Trends to watch in 2015By Catherine Elder

1© 2014 Catherine Elder

Security

• Cyber security will be a major focus. ◦ By 2016 security will be a top 3 business

priority for 70% of CEOs of global enterprises (according to CIO, Itworldcanada.com)

• “Global mobile devices and connections are expected to reach 10.2 billion by 2018” – Citrix Canada

• BYOD will also increase need for security systems.◦ BYOD = bring your own device

• Hackers, cyber terrorism – will be a major concern.

2

Internet of things, cloud, Big

Data, • Internet of things (IoT)

• Interconnection of embedded computing devices. This goes beyond

machine to machine (M2M) and includes biochips, sensors and actuators

embedded in physical objects—from roadways to pacemakers, cars to

thermostats, linked through networks - wired and wireless

◦ There will be between 26 to 30 billion devices wirelessly connect to IoT

by 2020 (According to Gartner, and ABI Research)

• Cloud

• Software as a service will increase, as will apps and other tools for a more

device independent experience – you can start a document on one device

and seamlessly finish it on another

• More talk of big data

• though there still isn’t a magic pill to get data integrated so that it can be

effectively analyzed and acted upon. With everything in the cloud and IoT

exchanging data, everyone will be collecting data – where it goes from

there will vary and by degrees. Security protocols will be a critical focus.

• Big data will represent $50B in spending in US in 2015 (according to

Teradata)3

3D printing

Sales are expected to dramatically

increase next year and double the

following year according to Gartner;

with prices gradually decreasing to

make them more affordable and

accessible their use will expand in

applications for industrial, biomedical

and consumer use to improve

prototyping and designs.

4

Gartner Identifies the Top 10 Strategic Technology Trends for 2015

http://www.gartner.com/newsroom/id/2867917

Social - foreshadowed

More selfies ◦ Nasa’s #globalselfie campaign for earth day

generated over 40,000; Photobombing selfies – Ellen DeGeneres at the Oscars;

More charitable interactive challenges◦ ALS ice bucket challenge – raised over $100 million

and had over 2 million videos posted on YouTube

Mistakes through lack of planning/research◦ #whyistayed which was set up for serious discussion

on women in abusive situations was erroneously used by DiGiorno pizza.

More product personalization ◦ Coca Cola’s #ShareaCoke campaign had 250

popular names put on their labels of their 20 ounce bottles and was supported by ad and social media campaign.

5

There will be More …

Wearables – there will be an increase in health applications and other verticals will see the potential

Personalization across multi-platforms requiring a more sophisticated content management plan for messaging to differ according to device and purchasing stage.

Advertising embedded into social news streams.

Integration of social into #events. Talk of agencies about storytellers,

writers and digital marketers.6

Mobile, multi-screen, apps,

The shift to creating content first for mobile will occur gradually and vary across industries with B2C leading over B2B.

Multi-screen will be a key consideration with user expectations being a consistent experience across devices, although the messaging format and style will vary.

Apps with photo, video and messaging will increase and diverge.

7

Local and global

Local and instant – with gps in

everything retail will need to be

prepared to promote relevant deals for

people in the vicinity.

Global – big language problem –

getting all devices capable of

managing all languages;

◦ look for more education on cultural

differences for communicators and

designers

8

People first

Personalization – expected for the digital experience, anticipated for more product labeling

Customization – the how and when Relevancy – context of where and what

else is occurring Customer Experience Management

(CEM) – more focus on experiences Customer journey mapping – data

mining and analysis for understanding behaviour for increasing and potentially speeding up purchasing decisions

9

People resource

Millennials will be 50% of workforce in 2020; with a high degree of technology fluency and will require flexible and fun workplaces, working remotely, working with their own device

54% of world population will live in cities and that will grow to 70% in 2050◦ Loss of (physical) community spaces; less

relationships, less loyalty (e.g. reduction in voting in democratic countries)

All employees have role in content marketing

10

Content Highly context relevant content – triggered by location (hyper

local) and other variable (weather, news etc.)

More emotional content in B2B as B2C

The continuum experience will replace the stand alone campaign – content demands its own process

Content becomes more decentralized – no longer just marketing – needs to be user-generated and participant; need to co-create with customers as crowd sourcing and mindshare

Content will be Fat – high value with multi-purposes

Content will be developed for mobile first; multi-device and wearable technology will become key considerations

Content needs to be personal and provide a connection (think of the Ice Bucket challenge on social media for ALS)

Brand journalism

Evergreen content, content that converts

11