2025 Marketing Toolkit: 5 Essential Tools for Brand Success

With 2024 in the books, it’s likely the 2025 marketing landscape will continue to be driven by AI and technology advancements, sustainability goals, and globalisation and personalisation strategies, especially for shopper marketing and retail media content.

To help brands navigate this transformative period and create the best competitive edge, the following '2025 Marketing Toolkit' has been compiled to inspire innovative strategies, optimise processes, and help deliver measurable results in the new year and beyond.

Tool #1: The Right 'AI Power Tool'

Making number one on the 2025 essential tool list? AI-driven technology that transforms data into actionable insights. For years, marketers have collected data on customer behaviours, content engagement, and campaign performance but often fail to fully utilise it. With AI predicted to contribute $15.7 trillion to the global economy by 2030, more and more companies will need to invest in AI data tools. “The companies that bring data to the centre of their organisations and ready it for AI use will be the ones to stay competitive - and those that don’t will fall behind,” per a recent Forbes article.

Brands leveraging platforms such as Digital Interact (DI) can unlock smarter decision-making and enhanced audience connections in real-time. DI enhances marketing strategies through predictive analytics, dynamic creative optimisation, and automated workflows. In addition, DI allows brands to personalise campaigns at scale while ensuring a seamless customer experience across digital and physical touchpoints.

Tool #2: Sustainable Solutions Supported by Real Expertise

Sustainability is no longer optional - it’s essential. In fact, 71% of consumers prefer brands aligned with eco-friendly practices. When brands are equipped with sustainable solutions led by knowledgeable sustainability experts, achieving carbon footprint reduction goals is a step towards positively impacting the environment and consumer choices. From recyclable packaging to carbon-neutral production solutions, sustainability aligns a brand’s marketing efforts with consumer values and environmental responsibility.

Eco-conscious campaigns that use recyclable, sustainable materials can help reduce waste, which improves brands’ strides toward sustainability goals by setting achievable benchmarks toward corporate responsibility and consumer trust. As brands strive to reduce their carbon footprint, maintaining high-impact creativity with low-impact solutions will be critical for brands’ success – now and in the future.

Tool #3- Localisation Tools for Globalised Marketing 

In an increasingly globalised market, localisation is key in 2025 to authentically connect with global, diverse audiences. With nearly 75% of consumers saying they prefer products with information in their native language, 76% of online shoppers also prefer to buy products with information in their native language. Additionally, 40% will not buy from websites in other languages.

Having localisation as a tool that includes both AI and human collaboration will help brands’ voices resonate globally while maintaining brand and campaign consistency. From language translation to culturally tailored creative, localisation experts and solutions are tools that can help brands transcend boundaries and foster genuine connections with audiences around the world.

Looking ahead, trends like AI-powered voice translation, immersive AR/VR localization experiences, and predictive analytics for content adaptation will shape the future of global marketing, making or breaking brands’ campaigns.

Tool #4: On-Point, In-store Solution Tools

Print and physical branding materials will remain relevant and indispensable in 2025 for creating memorable consumer touchpoints. Whether in-store signage, POSM (Point-of-Sale Materials), or event branding, premium print solutions will help reinforce a brand’s digital campaigns.

Recent studies support the idea that almost 70% of shoppers find branded in-store displays influential in their buying decisions. While store displays and print will play a crucial role in shopper marketing in 2025, a combined omnichannel, seamless shopping experience is effective. Store associates can access accurate online inventory and consumer purchase history data, as the store serves as a showroom for consumers who prefer seeing and touching a product before ordering it from their mobile device.

Print experts who ensure a brand’s materials are sustainable, eye-catching, and functional know that exceptional design with sustainable production techniques will help brands make every in-store and digital touchpoint count.

Tool #5: “GPS” for the Shopper Journey

While a Shopper Marketing GPS does not exist, there are tools brands can use to help map out an effective and engaging consumer journey. Understanding and optimising the consumer path-to-purchase is vital for driving conversions in 2025. Properly stocked shopper marketing tools that integrate physical and digital (phygital) activations to guide consumers seamlessly from discovery to checkout are priceless.

A recent RetailWire article on evolving shopping habits in 2025 shares an insightful quote, “The biggest change… in consumer shopping habits in 2025 is a return to brick-and-mortar visits. Consumers are tired of playing defence against online shopping scams.” During the 2024 holiday shopping season alone, over 1,000 Amazon-like websites surfaced in an attempt to defraud shoppers. The return to in-store visits provides traditional retailers an opportunity to win back customers – a ‘do-over’ of sorts post covid-19.

With nearly 73% of consumers engaging with multiple touchpoints before making a purchase, every brand’s 2025 marketing toolkit could be more effective with data-driven insights, interactive displays, and omnichannel strategies designed to enhance engagement and boost sales.

Shopper Marketing experts who create and implement effective retail media network campaigns optimising digital and in-store activations will help brands create an experiential shopper journey optimised for maximum impact.

Is your brand equipped with the right tools for 2025? Reach out here to consult with our experts.

Tag works with brands to create and deliver impactful content at speed and scale. From creative production and activation to strategic sourcing and delivery analytics, we transcend digital and physical touchpoints, allowing brand content and concepts to travel globally while connecting locally through flexible, tech-enabled solutions.