2025 Marketing Trends We’re Betting On (All Of Our 2024 Predictions Came True!)
We don’t want to brag, but all of our predictions about 2024 marketing trends that would be hot came true this year. From IRL experiences that ranged from small- to large-scale to the rise of social commerce on platforms like TikTok Shop, 2024 held all kinds of creativity in marketing, and at a crucial time. Economic downturns made this year a challenging one for many smaller brands and unique strategies centred around performance became essential. So what does 2025 have in store for us? We’re predicting the 2025 creative marketing trends that will shape the new year, so grab your popcorn.
Dropping The Curtain: MORE Behind-the-Scenes
Starting it off with a trend that you surely already came across in 2024: Behind the Scenes (BTS) content. Founder Day-In-The-Lifes, Employee Vlogs, The Making of ____, were all common pieces of content found across social media. So what’s so great about Behind the Scenes content? It humanizes the brand, piques curiosity, and allows the audience to form a deeper connection. And in 2025, we bet you’ll see brands going the extra mile when it comes to behind-the-scenes. Picture BTS content in longer forms with overarching stories that captivate more than just a daily vlog. The curtain will drop more than ever before.
Episodic Content Builds Consideration
Related to that, we predict that we’ll all be seeing brands embrace episodic content. Gone are the days of a whole feed of one-off memes or photos. The brands that will stand out this year will focus on storytelling throughout their content and overall brand strategies.
We’re talking reality show style with drama, recurring characters, conflicts, and resolutions – all from the brands’ POV. Find us all on the edge of our seats! Bingeable, narrative-forward content captivates, resonates, and leaves an audience wanting more. Long-form content fits this bill but so does recurring podcasts, educational series, and more.
Community-Centric Marketing Is Everything
We’ve been watching brands cut through the marketing noise in creative ways, and we predict you’ll see lots more of this in 2025. In an increasingly online world, people crave community and are using and aligning with brands to help them find like-minded people. Smart brands are capitalizing on this in 2025 by fostering connections between them and their consumers, and their consumers and each other.
Whether it be through outbound engagement or through micro-communities on other platforms, more and more brands will seamlessly slide into their customers’ day-to-day lives. Slack groups, Substack subscriptions, Discord chats, and Broadcast channels provide a place for fans to turn to superfans and superfans to stay connected and engaged. All while positioning your brand strategically as having a strong positive role in your audience’s life.
Glossier’s customer communities
Glossier, fondly known as the “people-powered beauty ecosystem,” has mastered the art of staying connected with customers. It does this by inviting top customers to Slack groups, where they can engage and stay connected.
The groups are hyper-localized, and members exchange over 1,100 messages weekly, creating a feedback loop from Glossier’s most engaged fans.
Doodle Institute’s member clubhouse
Doodle Institute sells online courses that teach people how to doodle. Students get basic training in the course. Then, as a bonus, they also get access to the Doodle Clubhouse.
The Clubhouse gives students a safe place to ask questions, share their work, and network with other doodlers.
MyYogaPal’s Community
MyYogaPal helps people connect with themselves and their yoga practice. They also provide a yoga community where students can connect with other people who are passionate about yoga.
Bold, Loud, Unexpected, and Out-of-the-Box Moves
Okay, this is definitely a catch-all for a variety of different trends, but we think 2025 will be the year of creativity. We’re talking full commitment to the bit. Originality. Playfulness. So many brands only touch their customers via online channels these days (think Hailey Bieber’s Rhode), so going all out on an in-person experience for them can be highly impactful and generates buzz. Think pop-ups on steroids. Think unique, somewhat impractical, but totally memorable immersive retail experiences.
In a similar vein, we also predict that we’ll be seeing more and more ‘unexpected’ or ‘playfulness on the expected’ will keep rising in popularity like Chaos Packaging à la Olive Oil in a Beer Can or an unexpected collab like Airbnb x Polly Pocket. Maybe we’ll see full brands lean into an unexpected theme, like Girl in Blue Studio’s kitchen-themed Pilates brand.
Finally, we’re saying bye-bye to the Sad Beige aesthetic and hello to bold, colourful, maximalism. We’ve seen this already with brands like Poppi really leaning into bold colours on social and in their packaging design, but we think this trend will move beyond CPG and towards retail experiences, services, and larger-scale ideas.
Rise of Campaign-Based Marketing
(This is a hope as much as a prediction.)
Finally, and a way to tie all of our ideas together, we think you’ll see brands execute larger, integrated campaigns. Large, successful brands already know the power of campaign-based marketing and utilize it often, but in 2025, smaller brands will invest more into campaign-based marketing, too. Think launches, promotions, and 3-6-month campaigns that utilize a variety of brand and performance marketing tactics. For example, brands may invest more heavily into a 3-month campaign promoting their new menu or new product line that includes a combination of social storytelling, influencer partnerships, out-of-home, and event marketing.
Will there be trends this year around AI, influencer marketing, and traditional advertising? Yes, of course. But Good Weekend Creative is looking first at the story, the creative, and then the medium.
How will you utilize these 2025 marketing trends to tell your story and connect with your audience?
