In today’s rapidly evolving digital landscape, keeping up with the latest marketing trends and refining your strategy to the absolute best is crucial for business success. Think of marketing as the pedals on a bicycle — propelling you forward. Without it, you’re going nowhere fast.
As marketers, we must adapt to the ever-changing needs of our audience. With that in mind, here are the top marketing trends for 2025 that will make waves in the digital marketing sphere in the United States and beyond.
1. Influencer Marketing goes micro
As we continue to work remotely, leveraging the audience of a key figure within your niche is a smart and location-effective way to go.
Micro influencers, those with 100,000 followers or less on social media, are themedia is the key to the success of this trend right now– with 88% of social media marketers preferring to work with them over ‘traditional’ celebrities.
Why? Influencers without the million+ status are more relatable, and more likely to be just like your audience. If they love your product or service, the chances are, their following (and your ideal customer) will, too.
When done efficiently and genuinely, incorporating influencer marketing into your social media strategy generates high brand loyalty. The key here is to look for someone that fits with your brand values and messaging, and allow them to produce content in their way (the more natural, the better) showing how your product or service easily fits into their lifestyle, making it better.
2. Stories are here to stay
While it’s important to focus some of your marketing efforts into gaining new followers and customers, nurturing the relationship with those that already subscribe to your business is vital.
Consistently showing up on Stories is one of the simplest ways to boost your social media marketing.
On Instagram in particular, 500 million people watch Stories every day, and because these 24-hour snippets don’t often show up organically in explore feeds anymore, they create an exclusive community that allows your audience to be closer to your brand than in any other way.
Powerful ways to use them include:
- Sharing behind the scenes of the day-to-day of your brand.
- Adding a face to your business by introducing yourself or team members for light-hearted conversation.
- Paid social media advertising to show up in between the Stories your followers are watching.
- Utilizing polls and question stickers to gather real-time customer data and insight to use in product or marketing development.
3. Email Marketing: evolving with AI and personalization
Your email list remains a critical asset. In 2025, AI-driven personalization and automation will redefine email marketing.
Features like predictive analytics and personalized content are set to become standard, enhancing engagement and conversion rates. Remember, your email list is one of the few platforms you own—leverage it wisely.
4. Dark Mode Design: a necessity, not a choice
With screen-time logging scary hours and causing havoc to our eyes, dark mode –switching a user interface (UI) from dark on light to light on dark– is becoming a highly sought after switch.
The jury’s still out on whether the cons of dark outweigh the pros, but designing with dark mode in mind is smart, as consumers want to save energy (and their health) without ditching the device.
Design forms an integral part of any digital marketing strategy so when designing, consider these things:
- Don’t go too dark. Keep some contrast, but avoid bright white text on bold black as that causes just as much strain on the eye. Material Design recommends a contrast level of at least 15.8:1.
- Think about how your branding will work when switched, you may need to desaturate your colours to pass Web Content Accessibility Guidelines’ (WCAG) AA standard of at least 4.5:1.
- Less is more. The idea of dark mode is to reduce strain, so stripping back your design can lead to a stronger user experience (UX).
5. The Rise of Reels (and short-form video)
A key driver for organic reach on Instagram, Reels are a content marketing force to be reckoned with, causing huge spikes in engagement on the platform, highlighting medium consumers are soaking up the most right now: short-form video.
After an experiment by Hootsuite, social marketing strategist Brayden Cohen noted that “[he’s] seen significant spikes in our follower count one to three days after posting a Reel. My hypothesis is that these spikes in follower growth came from our Reels content”
It’s not just Instagram Reels, video itself is gaining momentum by the minute, with watchers claiming that 95% of a brand’s message is retained when they’re given the information through video.
It seems everyone -and every consumer touchpoint- is evolving to accommodate this one, and reaping the rewards. Video-led TikTok is now cited as the fastest growing platform in the world, having rocketed to 1 billion active users since its inception. On Facebook, “native videos get 478% more shares”, LinkedIn has developed their own form of Stories and a survey from Wyzowl found that “66% of consumers prefer watching a video to reading about a product”.
Try adding short-form video to different touchpoints of your business with an introduction on your ‘About Page’, virtual product launches via email or Q&As on social media.
SEO Tribunal states that there’s 50 times the potential to drive conversion with video, so don’t miss out on this one.
6. Marketing Personalization – things will get (even more) personal
Personalization of a brand’s digital marketing strategy is a trend on the rise, and way beyond the realms of adding #firstname into your subject lines.
A level-up in artificial intelligence (AI) and augmented reality (AR) will allow businesses to create tailored experiences through specific offers for individuals based on their digital habits, creating a heightened sense of exclusivity.
80% of people surveyed here said that they are more likely to do business with a brand if they’ve been offered a personalized experience, and a massive 90% said they find personalization “appealing”.
What does this look like for your customer? Value, value, excitement, value.
So that’s it, our pick of the best marketing trends 2025 has to offer.
Which will you test out first?
All of these digital marketing trends keep one key thing in mind: your customer is vital. Please them, and your business will succeed.
Embrace the Future of Marketing
As we venture into 2025, these marketing trends offer exciting opportunities to elevate your brand and engage more meaningfully with your audience. Whether it’s personalizing your marketing strategy to resonate with individual needs or leveraging short-form video to capture attention, embracing these trends can place your business ahead of the curve.
The key takeaway? Keep your customer at the heart of everything you do. Now, it’s time to dive in and experiment with these strategies to see which ones drive the best results for your business.
Ready to implement these marketing trends and take your business to the next level?
About Design Force
Design Force is your ultimate partner in creative design, offering scalable and flexible design solutions tailored to your unique marketing needs. With a dedicated team of experienced designers, we help businesses like yours enhance brand visibility and maximize creative potential.
Contact us today to access our world-class design services that can help you create impactful marketing campaigns. Let’s work together to transform your ideas into reality and captivate your audience like never before.
