Insights from experts at Chameleon Collective 

Staying ahead of the curve remains paramount in the ever-evolving business and marketing landscape. As the promising year of 2024 unfolds, we asked our experts at Chameleon Collective for their insights into what lies ahead. With their fingers firmly on the pulse of industry trends, these forward-thinkers presented a compelling narrative of what lies ahead. 

Marketing Trends:

“Marketers will realize that CTV is just TV, with fewer ads.” – Ed Gold, Interim Marketing & Media Leader.

“One of the biggest opportunities this year will be optimizing marketing channels to maximize the potential of generative AI. AI has the potential to drive significant growth if you are set up to take advantage of it. It will enable you to optimize the customer journey from structuring campaigns to personalizing email communication to drive incremental revenue.” – Farzana Nasser, Partner, VP of Growth Marketing & Business Transformation.

“The impact of a “cookieless” world will send many marketers back to basics. We must redefine customer profiles and engage buyers by creating unique experiences, compelling copy, and content that solves their challenges. Building up first-party data will help marketing and sales in the long run as we will develop better relationships with buyers and own that data. However, it might be a painful start in a cookieless world for some.” – Erika Goldwater, CIPP/US – Fractional VP Marketing/CMO.

“Marketing platforms will continue to evolve their dynamic ad-building capabilities by rebranding them to AI. The dynamic ad will now be the AI ad. These enhancements to ad structure and variability will be more prescriptive than they are today, with automated copy and assets further to increase creative variation with just a few inputs.”  – Chris Baccus, Digital Marketer.

“Lazy marketers will crumble with the cookie when they can’t figure out how to operate and measure. According to Gizmodo, Google removed it from 1% of its Chrome users. It’s about to get messy.” – Chris Nella, Interim Leader, Growth.

“The trend toward marketing channel diversification will continue. With increasing media costs on Google, Meta, and TikTok, affiliate programs, partnerships, and SEO will be resurgent.” – John Rospenda, Interim Media Lead, Media, Growth Strategy & Execution.

“Expect another year of innovation infused into marketing fundamentals. AI will simplify personalization, among other benefits, and marketers will mitigate 3rd party deprecation. Being curious while tackling customer relevancy at 100mph will be key.” – Akash Pathak, Growth Marketing and Business Transformation Consultant.

Customer Experience Trends:

“The world of regulated customer communications often lags behind the glitz and glam of marketing communications. In 2024, however, a notable trend in customer communications management will be the shift to dynamic interactions. As organizations embrace the power of generative AI, bills, statements, policies, and the like can now become much more contextual and relevant, incorporating relevant customer data and actions in close to real-time. This trend signifies a departure from batch and static communication models, enabling businesses to establish meaningful connections with their customers, ultimately enhancing customer satisfaction and driving positive outcomes.” – Mia Papanicolaou & Liz Stephen, CX & Customer Communications Strategists.

“AI-Driven Conversations with Brands and Personalities Radically Revolutionize Customer Experience & Engagement” – Ryan Hart, Fractional Chief Customer Officer

“Digital customer experience has changed radically. Today, all brands know that CX matters. However, the rush to embrace users came with vanished subsidies, and consumers were unhappy. They feel like everything has become more expensive and worse and need a solution. Customers want to feel more control over their technology, have interactions, feel more human, and get a break from the sea of sameness. Value will come in experiences that are different.” – Andrew Solmssen, Interim Chief Experience Officer/Consultant.

“The composability of Marketing Technology will continue to gain momentum and importance as Customer Experience expectations continue to accelerate rapidly, forcing brands to innovate quickly by applying coarse-grained, composable capabilities like experience management, personalization, and e-commerce.” – John Schneider, Interim Chief Technology Officer.

Recruiting Trends: 

“Talking with several CEOs, it’s evident that companies are strategically reinvesting last year’s profits to bring on board top marketing talent….cautiously. With wage and salary growth surpassing inflation rates, it’s an opportune time for firms to pull the trigger to bring that senior hire on board. Looking ahead, my predictions for 2024 signal a path of slow but steady growth. The cautiously optimistic atmosphere suggests businesses are gearing up for a positive trajectory.” – David Honig, Executive Recruiter.

“It comes as no surprise, but AI impacts recruiting positively for us recruiters and maybe not for candidates. All candidates should tailor their resumes to the position they’re applying for and ensure that all keywords are included. I caution all recruiters to review resumes, as the technology isn’t 100% there yet. They could be missing great candidates that AI isn’t picking up.” – Melissa Pacheco, Executive Recruiter.

eCommerce Trends:

“Following the continued march upward in 2023, 2024 will likely see the continued outpacing of Pay-in-4 micro-loan checkout adoption by both businesses and consumers. Pay in 4 was an absolute standout in the Cyber 5 reports for 2023, and given that household debt is rising in the US, it is likely to continue growing in adoption.” – Gary Penn, Interim VP/CDO eCommerce.

Branding Trends:

“Companies that believe branding is something you do once every 3 or 6 years will have difficulty staying relevant. Branding is no longer stagnant. It is organic and requires change as industries, consumers, times, behaviors or product offerings, and internal philosophies advance. Today, much of that happens a few times throughout the year.” – Fabian Geyrhalter, Executive Brand Strategist.

“In the age of advancing AI technologies, it’s evident that machines, while impressive, have yet to master the delicate art of conveying genuine human sentiments such as empathy and creativity. As we look ahead, it becomes increasingly clear that to stand out and resonate truly, strong brands will need to forge deeper connections with humanity, transcending the digital noise and embracing the authentic essence of human emotion.” – Karen Lithgow, Brand Strategist & Fractional CMO.

“As performance marketing costs rise amid new data privacy regulations, a resurgence in brand marketing is anticipated for 2024. Successful brands, however, won’t pit brand building against performance marketing for budget allocation. Leading marketing teams will thrive at the intersection of brand and performance, seamlessly connecting brand building with activation metrics for more sustainable business growth. This approach will attract diverse audiences, captivate loyal consumers in crowded markets, and reduce conversion costs.” – Christa Patrylak, Interim Marketing Leader & Business Transformation Leader.

“I think brand building and marketing will take time and resources from performance marketing. The two-pronged attacks coming for performance marketing are the end of cookies and the rise of the profit mindset vs the growth mindset. On the one hand, without the insights easily available via consumer data tracking, brands will be forced to evaluate the elements of their marketing that truly engage their customers on a deeper level, and that’s brand. From a financial perspective, we may have reached peak-marketing performance. Chasing the perfect or ultimate ROAS or CAC for many brands has turned into a war of capital attrition. The tools are incredible, but so are the costs associated with finding and retaining customers at VC-approved trajectories. AKA Scale. You’ll have to find what’s valuable to your audience when you can no longer vacuum up the cookie-crumb trail to potential customers and can’t afford to acquire them at 3X their LTV. The tools best suited for the job are brand building and marketing. – Michael Saint-Aubin, Brand Strategist

“Brands, even established ones, will be more entrepreneurial, embracing unique ideas and activation more intentionally as part of their marketing mix.” – Jackie Woodward, Interim CMO.

SEO and Data Trends:

“In response to Google’s EEAT algorithm, a big part of SEO is now focused on demonstrating expertise through topical authority. One way to accomplish this is to create a topic cluster—a group of interconnected content pages.” – Jeff SanGeorge, Sr. SEO Consultant.

“AI will enter its next maturity phase as companies transition from exploration and experimentation into a more mature level of differentiated and structured usage. Data, governance, and measurement of AI usage will be necessary for organizations to truly harness the power of AI and enable it to transform their business effectively.”  – John Schneider, Interim Chief Technology Officer.

Artificial Intelligence Trends:

“A lot of people will be asking about their style guides. What has always been a niche resource for a few content creators will become the state of play for generative AI and chatbot technology and a front-line tool for how brands present themselves this year.” – Adam Rich, Content, Brand and AI.

“The continued effect that AI will have on marketing will further widen the gap between those who are effectively collecting and using data vs. those who aren’t.” – Vu Pham, Data Scientist.

“We’re entering an era where the potential of AI in partnership with human creativity truly ignites my enthusiasm. AI is already enhancing our analytical skills and has introduced a new dimension to creative thinking. What’s vital in 2024 is the collaboration between AI’s novel capabilities and the irreplaceable human touch. This partnership promises to bring forth solutions and ideas as precisely as they are imaginative.

As we look forward to 2024, this blend of AI-driven analysis and creativity will not just be a feature across industries but a fundamental driver of innovation, reshaping how we approach challenges and unlock new possibilities: 

• Rise of Specialized AI Assistants: We’ll see a surge in specialized AI assistants designed for specific industries or tasks. These AIs will go beyond general capabilities, offering tailored insights and creative solutions based on their domain expertise.
• Deeper Integration of AI in Creative Tools: We’ll see a much deeper integration of AI functionalities into mainstream creative software. Tools for design, video editing, and content creation will start incorporating AI as an add-on feature and a core component, offering more intuitive, real-time collaboration with us humans.
• Enhanced AI Understanding of Context and Nuance: AI’s ability to understand and respond to context and cultural nuances will improve significantly through training and guidance. This will enable AI to provide more relevant and sophisticated creative suggestions closely aligned with human intent and cultural sensibilities. We’re approaching a point where AI’s role in creative processes will be scrutinized for authenticity, making ethical AI a preference and necessity.
• Customizable AI Creativity: More customizable AI models will emerge, allowing creative professionals to ‘train’ or ‘guide’ AI according to their specific style or the needs of a particular project, leading to more personalized and unique AI contributions.
• Seamless Human-AI Feedback Loops: The feedback loop between human input and AI output will become more seamless. Creative professionals will be able to adjust AI-generated ideas more efficiently, leading to a more fluid, iterative, and dynamic creative process.
• Collaborative AI Platforms for Teamwork: We’ll likely see the rise of collaborative platforms explicitly designed for human-AI teamwork. These platforms will facilitate individual work and team-based creative projects, where AI contributes alongside multiple human team members.” – Stephane Gringer, Transformation Catalyst & Futurist.

In the dynamic landscape of 2024, success in business hinges on staying ahead of the curve, and Chameleon Collective’s team of experts is here to guide you every step of the way. With their profound insights into marketing, customer experience, recruiting, eCommerce, SEO and data, branding, and the transformative power of artificial intelligence, Chameleon is your trusted partner for navigating these evolving trends. Whether you’re looking to revamp your marketing strategies, enhance your customer experiences, or harness the potential of AI, our experts are ready to collaborate with you. Contact Chameleon Collective today to embark on a journey towards business transformation.