On today's episode, we discuss where B2B marketing is headed and what some of the biggest challenges will be along the way. We then talk about our brand new influencer marketing spending forecast, what to make of TikTok Stories, and Instagram testing ads within its Shops tab. Tune in to the discussion with eMarketer principal analyst Jillian Ryan and senior forecasting analyst at Insider Intelligence Eric Haggstrom.

eMarketer was pleased to moderate a Tech-Talk Webinar featuring Jonathan Woodward, head of demand generation and account-based marketing (ABM) at Adobe Digital Experience Cloud, Americas. He discussed why A/B testing is such a powerful strategy for email marketers, and shared testing ideas you’ll want to tell your team about.

In 2021, US B2Bs are using digital ads across the customer life cycle:. 42% of US B2B marketers said paid advertising is a digital customer experience area that will impact overall strategic success, according to a May 2021 survey from Ascend2 and Wpromote. 41% of US B2B marketing and sales professionals find digital advertising to be the most effective data acquisition tactic, per December 2020 research

Amazon Business, which has grown rapidly since its launch in 2015, will increase its US product sales by 43.5% year over year to reach $27.59 billion in 2021.

B2B tech products and services, the largest sector of B2B advertising, saw a massive boost in the US as the pandemic increased demand across the tech industry.

In 2020, B2B digital ad spending leaped from 4.9% of the US digital ad market to 5.7%, marking a sizable growth in share for the industry.

LinkedIn had a very strong 2020, during which its total ad revenues grew 31.3%, driven by its Marketing Solutions as B2Bs focused on targeting audiences working from home.

When will mobile surpass nonmobile in B2B ad spend?

Display ads like banners and graphics, which have historically been less of a priority than search ads for B2B marketers, took up a greater share of US ad spending than ever before in 2020.

Clubhouse has buzz, but social audio isn’t as simple as it looks. The most promising marketing use cases are for thought leadership, virtual events, and influencer marketing.

As B2B marketing becomes more targeted and data-driven, one might assume that a strong brand strategy isn’t necessary since performance strategies can drive pipeline and close deals. But that is a fallacy. Branding is as essential now as it has been since the advent of marketing. It is the foundation on which all good performance marketing is built.