Beyond the click: Marketing that matters in 2025

At Prolific North’s Northern Marketing Festival earlier this month, I spoke about a challenge I think many of us feel but don’t always talk about: how easy it is to get stuck measuring performance in a vacuum. How campaigns can become just a string of clicks, cost-per-acquisition figures, and marginal gains.

 But here’s the thing, performance marketing isn’t about the click. It’s about the customer, the brand, and the real market impact we can create if we connect the dots properly. 

So, here’s the gist of what I shared, for anyone who couldn’t make it (or wants the highlights without the awkward moments). 

We all know the theory (but let’s rebuild it)

We all say we want integrated marketing. We nod at slides about full-funnel thinking. But in practice? Our research. media planning, creative, reporting, and budgeting often still operate in silos. 

The industry is measurably underqualified with the foundational knowledge to put each silo into context. 

Each team has a unique view of the market, but unless those views are actively collated and shared, we’re only seeing a sliver of the opportunity. To break out of that narrow lens, we need to shift the conversation from platform limitations to market opportunity and reiniforce our shared knowledge of marketing. 

Why trust and strategy should be built in

A strong strategy isn’t a one-time doc, it’s a rhythm. A culture. Strategy should be something your team lives and breathes, with time carved out to actually talk about why you’re doing what you’re doing. 

But that also requires trust. You have to trust your teams to challenge KPIs, to look up from the daily dashboards and think about long-term growth. When teams are encouraged to focus solely on short-term metrics, they lose sight of the bigger commercial picture. And worse, they become disconnected from the brand itself. 

Trust breeds confidence to allow a strategy to be delivered, actioned market-based strategies lead to more consistent performance and a further build of trust. Trust and Strategy lead to the ability to challenge, evolve and lead a market. 

Brand + performance isn’t just a buzzword

Performance marketing shouldn’t sit in opposition to brand, it should fuel it. 

Ask yourself: does your performance activity clearly link back to what you sell and what your brand stands for? If it doesn’t, you’re probably wasting spend on short-term wins that don’t build long-term value. 

Take YouTube, for example. It reaches 91% of online UK adults. It’s not just a brand-building platform or a performance channel – it’s both. The same applies to most platforms when used properly. 

But if your budget’s being driven purely by what converts last-click in GA4, then you’re going to keep spinning in the same small pond. That’s not growth. That’s stagnation with decent CTRs. 

So, what should we be doing?

Here’s a practical checklist I gave during the talk – call it a manifesto if you’re feeling grand: 

1.   Reinforce marketing principles across your team. Education is a massive competitive advantage. 
2.   Collate market views from across performance teams, no one team has the full picture. 
3.   Widen the focus beyond platform limitations to market opportunities. 
4.   Make time for strategy and knowledge sharing, it’s foundational. 
5.   Create rhythm and momentum, not just monthly reporting cycles. 
6.   Challenge the KPIs; they’re not gospel. 
7.   Measure share of voice (by platform!) and aim to increase brand visibility. 
8.   Add scale; real market numbers and context make digital more powerful. 
9.   Have someone who connects the dots. If you don’t, hire one. 
10.   Be brave. Focus on what really matters. Your long-term growth depends on it. 

 We’re at a point where the lines between brand, performance, and even offline media are blurrier than ever – and that’s not a bad thing. But to capitalise on it, we need to stop obsessing over what’s easy to measure and start aligning behind what’s actually meaningful. 

Clicks matter. But context matters more.