2016 was a memorable year – for us in Leicester, we were delighted to see LCFC win the Premier League. In entertainment, we lost some of our favourite entertainers: David Bowie, Leonard Cohen, George Michael, Ronnie Corbett and Prince to name a few. In technology and marketing, we saw the rise of AR and VR (augmented and virtual realities respectively) and trends like video as the dominant form of online content.

With all this in mind, we’re looking to the future. What’s in store for 2017? We’ll be looking at it from a more creative angle and thinking about how brands develop this year – here’s what our courageous leaders (otherwise known as Creative Directors…) Joe and Luke had to say:

DOOH

“Yes, DOOH – which sounds like Homer Simpson falling down a well – is, actually, an acronym for Digital Out Of Home.” quipped our Creative Director Joe. If you don’t know what DOOH is, it’s advertising outdoors on a screen (or other digital mediums) – replacing the traditional billboard.  “This gives the option for OOH advertising to be interactive, engaging and more exciting – the possibilities for connecting directly to your audience are too huge to ignore. We’ll see a rise in innovative ads like the ad that coughs when someone smokes nearby.”

 

Mobile

The mobile take-over – it’s nearly complete – a transition of how consumers operate online, with more people than ever not using a computer and simply using their phones. More than half of all Google searches happen on mobiles, so it’s a natural progression that company websites are viewed on smart phones as well. If you’re not set up for the mobile marketing game, you might as well not be set up in 2017!

Mixed Reality

So VR (Virtual Reality) and AR (Augmented Reality) were 2016 trends – 2017 belongs to Mixed Reality. After getting his head around the varying realities, Luke said: “How brands use mixed reality is a mystery in the immediate future, but the fleeting success last year of Pokemon Go shows that alternative realities work – VR is tough to implement and AR isn’t immersive enough – Mixed Reality is the way forwards.”

MR is the future, hopefully you won’t look as stupid as these two when you use it.

Explainer Videos

Video is slowly but surely taking over the internet, in fact- it’s not even slow. Video is taking over at a rate of knots. We’ve created many videos for both ourselves and our clients, as Joe pointed out: “The simplest and most effective way brands can utilise video is the Explainer – the quick, easy route into the brand which highlights exactly what they do and how they do it. For us here at Arch, Explainer Videos have been a key element to our recent success in helping prospective clients quickly understand exactly what we do.”  Here’s a few examples of explainer videos we’ve created for Energy Buzz, Recycle Week, and Fruity Beauties.

Wearable Tech

With a continuing focus on health and fitness, Wearable tech is only going to get bigger. This opens up a whole realm of new targeting opportunities for businesses – remember the DOOH advertising from earlier? The ability to sync digital advertising and wearable tech will be huge for capturing audience attention. When we asked Luke about the tech, he mentioned the broad spectrum of options consumers will have: “Wearable doesn’t just apply to the iWatch and FitBits – think VR (or MR) headsets, Smart Trainers, ‘Hearables’  – 2017 is the year our gear gets smart, and marketers will need to get smart themselves to keep up.”

There it is – Arch Creative’s predictions on  marketing trends in 2017. 2016 was a crazy ride, and if technology and business moves as fast as it has in the last year, we’ll all be flying Jetsons style space cars by 2018. That’s going to be fun.