Marketers have juggled many unknowns in the last year, including media chapters that were left unfinished. There is the looming ban on TikTok in the US (or is there?) and the mad dash to gain generative AI-based efficiencies. And let’s not forget Google’s third-party-cookie pivot and the ensuing question of whether it helps or hurts marketers.
In 2025, we’ll see many of these chapters close and marketers gain confidence as a result. But don’t get too comfortable: Just as some stories wind down, others will ramp up (Google antitrust cases, anyone?).
To help you prepare for the coming year, Forrester predicts that:
- Privacy Sandbox will erode as Google bulldozes the Topics API and Attribution Reporting API. Google faces pressure on multiple fronts: antitrust scrutiny, nonviable Privacy Sandbox tests, and marketers long believing that Google was bluffing on third-party cookie deprecation (only 13% of global B2C marketing decision-makers believed that Google would actually go ahead with it, Forrester survey data shows). These pressures will force the company to abandon the Topics API and Attribution Reporting API, two hallmarks of its Privacy Sandbox. Doubters don’t believe that a Google-built, -owned, and -self-measured solution will actually work. Despite the inevitable disintegration of Privacy Sandbox, marketers should still test alternative targeting and measurement methods.
- Marketers will shift 10% of their performance media budgets into social commerce. While social commerce is already established in APAC, other regions have been slower to adopt the behavior. 2025 will be the year when social commerce becomes a staple within media plans. This will be a sharp turn given that in 2021, 60% of online adults in the UK, 51% in the US, and 46% in France hadn’t even seen a shoppable ad on social media. TikTok Shop changed the narrative with a massively improved user experience. Integrated payment and retail systems such as Apple Pay and Shop have also made checkout and tracking experiences on social media platforms significantly more seamless. Consumers will embrace social media channels as viable shopping platforms, making these channels critical for marketers with goods to sell.
- TikTok will not get banned or divest in the US in 2025. Despite intense pressure from the US government to divest TikTok from Chinese-owned ByteDance, the immensely popular platform isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. Aside from the fact that a ban would be a political land mine for either Kamala Harris or Donald Trump, TikTok’s enormous investment in lobbying and legal fees would push the appeals process beyond 2025. But should our prediction be wrong, Meta and YouTube stand to gain both consumers and media dollars. Forrester survey data indicates that if TikTok gets banned in the US, TikTok users would turn to Reels and Shorts instead — which is exactly what happened when India banned TikTok in 2020. Continue investing in this high-performing media channel and build a multidimensional creator strategy to support it.
Although it might feel like things are settling down, don’t be fooled. Marketers should stay observant and adaptable in 2025. The new media chapter that we’re entering is bound to keep you on your toes.
Continue Reading At:
Predictions 2025: The Media Industry Resolves 2024’s Unruly Unknowns