Key marketing trends of H2 2025 – and how to make the most of them
AI is baked in as standard, and social commerce and Web 3.0 are on the rise, too. Digital Marketing Director, Andy Cove, looks at the key digital marketing trends of H2 2025 – and how you can capitalise on them.
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AI-powered ads
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AI driven campaigns and audience selection
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AI Search and zero click marketing
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Social commerce growth
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Elon Musk’s cancelled cancel culture
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Web.3.0 and crypto adoption vs regulation
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Changes and gaps in platform expertise
The biggest trend of the last two years has been the mass adoption of AI, following the introduction of ChatGPT at the backend of 2022. Since then, we’ve seen a rapid wave of industry updates with the integration of AI as standard, and no doubt adoption and optimisation will only grow and accelerate.
With everything starting to settle though, what does the rest of the year look like? In this post, I pull out some key emerging trends that we’re seeing at M3 – along with some practical suggestions for how your business and marketing departments should react.
1: AI-powered ads
Automation of ad generation isn’t new. Google released RSAs in June 2022 but we’re seeing a lot more automation in the generation of ad copy, images and optimisation of destination to convert.
In a roundtable conversation with veterans of the marketing world recently, there was a lot of talk about the risk of creativity becoming diluted due to automation. Some are concerned that, if everything is left in the hands of AI, will that lead to inauthenticity in the longer term – and a dangerous lack of connection with your audience?
How should you react?
If you’re going to use AI, feed the programme with well-considered ad copy that’s unique to your business and its true UPS. Don’t use all or only AI-generated copy. Too many SERP results from ads don’t stand out and I suspect this is due to lazy ad managers using ChatGPT at an industry level. Be present with your ads to stand out.
2: AI driven campaigns and audience selection
PMax and Advantage+ continue to perform extremely well when tested against existing activity. Although still relatively new in the big picture – Advantage+ Shopping campaigns launched a significant update only in September 2024 – I can see more variations of AI campaign types and options within these automated campaigns becoming available in 2025.
How should you react?
Our AI-powered campaigns assuming the role of digital marketers can be little black boxes. As with any new campaign type, there are always guinea pigs that build data for the platforms to learn from. To take advantage of these campaigns, building them early is a great way to test and learn over time.
3: AI Search and zero click marketing
SEO veteran, Rand Fishkin, recently highlighted the growing trend of zero click searches driven by the increased AI features and results that give users an instant answer on a SERP. This trend – coupled with direct AI search – means less clicks for website from search activity.
How should you react?
Start by looking hard at your results from AI and how they affect your current ranking and traffic. We’ve been particularly focused on the calibre of references and the length of content that AI results are being taken from. This only means one thing… the need for original content of even better quality!
4: Social commerce growth
E-commerce is increasingly intertwined with social media and digital platforms, giving rise to a dynamic trend known as ‘Integrated Social Marketplaces’. This innovative approach to online shopping leverages the power of social networks and digital media to streamline the entire purchasing process. You can see this with TikTok Shop, to give one example among many.
How should you react?
If you’re an e-commerce store, get started on these platforms or contact us to see how we can help you build your social first store.
5: Elon Musk’s cancelled cancel culture
The richest man on the planet has made headlines many times this year, and doubtless there is much more to come. But what I want to focus on here is the impact on the social media landscape.
From a personal view, this year has seen more toxicity coming back to platforms in the guise of ‘freedom of speech’. With the demonisation by some of ‘wokeness’ and ‘brand purpose’, influencers are currently encouraged to be ‘authentic’ in a bid to ride the Musk wave. But this could mean your brand is exposed when influencers produce content or share opinions that do not align with your values.
How should you react?
Be more cautious working with influencers by fully vetting potential brand affiliates. Create a ‘values vs performance’ matrix to find a balance of working with profitable partners that are also brand-friendly.
6: Web3.0 and crypto adoption vs regulation
The Web3.0 market is forecast to grow at 44.9% between 2022 and 2030. This sounds slightly underwhelming at first glance but remember the goal for the blockchain community is enterprise adoption.
Across the rest of 2025, we will continue to see brands dip their toes into Web3.0 whilst regulators across the world continue to debate laws around cryptocurrency and related tech. And with a Trump administration that is heavily pro-crypto and blockchain, we expect to see significant strides across all sectors within this space.
Source: https://blog.thirdweb.com/why-web3-is-ready-for-mass-adoption/
How should you react?
Watch out for how the big brands are adopting these new technologies. For example, Adidas is brand building in Web3.0 by creating virtual items for its audience all the time. You can check out its collections here: https://collect.adidas.com/
7: Changes and gaps in platform expertise
A growing and concerning trend for agencies and in-house teams alike is the lack of availability of platform experts, and the loss of skills across platforms.
October 2025 will mark the 25th anniversary of the launch of Google Ads. When the platform was first introduced, many of the tasks were manual and extremely time-consuming – does anyone remember creating multiple variations of the same keyword three times across the match types?
Although the platform has developed tremendously and for the better since then, the deep skills built within the platform have become redundant, so a different approach and skillset is needed. Today’s Paid Media managers need to understand – as a primary skill – how to control, impact and support the platform’s machine learning optimisation process.
How should you react?
Keep on learning! At M3, for example, we constantly share social posts, articles and toolkits that help us do our job better and keep the team up to date with the platforms.
If you feel like you’re behind the curve, you probably are – and your results could be suffering. We recommend you review your strategy for training and development, and look to recruit candidates with a strong learning mindset.
