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Brain Driven Brands
What Marketers Got Wrong in 2024…and How to Get It Right in 2025
00:24:25
On this episode of Brain Driven Brands, Sarah recaps the year, throws it back to the best (and worst) advertising trends of 2024, and gives insight to the behaviors, habits, and needs of the consumers in 2025 so you can stay ahead of the game. ...
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Sarah Levenger
Welcome back, Brain Driven Brands. My name is Sarah Levenger. I help brands use psychology to cut costs, boost sales, captivate the masses. That's my marketer speak for literally. I just study humans all day long. Literally all day long. This is my dream job. So thank you for joining my show and also for letting me basically just jam with you guys about psychology. This is episode 40. We have been doing this podcast now for quite a long time. Shout out to producer Scotty, who does a great job job making sure everything is just buttoned up beautiful. All the audio looks great. All the videos done. Shout out to my co host, Nate Lagos, who is fantastic, wonderful co host. I feel like that guy has a lot to the show. But this particular episode, I really wanted to kind of sit down and do like a chat with Sarah. We're gonna have some coffee, or in my case, protein shake with Sarah today because I want to talk about something that I think is going to be pretty monumental for the brands going into 2025. So today's podcast is all about what we got wrong in 2024 and what we need to get right in 2025. So as marketers, please, please, please take some notes. Like, if you're not sitting in your car listening to this or like, you know, halfway through a meeting or whatever you're doing, while you're listening to my podcast, sit down, take some notes. Because this is what I have seen as some of the best and the worst of 2024, all the way from starting January to today, which today is what, December 4th. We're running right into 2025, guys. If you guys haven't drafted your strategies, gotten all of your stuff together, are starting to sit down with your teams and actually do some work on your 2020, 2025 strategy. If you haven't done that, you're kind of already behind. And here's the reason why. So as the year kind of wraps up, right, we're kind of diving into kind of a critical time of reflection. So what worked in 2024? We're just coming off of Black Friday. A lot of you saw some really good results from that. A lot of you didn't, right? So I wanted to kind of dig deep into what missed the mark this particular year. What content trends were just fire just works like magic and what really didn't. I also want to go down a little bit into what's shifting in the consumer needs. So, again, if you haven't drafted your 2025 strategy, this is the episode you need to listen to because it's going to tell you exactly what's coming up and what you guys need to know about. So let's start with the best. What actually worked in 2024. I saw some really interesting things on the ad side that really just made me happy as like a psychology based marketer, but also was fascinating just from a consumer standpoint, like how they were consuming the content. So first one, what worked best of 2024? Personalized marketing. Personalized marketing at scale has become basically the norm, right? So campaigns that feel more personal, right. They don't feel invasive. Ones that really kind of stand out from the crowd specifically about like customer identity, I'm noticing is becoming kind of a big trend in 2024. So brands like Spotify with their kind of wrapped campaign or Nike's kind of like hyper focused ads did really well this year. Really kind of hit home with the consumer base. And it's because consumers are starting to feel more seen and heard, right? So data that we're using on, especially on the paid advertising side is now being used to enhance the experience instead of create the experience, if you know what I mean. So in general, I'm seeing this personalized marketing at scale do incredibly well in 2024. I believe it's going to continue in 2025. Now, when I say personalized, I don't necessarily mean you're talking straight to one specific use case. This is very, very important. I'm not talking about angles, I'm not talking about uses, features, benefits. I'm talking about what does this person experience in their everyday life. Tailoring campaigns to their experience in the world, not necessarily their problems or their solutions that they're looking for. Second to personalization, best of in 2024, really cool trend that I was watching for a long time was authenticity. So we're still leaning into kind of that human side, right? Relatable stories saw some really major wins. And I'm not talking just UGC or cgc, depending on which acronym you use. I'm talking specifically on about campaigns that are using raw, like just raw stories about very real issues that very real humans face. These seem to do incredibly well on the ad side and really well on organic. So Dove is one of the ones that I've been following for a long time because they're focused heavily on this kind of real beauty type aspect of their brand and they just continue to win with it over and over and over because they are so incredibly attuned and attached to what the culture is prioritizing, right? So here's why it works. These, these particularly like authenticity and selling really just comes down to consumers valuing brands that have a clear mission. And I can't tell you how much I love this concept. Like, the consumers are starting to value brands that have a clear mission. A lot of the brands that I work with, a lot of the brands that I'm looking at all over Twitter and LinkedIn and wherever else. A lot of you guys are so good at what you do. Incredibly good product, really good customer service, amazing visual presence, really poor mission, right? It feels a little bit like the brands kind of got away from what they were originally built to do, which is make people's lives better. So in 2024, this idea of authenticity and showing up with a very clear mission for what you solve in the world, right? Or a very, very, very clear way of like, allowing people to trust you just by being authentically you being human. Now that that's what's going to make the brand stand out in 2025 and beyond. So last one on here, number three, simplicity. Oh, my gosh. Interestingly enough, we have followed UGC and we, UGC, CGC, whatever you call it, we have followed ugly ads. We have followed all kinds of different, like, founder stories and the rise of sticky notes and the rise of, like, podcasts, right? Like fake podcasts got really, really big over the summer. Regardless of all those trends, the one clear thing that I found did really well in 2024 was clean, clear, simple, right? Bold, creative, kind of out outperform these really complex and cluttered designs and specifically like minimalist or punchy, right? So one of my favorites, liquid death. Literally, their entire marketing strategy this year was just, we're just going to be as funny as possible, right? So they didn't go after all of these different ad trends that they saw. They generated their own traction, their own momentum by being incredibly simple with their message and just delivering it in an interesting way. And this is a new trend, guys. Like a new. I don't even want to call it a trend. This is like a new wave of marketing philosophy that I want you guys to remember. If you take nothing else from this podcast, take this one very, very important to remember. Overall, it's going to come down to how well can you convey one message in as many different ways as possible, right? So format. Change up your format. Change up your creative format. Do not change the message. If you have a message that you've been like, really honing for a good year in 2024, you know, it works every time you run it. Please Please, please don't change the message. Take that message and put it into as many formats as possible. Change your creative, don't change your message. So I digress. Okay, let's talk about now, the worst of 2024. All the things that I saw that flopped hard. I'm so excited to talk about these because, like, some of these are ones that I, I just followed because I thought they were interesting trends. But that's the thing about trends is they don't last long. So important, just caveat to all the ones that we're about to go through. It's very, very important, I think, for everyone to realize trends, angles, ad types, those are all cyclical, right? They're going to come back again and again. So you can capitalize on the wave when you see it, but please don't make your entire 2025 marketing strategy based on ad trends. Okay? So number one, one of the very first things that I saw, great segue was over reliance on trends, right? Specifically trendy platforms. So I don't know if you guys remember this, but man, we jumped hard onto threads. Like the minute we saw it, everybody was like, threads, we're getting off of Twitter, here we go. Which was kind of hilarious because, I mean, millions of people migrated over there, very few have actually stayed over there. Right. It's still not got the traction that like Twitter and X, whatever you call it, has. So here's why I think it failed. I, I think chasing these trends where people jump ship from platform to platform, trying to figure out which one is going to be the next biggest thing, I think that's really interesting for early adopters and it's a very important part of your business strategy. But you got to stay where your consumers are. Do not forget this. When you're building an ad strategy, you have to stay where your consumers are. If a lot of them are going over there, possibly follow and start generating some traction. But don't just jump ship entirely, leaving all of these other platforms who have long histories and are well suited to your audience, don't just leave them for the next biggest thing. So take away from this, it is not about being everywhere, okay? It's about being where it matters. Go where it matters to your customers. So that was, number one, overreliance on trading platforms really kind of flopped hard. And on like 2024, the second one here, tone deaf campaigns. And I say tone deaf, not like, I don't say that flippantly, right? It's not like you guys just weren't listening to your customers at all. But I think there was a lot of. There was a lot of like ignoring going on by the brands where we were basically just launching ads at a poorly timed standpoint, like at a point moment in the culture. Right? So this was really interesting. Long time ago, Pepsi. Did you know an ad that. I think this was 2017, where they launched it and they were trying to get involved in kind of like the movement of political stuff. And I'm sure you guys have seen this. Kendall Jenner came in, she put like a flower on a guy and she gave him a Pepsi. And then every, like all the police officers stood down. It was just ridiculousness, right? The, the reason why that ad failed in 2017 was because it was very insensitive to the broader societal movement. Right? It was, it was basically just like trying to take consumer sentiment and use it to build a brand. I saw this in a few places this year in dtc where we were basically trying to generate traction off of cultural movements, which I 100% think you should do. But you have to be so, so selective about which cultural movement you choose. Very crazy important. So the takeaway here for this, especially this flop for 2024 tone deaf campaigns. Very important. I think you gotta read the room, right? Always, always, always align your campaigns with the current cultural and economic climates that make sense for your brand. Don't just capitalize on stuff that you see because it's something that a lot of people are interested in, right? Make sure that you're aligning whatever your brand's message and mission is to the actual culture movements that make sense for you. So number three here, I saw something that flopped hard in 2024 that was just strange. It was like the most interesting thing I've ever seen. And it was very psychology focused. I saw a lot of brands discounting very haphazardly. Like we're just discounting because we need a sale this weekend. We were just discounting this and discounting that. Okay. If you've listened to my podcast before, you know, Sarah just. It drives me crazy. Discounting drives me absolutely nuts. I think over discounting during like major sales events like Black Friday and all kinds of different things is diluting the value of brands in general. The more we discount, the more consumers are going to get trained and used to the discounts, the more they're going to want discounts, which drives me a little crazy. So in general, this kind of like unfocused discounting strategy is something that I think every single brand should be very carefully contemplating in 2025. Especially. And if you don't know how to use psychology to actually price yourself, well, build bundles based upon what people actually need psychologically, or choose prices that fit with what their expectations are. If you don't know how to do that, you contact Sarah, you get, you can find me on Twitter, you can find me on LinkedIn, you find me on YouTube, but. Or go to tetherinsights IO. Go find me somewhere and I'll sit down and I'll show you how we're actually using psychology to make sure that your strategy for discounting is aligned with what your consumers need, not necessarily what you think they need. So in general, the reason why it's failed is because all these consumers are out here just looking at every single brand on the planet, big and small, large and micro startup, all the way to frickin Disney level. And all they're doing is just seeing straight through that bullshit. They're just going, this is ridiculous. Right? Like anytime they see a price now, they're going to assume that price is not real or valuable because there's going to be a red sticker next to it, right? So takeaway for this one, incentivize your loyalty without cheapening your product by being very careful about how you discount. Right? Very, very careful. So that was the worst all things flopped in 2024. Let's talk about 2025 and I want to give you guys some good strategy here so that you can figure out, okay, what do we need to focus on? Because I know we're sitting down with teams pretty soon you guys are trying to get traction on things like it's time. This is the time in the next 30 days to figure out what the heck do we want to do in 2025. So very first thing, these are my like 2025 consumer predictions, right? These are the things that I'm going to focus heavily on with the brands that I consult for and the brands that I work with. Because I think this is where the consumers are going to go next. So personalization is still going to be big. Very first, right off the bat, number one, personalization, right? But with boundaries. Personalization with boundaries, this is incredibly important. Consumers are going to expect tailored experiences. Not just personal ones, not just interesting ones, but tailored experiences. Right? Now this comes with a caveat. They're going to want something that's going to be super interesting, very different, unique, bizarre, right? They're going to want these cool experiences as a part of their brand engagement, but they're going to be incredibly concerned about privacy. This is just a 20, 25 and beyond thing. This is the world we live in now because we're so incredibly connected online. It is critical, critical that if you're going to do personalization and do it well, you respect the consumer's right to privacy, right? So you got to balance this like customization and transparency with your data usage. That's obviously very important. But what I want you guys to do is shift your like personalization to like intentional micro segmentation. That may sound strange, but here's what I mean by that. We're not just going to personalize. We're not just going to throw this person's first name on an email and hope to God that's good enough. What we are going to do is build funnels within funnels, right? So it used to be that we would have basically one to seven funnels that would all be going after use cases, right? I don't want you to do use cases anymore across the funnel. I everybody, if you've listened to Sarah long enough, you know that I hate the funnel but we're going to use it for this particular example. What I'd love rather you do is I'd rather you build a brand that, that targets specific identities within each silo. Identities in each silo, meaning if we have, I don't know if we're selling like shoes or whatever it is. One identity might be somebody who believes they are a fashionista. They're incredibly ahead of the trends. They, they're super with it, they're always styled, they always look great. That's her belief. The entire silo needs to talk about the belief that you're a fashionista. You're different, you're just like somehow better than most people who dress out here. That's the difference between personalization and intentional micro segmentation. Crazy important for 2025. Second to this, very important, I want you guys to do value driven spending, right? So this, well I want you to market towards this like value driven spend. Not that you have to spend, but consumers are going to like continue to prioritize this kind of sustainability thing. Especially in the younger generations, young millennials, young gen zers, they're going to prioritize ethics, brand purpose, quality products, specifically products that do not lead to any sort of toxic environments. This is incredibly important to them. So transparency guys, transparency. If you have something in your product that might not be all that non toxic but you're working to make it, so call that out, right? These people value alignment over everything else. Consumers value alignment. You must align with the person they believe they are. So if you're going to drive loyalty, you got to make sure that your brand practice what it preaches. If you say you're transparent, please be transparent. Number three, convenience. Right? We're gonna, we're gonna talk a little bit about this on another episode because I think this is important, but automation is not always the best way to do things, right? We don't want to constantly send out emails that are scheduled or SMS that's scheduled or like start posting things on organic that's just constantly three months ahead of time. Human connection still matters intensely in 2025 and it must be a part of your brand strategy. Brands that are able to kind of blend this efficiency, right? So like chat bots or like automated text messaging, those type of things with the personal touch of being actually integrated into the industry. Those are the brands that are going to win. AI is a tool. It should not replace the human element. It cannot replace the human element. So what I want you guys to do is as you're drafting your 2025 plans, trying to figure out where does our brand want to go, keep this idea in mind that we need to be convenient. The customers want convenience, but overall they would rather have a human connection over something that's just quick and efficient. All right, prioritize that 100%. Last one on here, we got a note. In 2025, economic uncertainty is just going to be a thing. And I hate to say this because I know everybody's going to go, eh, cringy. But really as spending tightens, consumers are going to be more selective. They just are. So if you're in a heavily saturated industry, I highly suggest you prioritize providing value outside of your product. Provide value outside of your product. And what I mean by that is I need you guys to prioritize something that doesn't involve a sale, right? We need to start providing something that's practical, practical, long lasting organic content, right? Cookies sent to anybody that's on our high LTV list. Any sort of like phone call where we just say what can we do for you? How are you today? Like as a brand, we're just looking to make somebody's day better. What, what can we help you with? Right? Emphasize your quality and like your practicality. I think that's important. But overall, because people are going to start tightening those strings and because consumers are highly selective in their purchasing behavior, the best thing you can do is try to push brand this year, guys, brand. And again, if you don't know how to do that, it's totally fine. You contact Sarah and I will teach you how to do it. Okay, this is getting way too long. Sorry, producer Scotty. Okay, so actionable takeaways for you guys. Here we go. A couple different things that you can actually take this week and just go do some strategy, do some thought work, take some time, brainstorm, sit down with the team and say, this is what I want you guys to think about. Number one, how can we double down on authenticity? How can we double down on authenticity if consumers are going to create connection, which they are. We're in a credibly disconnected world. No matter how much we like to think social media solves that, you got to be a brand that they trust. So I want you to start to think about how can we incorporate real stories not just from our consumers, but from our team? Right. Or how can we put customers more into campaigns that's not just a testimonial. Do we have a way to show how many people actually purchase from us in a way that's going to be interesting for other people to watch? How can we double down on authenticity? So that's the first question you guys got to answer. Second question. How can we segment smarter? Right? We talked about this a little bit before, especially for your 2025 strategies. How can we segment by identity and not by use case? Right? We're going to stop blasting these broad targeted messages. We got to, we got to find those micro segments, right, that are really going to speak to these niche audiences. Mostly because, like, customer feedback is our. Is just going to flow in. Like, we've got so much data to work with and really, like, their experience is going to help us draft a better brand overall. So in general, stop going broad with your segmentation. I don't want to see any of this, like, lose weight in 30 days or look cute in these shoes or the suit for guys who hate suits. That's a use case, right? I need, I need more identity focus. Meaning if you're the type of mom who believes that health is most important for her kids, this is the granola bar for you that's identity focused. Because we're speaking directly to. If you're the type of mom segment by identity in 2025, that's going to cut your costs and keep you guys at the, at the forefront of your industries. Last one on this. You gotta stay agile. Trends are gonna shift real quick in 2025. They have every single year. But we're noticing trends are starting the trend life, the lifetime. What do you call it? Like, the Half life, basically, of a trend is starting to shorten. Trends used to last for six to eight months, especially on TikTok when it was incredibly new and we all started to, like, notice UGC was a thing. Now they'll last anywhere from four to six weeks. Trends are shortening, right? So do not be married to one trend strategy. You gotta test iterate, obviously, and evolve. But I want you guys to launch smaller, more targeted campaigns. You don't need volume to figure this out. I. Everybody should know that. Like, Sarah doesn't. Sarah doesn't love volume until you know what the message should be. As soon as you know your message, go for volume, right? Take that one message, like we talked about before, and drop it into as many different creative formats as you can. But don't do it until you know what your message should be. So closing thoughts here. 2024 taught us a lot. It taught us a lot. Some brands suffered a lot this year, and some brands did incredibly well because they focused on these key aspects of what the consumers need just from, like, a human standpoint. So we obviously, we just went through, like, what worked, what didn't, and what we can kind of learn from those lessons. But as we move into 2025, I think it's important for us to kind of commit to understanding our consumers better. Stay authentic. Right. And create some sort of strategies that resonate in real time. You got to know what's happening. You can't just be running a brand anymore. You have to be integrated into the actual culture, the organic sense and the lives of the people that you're selling to. Otherwise you get left behind. That's just how it's going to be in 2025. So if you are ready to stop guessing and start scaling with science, you can DM me or check out tetherinsights IO. I guess it's technically a sponsor of this podcast. I don't know. Can I sponsor my own podcast? Is that weird? I feel weird about that. Anyway, go to tetherinsights IO, check out what we're doing over there. I run psychographic panels to actually track and see what the consumers need from an emotional standpoint. And we're also doing some really cool things. We're gonna launch an incubator here pretty soon for the brands who want to move into the industry leader position for their markets. But yeah, if you're interested, go check it out. Go see what we're doing over there. Otherwise, have a great read. The Brain Driven Brands podcast is part of the Learn and Laugh series on the Quick Fire Podcast Network.