Placing an advertisement is not as simple as it used to be, especially due to all the choices we have at our disposal. New digital marketing tools, channels, platforms, and pricing strategies are all making the rounds and we’re here to cut through the noise. This article will look over all the crucial advertising trends 2023 has to offer.

Advertising Purchase & Pricing Trends

Advertising prices for the year have shown that prices are increasing in the digital sphere.

• Meta/Facebook have raised their CPM (cost per thousand) by 61% annually, now arriving at a rate of USD 17.60/CPM. Other counts estimate an increase of 89%.
• TikTok has raised its CPM by 185% year over year as the platform gets more popular. The average lands at USD 9.40/CPM.
• Google’s programmatic display CPM has been rising by 75% every year, while their search ads CPC (cost-per-click) raised 14% year over year.
• Instagram’s CPM has also increased, growing by 23% annually.

Here’s how much Google ads cost in 2023:

• Across all industries, the average CPC is between 1 and 3 USD.
• The most expensive keywords go near or above 50 USD and are mostly related to financial and legal services.

However, the price is not all that matters when calculating ROI. In many ways, advertisements have become less effective due to tracking policy changes from, for example, Apple or even the implementation of GDPR measures. For example, of Apple’s new privacy policies, changes to demographic data collection make it less effective, which causes more waste readership and less ROI.

In context, digital marketing is still cheaper than old-school methods of advertising. When it comes to traditional advertising, how much it costs to advertise on a billboard is $2,000 to $20,000 per 4-week period. It can become cheaper with services like Blip Billboards, although they offer limited time due to the multi-ad-per-billboard format. Similarly, in terms of how much it costs to advertise on the radio, you’ll need between $200 and $5000 per week for an effective campaign.

Mobile Advertising Trends

Device-specific advertising is increasingly more important with nearly 80% of mobile users buying using their phones for purchases within the past 6 months. Over 51% of users also prefer mobile web apps to other shopping channels which illustrates the importance of optimizing for other devices.

Similarly, there is a growing trend towards voice search which is slated to only increase over time. Mobile is increasingly becoming audio-driven and this form of search is expected to grow exponentially. Siri captures 36% market share for voice search with another 36% led by Google Voice Assistant.

Here are a few ways to optimise for voice:

• Focus on featured snippets since Google focuses on them.
• Focus on knowledge graphs as well.
• Question keywords and Longtail keyphrases are more representative of voice search queries.
• Schema mark-ups also aid voice searches in rising to the top.
• Optimize for mobile, since a lot of voice searches come from mobile devices.

Advertisers should consider using responsive display ads because they can cater messages and ad formats that adjust their size, appearance, and format to fit available ad spaces. These can be especially useful for ads sent out to different devices or target groups to best suit the format that would be most appealing.

Demographics & User Trends

Demographics and Internet usage can vary across channels. It’s no surprise that different platforms have stratified across different users and uses. Google ads are probably the most universal for targeting but when it comes to social media, you need to choose wisely. Here are a few tips:

• Facebook: Active monthly users: 2.963 billion, largest age group: 25-34 (29.9%), 44% female, 56% male. The platform is seeing declining usage but is still a viable means of advertising in 2023.
• Instagram: 1.35 billion active monthly users, largest age group: 18-24 (30.8%), 48.2% female, 51.8% male. An increase in Gen-Z users makes this an attractive prospect compared to Facebook.
• TikTok: 834.3 million active monthly users, largest age group: 18-24 (21%), 54% female, 46% male. As a relatively new platform, the audience is very young and the ad competition is lower so there is a lot of potential for effective campaigning.
• LinkedIn: 930 million users. Largest age group: 30-39 (31%). 43% female, 57% male. The best way to contact professionals and especially useful if your operations are B2B.

As you can see, some channels are better for different segments. Advertising aimed at teenagers can be very effective, especially on the channels they like and with the appropriate methods. Gen-Z is especially responsive towards influencer marketing and socially responsible branding. Similarly, they are also sceptical of traditional marketing and tend to be less affected by it.

Users of all ages are particularly swayed by positive reviews and word of mouth, with 92% of customers reading online reviews before a purchase. This is why advertisers use testimonials to build better rapport with users and move them further down the purchase funnel. Testimonials can inform users about the pros and cons of a product from their own peer group and are thus perceived as more reliable.

Global Advertising vs Local

Among the most underrated 2023 advertising trends is the debate about local vs global advertising. Let me explain: in the past few years there has been growing concern among marketers that advertising is getting too broad and universal to the point of losing its potency. In response, marketers have proposed local, regional, or more personal forms of marketing.

Here are some stats to consider:

• 89% of searchers look up a local business at least on a weekly basis.
• 46% of Google searches request local information.
• “Near me” searches make up a large portion of total searches.

In conclusion:

A strong mix of personalised local marketing with responsive messaging, age and demographic-specific channel strategy, reliable social proof, and utilizing advertising with mobile and PC-optimized applications is how you can get ahead in advertising in 2023. Hopefully, this article has shown a way forward for your marketing efforts.

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