In advising my clients on marketing and related business development issues, it is often difficult to get them focused on integrated marketing approaches. Many have been sold marketing services by an agency that is not necessarily coordinated with either the overall business strategy or other marketing strategies and tactics. With the advent of a new year come a series of questions regarding the future and direction of marketing given the increased importance of the internet. Recently, Uri Bar-Joseph, director of marketing at Optify, in a blog post on the Marketing Profs website, addressed what his firm sees as trends in marketing for 2013. His opinions are offered below:

1. Digital marketing will continue to grow

It’s pretty obvious to just about everyone that digital marketing is becoming the main channel for demand generation. But despite the adoption levels of digital marketing, there’s still a lot more upside. In 2013, digital marketing will continue to see huge adoption rates as businesses of all sizes implement all manner of digital marketing tactics.

2. Digital marketing services will surge

Subsequent to digital marketing’s mass adoption, adoptions, digital marketing services will spike. Consultants, agencies, and new services will surge to support new users and meet their demand for assistance.

3. Content creation services and software will proliferate

Content marketing is becoming the core of just about every marketing initiative for B2B marketing as well as B2C. In 2013, we will see a host of software and services solutions for content creation and syndication emerge as companies try to use content for more demand- and lead-generation results.

4. Integrated marketing will gain popularity

After new channels stabilize as standalone, consistent lead-gen options (social media, content marketing) and new channels and tactics emerge with enormous promise (mobile, re-targeting), 2013 will become the year of integrated marketing campaigns. Marketers will try to combine tactics to make use of the compounded effect of multiple channels’ working in unison. The market will react as more solutions will come to offer the ability to manage and measure integrated campaigns in one place, marking a decline in the adoption of one-dimensional solutions.

5. Direct mail will make a return

While digital marketing rises, sophisticated marketers will recognize the potential of direct mail coupled with an online connection to break through the noise. Solutions and services that offer integrated—offline and online—approaches will emerge and gain traction as a result of being affordable and highly measurable.

6. Big Data applications will emerge

Big Data has been the hot topic in the media for the last 18 months, and big companies such as HP, IBM, Microsoft, and other software conglomerates have been developing solutions to tackle Big Data. In 2013, we will see solutions emerge and adopted that offer big data applications for day-to-day marketing campaigns.

7. The immeasurable will become measurable

In 2012, we noticed a lot of talk about measurement and the ability to justify marketing efforts. As ROI becomes essential to the broad adoption of any marketing tactic, in 2013 solutions and services will find ways to measure previously immeasurable tactics and evaluate their contribution to the bottom line.

8. PPC will decline as budgets move to other paid solutions

In 2012 we’ve seen the first signs of decline in PPC usage for B2B companies. In the next year, more budgets will move away from PPC to new and more affordable channels and tactics.

9. Marketing spend on software will increase

As more software and infrastructure for marketing is required, Marketing’s budget will match IT’s.

10. Sales responsibilities will move to Marketing

The expansion of lead generation responsibilities in B2B marketing is resulting in the moving of more sales-related tasks to Marketing. In 2013 we will see marketing teams take over more sales tasks, such as lead qualification, inside sales team management, and sales operations.

How about you and your company? As you think about your strategy for business growth for 2013, which of these trends have you thought about? For me, the top 3 things I want my clients to focus on are integrated marketing, metrics, and a digital marketing (including content) strategy.