Three Challenges for Marketers in 2023

In the first days of the new year, most marketers already have their objectives for the next 12 months set; before proceeding into the execution of those, it’s good to take a closer look at the trends that might heavily influence them.

I will avoid buzzwords like “AI” in the text you are about to read. Even though Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence unlock tremendous potential, they will play a minor role in fulfilling 2023’s strategies.

In my opinion, Artificial Intelligence tools that are now emerging and entering widespread use are mostly cause & effect algorithms that rely on massive databases, not true Skynet-style AIs as some try to perceive them. Those are still distant songs of the future. We can now create simple texts in ChatGPT and images with DALL-E 2, but that’s it.

Challenge No 1 — More Digitized Customer

Millennials (people born between 1980 and 1996) and GenZ (those born after 1996, up until 2021) are primarily responsible for purchases made by businesses. According to American Marketing Association, they constitute as much as 65% of all the decision-makers in companies (AMA New York’s Future of Marketing Study reports on the evolving B2B space https://www.amanewyork.org/landing/download-report-the-future-of-marketing-the-new-b2b/). It means that consumer choices are now influenced more often by digital factors. Before the first contact with the sales team (if it is ever initiated!), new generations will check out the website, verify the company on YoutTube, compare it using trusted product ranking or organizational culture source, will attend a webinar, or conduct open source intelligence via LinkedIn.

In addition, no matter what kind of product or service is involved, customers will want to make their digital decision on their terms. Those are, in particular, independent time and location of the decision, gathering information from multiple sources (of which only a tiny part is created and curated by marketers), best customer service, and matching their consumer experience known from e-commerce platforms.

Marketers must ensure consistency of all information and match the highly-demanding requirements of digital customers, including self-service of selected processes. Going sub-par on any of those standards will instantly be perceived as an archaic approach, and thus the young will tag the brand as unreliable.

Challenge No 2 — Additional Valuable Content

In his book “Don’t make me think.” Steve Krug states that one of the most important facts about web users is that they do not read websites and barely “scan” them. There is plenty of research that confirms this thesis. For example, a survey by Nielsen concluded that users read less than 20% of the website’s content (How Users Read on the Web https://www.nngroup.com/articles/how-users-read-on-the-web/). Another one, done by Chartbeat, proved that the visitors scroll through about 50–60% of the website’s range (You Won’t Finish This Article https://slate.com/technology/2013/06/how-people-read-online-why-you-wont-finish-this-article.html).

Most marketers might quickly confirm such behaviors using Google Analytics or Hotjar dashboards. Interestingly, there is no correlation between scrolling through and sharing, and users eagerly share articles without reading them altogether. Does this mean the content can only consist of well-chosen headers and graphical design? Not necessarily.

While it is true that the users want to verify the quality of services and products quickly and thus do not usually read all the content, it doesn’t mean that they can be ignored and neglected. The choice of the issue and its level of insight for the target group are fundamental, and search-engine-optimized texts will help maximize the brand’s exposition to the market. Still, the decision will be based on the content deeply connected with the particular target groups’ problems, challenges, and objectives.

Challenge No 3 — Growing Use of Low-Code and No-Code Tools

In a recent project, I surveyed the broad challenges of marketers. One of the leading problems was the high interia of the projects. It’s mostly caused by a lack of resources to implement ideas, especially so, when both front and backend work is nessesary. Everyone on the market seeks those competencies. As soon as they are available, they are usually redirected to projects developed for customers instead, leaving internal ones often abandoned. When that happens, those responsible for marketing have three choices:

• Patience and a long wait for the resources to be freed up.
• Seeking outsourced support.
• Embracing Low and No-Code tools.

All of the above have their respective downsides. That’s obvious. Relying on internal resources provides high quality but usually takes a long time. Outsourcing might shorten the time for the project’s delivery — but there is a threat of delays at the onboarding stages. That’s why automatization and low/no-code tools are a good compromise. The repeatable processes that make the lead progress down-funnel can be automated. Some, however, which are vital for the concept to see the light of a day must be done manually.

Low-Code and No-Code are great and helpful solutions for this problem. Simple app-making platforms let the marketing team quickly introduce and validate their ideas without forever waiting for the developers. Inside Big Data tells us that a fusion between low-code and standard methods will be adopted by at least 75% of the companies (Why 2021 is The Year of Low-Code https://insidebigdata.com/2021/01/09/why-2021-is-the-year-of-low-code/), which is not limited only to marketing teams. Thus, a basic knowledge of how to use those tools becomes valuable in daily work and responsibilities. Not only for a marketer in IT!

Photo: unsplash.com / Sam Mgrdichian