The State of Marketing at Axelerant in 2024 and 2025 Focus Areas

Introduction

2024 was a transformative year for marketing at Axelerant. As we look ahead to 2025, marketing agencies, including ours, are undergoing rapid evolution driven by AI-powered automation, strategic partnerships, and shifts in content creation. These trends bring both opportunities and challenges, reshaping how marketing teams function, how content is generated, and how authenticity is maintained.

Here’s a deep dive into what worked, what we learned, and how we plan to refine our approach moving forward.

Axelerant’s 2024 Marketing Performance

Channels, Learnings, and Future Focus

As we reflect on 2024, Axelerant’s marketing strategy provided key insights into what worked, where we saw success, and where we can improve.

Despite industry-wide shifts, we saw organic growth, an increase in referral traffic, and a stronger focus on thought leadership, reinforcing our position as a trusted digital partner.

Channels That Worked for Axelerant in 2024

1. Organic Search: The Foundation of Our Growth

• Performance: With over a 15.1% increase in users and +10.9% increase in sessions, organic search remained our strongest acquisition channel.
• Why It Worked: Our investment in SEO-optimized content around key industry topics paid off, with high impressions on queries like marketing automation, CDP, and Salesforce integration.
• Key Takeaway: Continued focus on technical SEO and high-intent content creation is critical for sustained growth.

2. Referral Traffic: Leveraging Trusted Sources

• Performance: Referral traffic grew 150.3% in users and 125.6% in sessions.
• Key Contributors: Clutch, GitHub, Drupal.org, and partnership-driven content amplified our reach.
• Key Takeaway: Strengthening high-quality referral partnerships and ensuring Axelerant is visible in key industry directories will continue to drive valuable traffic.

3. Organic Social: Building an Engaged Community

• Performance: 98.9% increase in users and +97.3% increase in sessions came through organic social efforts.
• Platforms That Performed: LinkedIn and Twitter emerged as our best-performing channels for engagement.
• Key Takeaway: Doubling down on LinkedIn thought leadership and leveraging video content will be key in 2025.

"Social is no longer just about broadcasting—it’s about conversation. The best engagement comes when we listen, not just when we speak." – Nathan, Marketing Director

4. Thought Leadership & Webinars: Strengthening Brand Authority

• Content Initiatives: 98.9% increase in users and +97.3% increase in sessions came through organic social efforts.
  • 3 webinars + 1 webinar series were conducted under Axelerant Live.
  • The Delivering Differently series featured deep dives into agency transformation and technical innovation.
• Key Takeaway: Positioning Axelerant as a thought leader through high-value, industry-focused content is a winning strategy.

Key Learnings from 2024

1. Intent-Driven SEO Yields the Best Results

• Queries around marketing automation, CDP, and Salesforce integration generated high impressions but lower CTRs.
• Lesson: We need to optimize meta descriptions, strengthen internal linking, and add compelling CTAs to improve click-through rates.

2. Partnerships & Community Engagement Drive High-Quality Traffic

• Clutch, GitHub, and Drupal.org referrals brought highly engaged users.
• Lesson: Strengthening Axelerant’s presence in key industry communities and partner networks will further enhance quality lead generation.

3. Video & Interactive Content is Underutilized

• While social engagement grew, engagement rates on video-based content were significantly higher than static posts.
• Lesson: Investing in video, webinars, and interactive storytelling should be a priority in 2025.

4. Conversion Optimization is a Priority

• While traffic increased, conversion rates on key pages remained flat.
• Lesson: A/B testing landing pages, refining CTAs, and optimizing form experiences will help translate engagement into conversions.

The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly of Marketing in 2025

As we step into 2025, the marketing landscape continues to evolve at an accelerated pace. AI-driven strategies, automation, and structural shifts are redefining how marketing teams operate and deliver value. While these advancements present unprecedented opportunities, they also bring new challenges in maintaining quality, authenticity, and the essence of creative marketing.

The Good: The Evolution of the Marketing Agency Team

The evolution of marketing teams isn't just about AI and automation—it’s also about structuring teams for maximum impact. At Axelerant, our GTM-focused marketing reorganization reflects this shift. 

By integrating platform-specific and agency-specific marketing functions, streamlining content and campaigns, and ensuring that marketing directly drives revenue, we are building a model that aligns with the future of marketing organizations.

Moving beyond custom GPTs optimized per account, agencies are now building and integrating AI-driven marketing agents that can function independently as builders, managers, and strategists within hybrid teams.

This shift isn’t just a step forward; it’s a necessity. Getting this right means unlocking growth at scale, enabling smaller agencies to compete effectively against industry giants. It’s never been easier to be David in David vs. Goliath.

The Bad: Quality Control and the Challenge of Truth in AI-Generated Marketing

Despite the advancements, one truth remains: Good marketing will always be about telling the truth well—and that is becoming more complex. 

"AI can generate content, but it can't generate trust. The challenge for marketers is not just accuracy but authenticity—ensuring that AI-driven messaging still reflects a brand's values and unique voice. The future of marketing depends on how well we guide AI to tell the right story, not just any story."

– Nathan, Marketing Director

As AI-driven content and multimedia generation become more prevalent, the real challenge will be ensuring authenticity, accuracy, and human creativity in marketing.

For agencies marketing on behalf of others, the need for a new model of SME engagement and collaboration has never been greater. Success will hinge on agencies’ ability to:

• Develop AI systems that ask the right questions to the right people.
• Empower SMEs to provide meaningful insights that guide AI-generated outputs.
• Ensure human creativity prevails in a world increasingly driven by automation.

Those who master this balance will lead the industry. Those who ignore it risk creating shallow, inauthentic, and ultimately ineffective content.

The Ugly: The Changing Role of Marketers

The fundamental roles of marketing professionals are shifting. Writers no longer just write. Designers no longer just design.

Ad campaign planners no longer just plan. Instead, marketers find themselves responsible for editing, curating, and orchestrating at scale—using AI-driven tools that fundamentally alter their roles.

This shift is leading to an existential reckoning for marketers:

• What does creativity mean when machines generate the first draft?
• How do marketers retain their strategic and artistic edge when AI is doing more of the work?
• Where does human intuition fit in an era where algorithms dictate much of the content creation process?

Without a clear framework for maintaining authenticity and expertise, the result will be a flood of misinformed, low-quality content saturating the market—a slow, agonizing death of traditional creative marketing roles.

As Axelerant steps into 2025, focusing on ABM campaigns, refining our SEO strategy, expanding referral partnerships, doubling down on video content, and optimizing conversions will be our key focus areas.

Marketing is changing, and those who embrace the shift while prioritizing authenticity, engagement, and value-driven content will emerge as industry leaders.

This is the State of Marketing at Axelerant, setting the foundation for an even stronger year ahead!