In a year as tumultuous as 2024, it’s more challenging to decide which of the biggest shifts moving through the consumer landscape to focus on. These 2025 trends highlight some ideas for understanding what’s changing.
1. AI Acceleration
AI is evolving at breakneck speed, integrating into our daily lives, while businesses are racing to keep pace, and we’re wrestling with the ethics of it all. Meanwhile, the discussion is quickly being replaced by agentic AI, which can act autonomously and by artificial general intelligence or AGI. While we’ve been fascinated by making images of squirrels playing football and marveling at how a Word document can be instantly converted into a believable podcast, experts say that artificial general intelligence (AGI) will go beyond simple tasks to decision-making and reasoning. On the much farther horizon is artificial superintelligence (ASI), which will reportedly surpass human intelligence.
Back in regular life, people have found plenty to complain about. The Spotify Wrap AI solution left out some favorite features, and the backlash was fast around unnatural-looking AI-generated ads like the one from Coca-Cola, reviewed in Forbes.
What This Means For Business:
– Don’t wait for the backlash to make a better model.
– Synthetic data is old. Get ready for synthetic people.
– Gen Z workers are already on board. A Google Workspace poll showed that “about 82% of young adult knowledge workers say they leverage AI in their work.”
2. There’s A Bad Mood Rising
Depending on how you voted in the election, you’re either thrilled or depressed. Either way, there are lots of feelings bubbling up and over.
– Anger is driving increased polarization and aimed at institutions perceived as unfair (like health insurers) that burst forth after the news of the murder of the United Health CEO.
– Jonathan Haight’s new book, The Anxious Generation studies a new level of anxiety among youth.
– Misogyny has surfaced with sexual assault accusations leveled at celebrities and politicians, debates about women’s rights and equality, and the manosphere anti-women messaging.
– Pew reported on a continuing decline in our trust in institutions—government, science, media, and political leaders.
– Illegal immigrants and the LGBTQ community are worried about the changes to come.
– People are fearful and sad due to the erosion of identity, economic insecurity, geo-political upheaval, and rapid technological and social change.
What This Means For Business:
Go beyond how customers feel about your product. Get the bigger picture to meet people where they are.
3. Influencing The Influencers
Influence engineering has infiltrated our digital lives. Influencer marketing continues to grow, and “57% of Gen Z want to be influencers,” according to Morning Consult. Both 2024 presidential campaigns used influencers as a critical strategy and micro and nano influencers are gaining followers.
One of the biggest changes is what’s happening to news media as self-anointed citizen journalists deliver “news.”
– “About one in five Americans say they regularly get news from influencers on social media. Most (77%) have no affiliation or background with a news organization,” according to Pew Research.
– “In terms of sharing content with their audience, the majority (62%) of the surveyed digital content creators admitted to not verifying the accuracy of information before sharing it with their audiences. About one-third of them (33.5%) reported they would share content without checking if they trusted the source or creator,” from UNESCO research.
– Jim Vandehei, CEO of Axios, addressed the National Press Club, saying, “Having a blue check mark, a Twitter handle, and 300 words of cleverness doesn’t make you a reporter.”
What This Means For Business
Who do we trust? Although it may not seem like it, experience and authenticity still matter. Give customers and readers tools to identify the real from the fake.
4. Aging Up
We’re all aging, but the world’s aging population is huge, so it’s not surprising that marketers see an opportunity. Allied Market Research reports that the global market for longevity is expected to reach $44.2 billion by 2030.
Treatments with drugs like rapamycin are showing promise in slowing the aging process. Longevity celebrities like Bryan Johnson have gone public with a detailed and expensive approach to living longer.
Researchers and startups are exploring genetic intervention techniques, using AI to discover new drugs that target disease and biological processes connected to aging.
What This Means For Business
We’re living longer. Want to improve retention and engagement? The customers and employees have been there waiting for you to come up with opportunities for them to learn, contribute, and stay active.
5. Transformation
The coming years will see waves of changes.
– Society: Social, health, and personal restrictions will ripple through society. Women’s sports are getting their due on the playing field, owner’s box, and media.
– Technology: AI, immersive experiences, neurological advancements, digital identities, quantum computing, enhanced surveillance, disinformation protections, and data privacy issues.
– Environment: Circular economies, EVs, and energy efficiency innovations are more long-term, and increasing extreme weather tragedies are more immediate.
– Economy: Tariffs, instability, inflation, digital currencies, and a hollowing out of the middle.
– Politics will be forever altered as party platforms change, government upheaval takes shape, and geo-political uncertainties unfold.
What This Means For Business
Change is our only constant, and change can be hard. Celebrate the positive and build contingency plans for what’s on the horizon.
