As the year winds to a close, we take a look at what marketers will budget for in the coming year, what tech consumers are most excited for and which video game came out on top for November.
Luxury For The Ladies
Edmunds’ Luxury Market Report revealed that luxury SUVs outsold luxury cars for the first time in 2016, thanks to the ladies. Fifty-seven percent of women who bought a luxury vehicle in 2016 bought an SUV, compared to 49 percent of men. The report also indicates a rise in female luxury consumers—just over 40 percent of luxury vehicles will be sold to women, compared to 36 percent in 2011.
Marketing Budgets Are All “Ad-ing” Up
In 2016, US advertisers spent $6.18 billion for digital video ads purchased programmatically, up from three billion in 2015, according to a new report by eMarketer. That figure accounts for 60 percent of all digital video ad spending, compared to 39 percent last year. The research provider predicts that by 2018, programmatic digital video advertising will reach $10.65 billion, or 74 percent of total video ad expenditures, not including video advertising on social platforms.
Eighty percent of marketers will increase their focus on digital advertising, content marketing and SEO in 2017, reports Conductor. Seventy percent of marketers will spend more on marketing in 2017, with 67 percent saying they will spend up to 75 percent more. Only 19 percent of respondents said they will spend the same, and five percent plan to spend less. About one-third plan to hire more SEO and content professionals, according to the study.
Meanwhile, influencers are also on the list for increased budgeting, according to a poll conducted by Linqia. Out of 170 marketers surveyed in the US, 48 percent said they will boost their influencer marketing budget in the new year. Just four percent said they plan to decrease investment in this area.
Artificial intelligence (AI) marketing may be the wave of the future, but there’s a significant learning curve for those implementing the new technology. A recent study by Demandbase found that while 80 percent of all marketing executives believe AI will revolutionize marketing over the next five years, only 26 percent are “very confident” they understand how AI is used in marketing. Sixty percent report integrating AI into their existing technology and 54 percent are training employees for its use, but 46 percent expressed difficulty interpreting the results.
When it comes to native ads, some consumers are still having a hard time differentiating them from editorial content. A new study, Fixing Native Ads: What Consumers Want From Publishers, Brands, Facebook, and the FTC, found that 74 percent of respondents support the idea of labeling native ads with both logos and brand names. The label, “sponsored” was considered the least confusing label by 49 percent of consumers, followed by “advertising” at 24 percent.
Top Tech
Google has released its most-searched consumer technology for 2016, revealing Apple to be the king of tech terms, along with Freedom 251—a smartphone sold in India whose manufacturer was rumored to have shut down recently. As of this posting, the only video game console to make the top 10 is the Nintendo Switch, coming in at number nine.
The top-10 most-searched consumer tech are:
- iPhone 7
- Freedom 251
- iPhone SE
- iPhone 6S
- Google Pixel
- Samsung Galaxy S7
- iPhone 7 Plus
- Note 7
- Nintendo Switch
- Samsung J7
The NPD’s top 10 best-selling games for November 2016 are:
- Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare
- Battlefield 1
- Pokémon Sun*
- Pokémon Moon*
- Titanfall 2
- NBA 2K17
- Madden NFL 17
- Watch Dogs 2
- Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim*
- FIFA 17
*Asterisks indicate that digital sales were not accounted for.
