Ask five marketers for the best marketing strategy, and you’ll get 15 different answers. Before data-driven marketing became a household name, the best marketer was the most convincing one. But now, the numbers speak for you. And the story they tell can make or break your career. So it makes sense that for a lot of marketers, the current focus on data comes as a threat.

But successful marketers have nothing to fear and everything to gain. Successful marketers use data to get more clients, show content performance analytics, and support their marketing ideas. And most of all, successful marketers stay on top of marketing data trends.

Because it literally pays to stay on top of data-driven marketing. Understanding how this topic evolves, will give you the tools you need to keep up with the market. That’s why we wrote this blog for B2B and SaaS marketers. In it, we’ll take a closer look at what’s in store for 2024. We’ll also dive into marketing data for intent, and close off by giving you our take on the future of marketing. Spoiler alert: the future of marketing is data. But before we explain why that is, we should get you up to speed on upcoming marketing trends.

Data-driven marketing trends for 2024

It doesn’t matter if it’s D2C, B2C, or B2B data-driven marketing — everyone’s strategy will benefit massively from understanding and incorporating 2024’s trends. Let’s dive in and see what this year has in store for us.

Personalized marketing

No surprise here, personalization is only growing in relevancy. While some people don’t love the idea of tailored ads and content, it’s kind of amazing from a marketing perspective. Because before we could do things like that, all of our marketing had to be a bit generic to justify the costs. It had to appeal to as many people as possible. And as most marketers know: when you talk to everyone, you appeal to no one.

But if we look at broader marketing trends now, it’s all about diversity and inclusion. And we’re not only trying to reach a more diverse audience. We actually can. Because when you use data-driven personalization, you can tailor your marketing to your target audience. You can deliver personalized experiences, by changing visual elements, copy, and even content to appeal to different groups of people. Based on what statistically appeals to them. And with that, you can do something that wasn’t possible before. Talk to everyone and appeal to everyone.

Omnichannel personalization

Starting a transaction on your phone and continuing it on your laptop doesn’t only feel incredible. From a conversion standpoint, it objectively is incredible. According to Google, omnichannel marketing gets your store 80% more visits on average. Mind you, just pushing your customer’s shopping cart from their phone to their laptop isn’t enough to reach numbers like that. Omnichannel marketing is much more than that.

In a nutshell, omnichannel refers to “all channels” that are expertly integrated to deliver a seamless buyer journey. As in, all the channels you can use to reach your customers. These include ads, emails, and social media sites. It also includes physical channels, like flyers and stores, but we won’t touch on that topic here. When it comes to data-driven marketing, omnichannel personalization can take many forms.

For example, if a customer spends a lot of time on the product page for a specific shoe, you can email them a discount code to give them that last push. Or if a lot of your social media followers follow a specific influencer on TikTok, you can partner with them for a marketing campaign. Basically, you can give your audience the feeling that your product or service specifically fits their needs. And if you work in marketing, you know what that does to conversions.

Not sure how to get started with omnichannel marketing? Our practical guide shows you the 6 crucial channels to connect, how to do it, and how to build a high-performance strategy – check it out:

Click to read 6 key marketing channels to generate and capture demand

Generative AI

A big marketing data trend to watch in 2024 is the rise of generative AI. A big problem with data used to be how much of it there is. And until recently, it took a lot of time to interpret it. Generative AI models, like GPT-4 or Google Gemini, have changed that, to say the least. On the analytics side, AI makes it possible to interpret data faster than ever before. And on the production side, it can be a valuable tool for your content creation efforts.

Intent data for marketing

Collecting raw data is only half the work. You need intent data. Intent data, or marketing data for intent, refers to the data marketers use to find out why people do what they do. For example, imagine someone googles “Fish London”. Would they want to buy a fish as a pet, or are they looking for a good fish & chips restaurant? Without knowing that, your data becomes much less valuable. That’s why marketing data trends now focus on the “why” of potential customers’ behavior. Simply said, if you know why your target audience behaves a certain way, you can tailor your marketing efforts to that behavior.

To collect intent marketing data, you can track website visits, searches, and social media clicks. On their own, it’s difficult to know the underlying reason that drives leads towards a purchase. But when you combine the data, it tells a story. Do a lot of your potential customers click back and forth between a number of different water bottles on your website? And do they search for reviews of them on YouTube? They have probably decided they want one of your products, but are unsure which of the options they should choose. Emailing them about your easy return policy can make all the difference.

But let’s say someone has been shopping at your store for a while and left a nice review on Google. Maybe they even engage with a few of your social media posts on Instagram. Giving them a shoutout as a loyal customer might be just what’s needed to turn them into a lifelong ambassador for your brand. And the only way to find these opportunities is to collect intent data. But not all data is created equal. And within data-driven marketing, we make a distinction between first-party data and third-party data.

First-party and third-party data

Ideally, you want your data straight from the horse’s mouth. That’s first-party data. But that’s not always possible. Sometimes, you only have access to information someone else collected. That would be third-party data.

Third-party data includes data collected by intent data providers, competitors, data brokers, or publishers. It’s usually easier to find than first-party data. But the downside is that it isn’t nearly as useful as first-party data. Third-party data can be useful in setting up broad marketing strategies. And for many companies, it’s the only data they have access to.

First-party data includes any data that you collect directly about your customers and visitors. The more specific, the better. For example, if you sell toothbrushes, you can track who downloads your whitepaper on dental health. And you can use that information to tailor an email chain to people that are interested in that topic. By sending them resources on the science behind healthy teeth, for instance.

But it doesn’t stop there. With the right content creation platform, you can even track the behavior of your audience within your whitepaper. Is someone skipping right to the segment about factors that influence teeth whiteness? They’ll benefit from an email chain that focuses on the teeth-whitening aspects of your toothbrushes.

With Turtl, adding readers to intent-responsive nurture streams is simple. Our content engagement data can be used to trigger automated workflows that bring leads through the funnel – and turn intent into action.

Why the future of marketing relies on data

Since the dawn of the digital age, your customers and website visitors have been leaving behind a trail of data with every action they take. That trail tells a story. It tells you their intent and what they find important. Their values and their beliefs. We’ve never had as much insight into our target audience as we do now.

The arena of marketing has shifted. It’s no longer enough to reach your audience. You have to understand them. And if you don’t the competition will. Because that’s another thing about the future. As more players enter almost every industry, the marketers that keep up with data marketing trends will be the ones that come out on top.
Most importantly, those that can collect first-party intent data can meet their customer needs with pinpoint accuracy. That’s where Turtl comes in.

Turtl is a digitally optimized, data-driven alternative to PDF. PDFs weren’t designed for the digital world. They’re a black box. Once someone downloads them, you have no idea why. With Turtl, you know exactly what your customers want.

What information do they zoom in on? What videos do they watch over and over? That’s right, we make it possible for you to incorporate videos when you create whitepapers. And even interactive elements like polls and surveys. That’s why successful B2B marketers love using Turtl to collect first-party intent data — and using that data to create strategies that truly move the needle.

Turtl takeaway

Why not try it out? Turtl Docs help you generate more leads and more demand than you are doing right now. Not only that, when it comes to PDF vs. Turtl, our format is scientifically proven to increase reader engagement by 10x.
So if you want to see what Turtl can do for you, let us show you!