Could you please share who you are and what you do?
I have been working with Digital Marketing for more than 13 years, and during this time I have worked with several companies in the field of IT and StartUps. I am also a University Professor with more than 10 years of experience, having taught Marketing, Advertising and Entrepreneurship to students in Brazil and Canada. Right now, I am an Assistant Professor in the MBA program at University Canada West. I also work as a Sessional Instructor at Douglas College and University of the Fraser Valley. Additionally, I work as a consultant focusing on small businesses and startups. My main goal as a professional is to share my knowledge to make people improve their businesses performance and themselves, so they can make better decisions.
What are the most common mistakes businesses make when analyzing their digital marketing performance?
The main issue is failing to plan how data will be gathered beforehand. Many companies start their marketing efforts based on results, but they don’t consider which data they need to collect, its quality and integration, or how to properly set up data collection across different channels. This causes data to be inconsistent, and therefore, untrustworthy. The other mistake I often see is not integrating data from different efforts, and treating the performance as isolate phenomena – it’s crucial to integrate sales (POS and online), website, e-mail marketing, PPC campaigns, social media and other data to understand the bigger picture and make decisions that really save money and maximize profits.
What emerging trends do you believe marketing students should focus on in 2025?
They should focus on getting good at using marketing tools. It is hard to be a generalist nowadays, due to the amount of job openings – you only need one Marketing Manager – but you need more than one Salesforce specialist, for example. The biggest mistake I see from students is not specializing in technical tools, so they are not aware of the possibilities and this makes their strategies weaker, and suggestions to improve the business performance insufficient. I think AI is also a big trend, but they should focus on understanding how AI can be integrated with those tools rather than use it to create content faster, for example.
How do you see the future of advertising shifting, especially in the age of AI and generative AI tools?
We will see more and more brands communicating the same way – AI makes the work faster, especially for content creation, but the standardization of the content is a problem. A lot of brands don’t know the proper way to prompt, and end up with generic and easily recognizable AI generated content. This could even be a problem for SEO, as businesses view AI as a means to automate blog posts and FAQs, for example. On the other hand, personalized ads with AI have made our job so much easier and assertive. I remember having to do Google Ads campaigns 10 years ago and a lot was based on guessing, trial and error – and we no longer need a long learning phase to optimize campaigns.
AI is changing how businesses approach content marketing and personalization. What practical AI-driven strategies do you recommend for marketers in 2025?
I would recommend strategies like the one Amazon is using for summarizing product reviews. People can get information much faster and make decisions in a better way, which enhances customer experience. I would also recommend using AI as a tool to brainstorm ideas with you – and criticize the campaigns you created to see if there are any gaps. This could be especially powerful when you have clear personas, you can test the results of your ideas by simulating and role-playing with AI. Using AI for optimizing PPC campaigns is also a good idea, and programmatic media has been evolving fast with Gen AI.
With platforms like Google Ads and Meta introducing AI-driven campaign automation. How can marketers use Google Ads and Meta’s AI-driven technologies to improve the performance of digital advertising campaigns?
If you’re running ads on Google or Meta, their AI tools can make your life so much easier. Instead of guessing who to target or tweaking bids all day, Google’s Smart Bidding and Meta’s Advantage+ Audiences are awesome. They figure out who’s most likely to convert and adjust things in real-time so your budget is spent wisely. Plus, AI makes ad testing effortless—Google’s Performance Max and Meta’s Advantage+ Creative keep mixing and matching different ad variations to find what works best, so you don’t have to waste time running manual A/B tests.
When it comes to budget management and retargeting, Google’s data-driven attribution and Meta’s budget optimization automatically shift your spend to the ads that are performing best. I remember having to spend more money on the learning curve, and having to constantly invigilate the spending on campaigns. Retargeting is smarter, too—Google’s Enhanced Customer Match and Meta’s AI-driven retargeting don’t just follow people around with ads, they also help you find lookalike audiences who act like your best customers. And if you’re running an online store, Meta’s Advantage+ Shopping Campaigns basically run themselves—AI tests your creatives, adjusts targeting, and optimizes your budget so you can scale faster without babysitting your ads.