TikTok, Canva, DeepSeek, ChatGPT… What will shape brands’ digital marketing this year?
To capture attention and increase customer engagement, brands must evolve with the times. Many are embracing emerging trends, tools, and strategies that are constantly redefining digital communication. The year 2025 is particularly promising for optimising artificial intelligence (AI).
Here’s a look at the trends brands should be following to maximise the impact of their campaigns, drive growth, and increase brand awareness.
On multiple platforms you will be
Consumers navigate between different online and offline channels throughout their purchasing journey. So, when it comes to digital communication, brands need to be wherever consumers are, with the right message at the right time.
To achieve this, they are adopting an omnichannel strategy, ensuring a seamless, and cohesive experience by harmonising all touchpoints: website, social media, but also email and even physical stores.
This maximises their visibility and accessibility, allowing them to tailor their communications to the specific context of each channel. For example, Instagram emphasises visual content, while LinkedIn focuses more on B2B. This omnichannel approach improves the customer experience by ensuring consistency across platforms, and enables brands to interact directly with their audience and increase engagement.
Every target is unique
AI produces customised, original and innovative content. Tools like DALL-E, Midjourney or ChatGPT – and its Chinese competitor DeepSeek – can be used to write social media posts, blog articles and video scripts tailored to the specific needs, interests and behaviours of a target audience.
Offers and recommendations can now be adapted in real time to provide users with increasingly targeted and relevant solutions. By personalising their messages, brands can strengthen their relationship with their customers and increase customer loyalty. This approach also improves conversion rates by delivering relevant content at the right time.
Run, Forrest, run
The success of platforms such as TikTok, Instagram with “Reels” and YouTube with “Shorts” shows that consumers prefer fast and dynamic video formats. Their impact on engagement and recall is significant, and brands have understood how useful they are for creating high-impact, entertaining and informative content.
Calls to action (CTAs) are often included to encourage interaction and to allow viewers to download a demo, purchase a product or register for an event or webinar via a provided link.
Authenticity and transparence
To satisfy consumers’ desire for authenticity, brands are adopting a marketing approach that is human, transparent and engaging. Thanks to graphic design tools such as Adobe Spark, Canva or Panda Suite, it is possible to create storytelling content, which remains a key element of digital communication.
The brand’s values are highlighted by sharing real testimonials, behind-the-scenes insights, and socially responsible initiatives. Brands are also collaborating with trusted influencers to build credibility.
Micro-influencers (10,000 to 100,000 subscribers), who are more trusted by the public, are often a better choice than bigger influencers.
Interaction and immersion
Thanks to Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR) platforms such as ARCore, ARkit and Unity, brands are gaining an edge by offering their customers a memorable and engaging experience that allows them to interact with their products and services. These experiences include immersive tours, virtual try-ons and VR events, depending on what the brand is selling.
These dynamic elements increase immersion: user engagement is active, the narrative is compelling and the navigation is intuitive. Interactivity allows the user to influence the flow of content, making the experience more personalised. A clean design and the ability to adapt to different media optimises impact and accessibility.
CSR efforts
To win the loyalty of their customers, brands are taking action on sustainability and showing that they have a real ethical conscience. Their digital communication strategy highlights their efforts in a transparent way, to avoid a misleading image of their environmental responsibility.
CSR efforts include carbon footprint reduction, employee inclusion and well-being, and ethical business practices. Integrating CSR helps to improve brand image and attract committed partners.
Hey Siri!
Voice recognition software, such as Siri, Google Home or Alexa, are becoming increasingly prevalent in everyday life, driving the growth of “voice search”.
Brands’ digital communication strategies are evolving in response to this new trend: they are adapting their content to respond to their customers’ natural language search queries. To gain an edge over their competitors, many brands are optimising their SEO (search engine optimisation) for “voice search”.
Data automation
As data volumes continue to grow, manual management and analysis has become inefficient and is prone to human error. Using solutions like HubSpot, Marketo and Salesforce makes it easier to automate repetitive tasks such as email, social media activity and other actions performed on websites.
Read also: AI & Marketing managers: keep calm and carry on!
Data automation allows information to be collected, processed and analysed without human intervention, improving the efficiency and accuracy of processes. With AI and machine learning, brands can identify trends, anticipate needs and make better decisions.
Automation is used in a wide range of sectors, including finance, healthcare and marketing, to maximise performance. In the future, it will play a key role in the digital transformation of organisations.
Watch closely…
The arrival of the Chinese chatbot DeepSeek, an event that shook the AI market, is challenging the American tech giants’ lead in this area. French regulators are questioning how it works and whether it respects user privacy, while Italy has already blocked access to it..
