While influencer marketing continues

Alison Battisby believes that “this type of content is very popular because it showcases very relatable people. They’re genuine perspectives and this allows for more faces and stories to be told from behind the scenes of the brand.”

It also builds trust, and many brands are embracing EGC through behind-the-scenes footage. Here’s a great example from IKEA.

Expert tip: Avoid creating heavily scripted EGC. It needs to feel natural and be entertaining.

While influencer marketing continues to thrive, many companies are looking for other ways to engage with their customers.

As a step up from user-generated content (UGC), some brands are collaborating with their customers to take a  email data community-first approach. This results in content that’s been created by the customer, which can then be used in an ad or featured on the organic feeds of the brand.

“In 2025, we’ll see brands begin to shun big name influencers in favor of nurturing their communities. Brands are going to invest more in nurturing relationships with loyal customers, loyal followers, the people that are always logging in to engage with them or watch their videos and stories and we’re going to see more collaborative content,” said Alison Battisby.

Beauty brand REFY has embraced this approach and recently hosted an exclusive retreat in a branded villa in Mallorca for their closest community members. This not only helped build connections with members, but also showed REFY as a stylish and aspirational brand.

Expert tip: Consider investing in private communications with VIP fans. This could be broadcast channels and live content to invite customers to join for exclusive announcements, interviews, and promotions.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is now an integral part of marketing, whether you’re using a lot of tools or not. The technology is built into many systems that marketers use, such as social media, customer relationship gig economy: a new face of the job market platforms (CRMs), and search engines.

Research from Marketing Week found that 54% of marketers use AI in their current role. This is significantly up from a year ago, when just over a third (37%) had used the technology. If you want to get more insights into the impact of the technology, check out our 10 eye-opening AI marketing statistics in 2025 blog.

It’s no longer about if you should use it, it’s about what AI tool or platform will help improve your daily tasks and enhance your role. But be aware that you also need to know how to use AI ethically in your digital marketing activities. So what are some of the AI trends you should know about in 2025?

The advancement and adoption of AI across industries has meant that marketers have had to adapt fast.

They have had to grapple with this new technology as management pushes them to use AI to be more effectiv e,whatsApp filter efficient, and productive – a promise that seems to be called out by the media consistently.

But the reality is that learning to use AI properly takes time! It can also create more work for marketers as they try to figure out how things work or use a range of tools or platforms to get the best results.

This has resulted in AI fatigue – a sense of weariness towards technology. It’s up to marketing leaders and their team to figure out what tasks AI can best help with, rather than create more work or challenges.

“Rather than seeing AI as this dystopian view as peddled by Elon Musk of robots coming to take our jobs, they will carry out tasks for you. They’re not particularly creative. They’re not particularly strategic. They don’t operate well on small amounts of information. There’s a few models that are getting better at it, but they can’t think like we do,” said Jim Lecinski, Clinical Professor of Marketing at Kellogg School of Management on the DMI trends podcast.

Expert tip: Take a bird’s eye view of the company to find areas or processes that could benefit from AI. This will free up marketer’s time to focus on elements that are more creative and strategic.