Paid social search offerings differ significantly from traditional search ads

Our user forecasts for Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat, X, and Pinterest in Canada highlight an expanding platform mix increasingly divided by age demographics.

The smartphone remains Gen Z’s favorite device, as it’s the quickest way to access digital video and social media. But adoption of CTV and VR continues to rise.

Gen Z and millennials shift to social media: Both cohorts prefer TikTok and Instagram over traditional search engines.

Social network user growth is stalling in Western Europe. Marketers should look toward changing platform dynamics, particularly among generational cohorts, to best manage their social media strategies.

Organic marketing is experiencing a comeback on social media. The resurgence is due to trends like community-building and social search that are helping brands resonate with audiences.

Younger generations have embraced TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube as search engines. Although TikTok’s future in the US is uncertain, the social search opportunity remains robust.

Influencer marketing is becoming a need-to-have for payment brands’ marketing teams. While not without risks, it’s key to building awareness and creating relationships with young consumers.

Digital, traditional, and total media ad spending growth will all accelerate in 2024, although only modestly. The outlook has stabilized for most countries and regions, even if spectacular growth is harder than ever to find.

Gen Z is Pinterest’s largest and fastest-growing demographic, according to the platform. To cater to its younger consumers, Pinterest is focusing on inclusivity, search, and AI-powered curation. Here are five key stats from a recent Pinterest report on Gen Z and what they mean for brands trying to reach Gen Z consumers across digital channels.

TikTok parent ByteDance has until January 19, 2025, to sell the company or face a US ban. The company is suing to avoid the ban, but if the platform goes away, marketers need to know how to reach TikTok users on other platforms. From Gen Z to niche communities, here are five key stats showing the places marketers should be able to reach TikTok users.

Time spent on social media is plateauing. Longer videos could keep users around longer while providing more monetization opportunities for platforms. But some short-form creators won’t be receptive to the shift.

The creator economy is maturing. While brand deals are still the No. 1 revenue stream for creators, more are going directly to consumers to monetize.

In the last of five reports in our “Payments Ecosystem” collection, we look at what’s influencing retail sales growth across in-store, online, and social commerce channels—and what it means for payment providers.

“Creator is in their name. So let them create.” That was the advice Sophie Jamison, CEO of Lightning Media, shared at the recent EMARKETER Summit. Jamison warned against giving creators too much direction and was optimistic about the future of social media marketing, even if TikTok goes away.

Brazil is Latin America’s largest retail ecommerce market by total sales volume and will be this year’s third-fastest-growing digital economy worldwide. Understanding the nuances of how and where Brazil’s diverse consumer base spends its money online is key for brands and retailers to thrive in this highly competitive ecommerce market.

Total media ad spending growth has stabilized, and digital ad spending is set for an extended period of low double-digit annual increases. Amazon, TikTok, and Instagram will be the main growth drivers this year.

Financial institutions that have relied on the platform to reach young consumers must come up with a Plan B—or face losing brand awareness.

Meta’s latest AI advertising rollout reveals a significant shift: Free, broad access to AI creative will help win favor with brands, but ethical quandaries are unresolved.

On today's podcast episode, we discuss how Meta could take the GenAI space by storm, the likelihood that rapid AI development and deployment backfires, and how advertisers are viewing Threads as it approaches its first birthday. Tune in to the discussion with our analyst Jasmine Enberg.