple blog brought in hundreds of leads every month. To stand out today, you need to always be open to new opportunities.
This often happens through co-marketing.
Take our own example. Our denser materials are always released in partnership with other brands that are also authorities in digital marketing.
But that’s just one of the many points you can address in the search for content opportunities.
For example: identify where communities spontaneously emerge about your product. Discussion forums, WhatsApp groups, anything goes: where are they talking about you? Produce content there!
Anything goes here. Just don’t stay still and keep producing the same old content.
Finding customization opportunities
Marketing is already personalized on various levels today. But often, this customization goes unnoticed by most people.
For example: did you know that there are personalized segmentations in Google Ads and Social Ads, right?
But at the same time, many people who are impacted by these ads have no idea how it happens.
A major trend in digital marketing strategies for 2024 is to make this personalization increasingly evident.
One of the best ways to do this is through a chatbot. With it, you can approach each visitor to your site in a personalized way using conversational marketing.
Through it, you get more chances of converting your visitors, and without needing to spend half of your marketing budget.
Past trends that still matter in 2024
This must be the most liberal trend text you’ve ever seen, right?
The truth is that trends don’t have to be true recipes. You don’t have to stop everything you’re doing and dedicate yourself 100% to the news.
Researching trends is about seeking opportunities. And as long as these opportunities are working for you, it’s good to keep them.
But what’s still valid within the trends that everyone always mentions, year after year?
Here are some digital marketing strategies that will never, ever stop being important. Come with me:
- Influence marketing and micro-influencers: even more so today, with the huge popularity of TikTok. Brands with institutional content have many difficulties in integrating into social networks and getting engagement. Allocating a budget for influencers is absolutely necessary in 2024;
- UGC: focus on the product and the overall customer experience generates User Generated Content, or UGC. You can’t “invest in UGC” — it is a natural reflection of your product’s quality and how well you know your target audience;
- Social Commerce: many companies use Instagram as an extension of their e-commerce. According to HubSpot in their own research, 17% of respondents said they bought something directly through social media in 2023. Whatever your model — direct sales on the platform or a Linktree for offers — it’s still very worthwhile to continue investing in this marketing strategy;
- Business Intelligence with AI: these were the first developments of AI within marketing strategies, through Commercial Intelligence platforms. Click the link to find out how it works. But I’ll tell you upfront: this is another established trend that will probably never go away as long as there’s the internet;
- Augmented Reality and VR: this is another trend that has been consolidating for years. The technology has been around for at least 10, but its marketing uses started taking off only recently. Those in retail need to update and offer VR (Virtual Reality) in their apps. Today, very few companies work with it. Be different!
- Personalized marketing: the trend, in fact, is for marketing to become increasingly personalized. You need to find the simplest customization opportunities, like chatbots, to include on your site. And over time, analyze the data you capture to understand how to offer even more personalized experiences.
So, what do you think of these marketing strategies to carry in your pocket in 2024?
As you’ve noticed, we’re talking about marketing trends, but in a much more realistic way: the more centered you can be and analyze what works for your brand, the better the results will be.
Now, I wanted to invite you to take your first step in these strategies. Ready to move beyond just reading?
Take a free trial with Leadster today — it lasts for 14 days and doesn’t require a credit card. See in practice how personalized marketing strategy has the potential to transform your results today.
