Five Predictions for Digital Advertising & Marketing

2014 was a huge year in the advertising and marketing tech sector. Companies have come and gone; been acquired, consolidated and become fragmented. The data available to marketers has increased exponentially and we are beginning to see opportunities widen as efficiencies and scale are achieved in programmatic, online video and native advertising. Marketers have also started to make use of emerging technologies like 3D advertising while taking a serious look at wearable technology and how the Internet of Things (IoT) will affect the industry.

As we look forward to the coming year, all signs point to 2015 becoming another exciting year of growth rooted in technology. Here are some of my predictions for the coming year:

More Technology Operated In-House

We will see an increase in the use of marketing tools operated in-house, steadily transferring power and responsibilities from agencies back to the brands themselves. With data now at the heart of all marketing activity, brands are less willing to part with their invaluable customer data, and as a result, will be less willing to outsource the technology needed to manage and maintain this data.

Tech Goes Mainstream

We’ll see ad tech providers take bigger steps to simplify their external communications by eliminating superfluous acronyms, and instead, actively educating brands and agencies about how to gain to the most amount of value from their technology. In turn, this will improve the overall usability of the product, and will eventually mimic the processes and structures of familiar technologies.

More Actionable Data Available

Innovation in marketing and advertising technology is far outpacing most companies' abilities to understand, absorb and, most importantly, use the advertising technology effectively. We will see more vendors respond to this by ensuring their tools contain truly provide insightful measurement, metric and analysis functions.

Surge Of Cross Channel, Cross Device

Currently, consumers frequently see the same exact content distributed across multiple channels, which leaves brands with no real concept of the overall impact of their media investments. Therefore, brands will increasingly look to engage audiences across channels and be able to track their engagement with specific targeted individuals.

In the coming year, we’ll make better strides in cross channel/cross device targeting, attribution and measurement. In turn, this will allow brands to truly understand when an individual has seen or engaged with an advert across various channels, and how they reacted to the brand messaging on each device.

Continued Market Consolidation

We’ll continue to see more consolidation in the market. Automated/programmatic technologies will continue to provide a lucrative business opportunity for brands, however, there is a limit to how many of these solutions can survive in an already saturated market. In that sense, we will see more single function tools become integrated into current platforms, or join forces to create new platforms.