LONDON: UK marketers appear to be well-prepared when it comes to incorporating new technology into their sales and marketing strategies for 2018, according to a recent survey.

Based on a poll of 100 marketing managers in the UK about how they are preparing for the future of consumer retail, digital content firm Purch and researchers OnePoll revealed that a large majority are already getting ready for live streaming, artificial intelligence and other technological breakthroughs.

As reported by Netimperative, around three-quarters (74%) of respondents said they are already using live streaming – or plan to do so – as part of their strategy in 2018.

A similar proportion (72%) plan to use augmented and virtual reality, which is a significant increase because currently only 10% already deploy AR and VR in their campaigns.

UK marketers also revealed that they are switching on to the voice interface with 42% of respondents saying it was on their “marketing roadmap” for next year.

Only 18% said they have no immediate plans to integrate a voice interface into their strategy, while 8% have already designed a voice aspect into their operations.

Elsewhere, the survey found that more than a third (38%) of UK marketing managers think virtual reality will proliferate the quickest into the buying habits of UK consumers.

“As new technologies proliferate ever faster into consumer buying habits, we wanted to gain a sense of how quickly UK marketing managers were taking up their implementation and, crucially, which technologies they were betting on to enter mainstream buying habits fastest,” said André Baden Semper, VP of Purch EMEA.

“We were very impressed with the level of uptake for virtual and augmented reality, as well as live streaming and voice interfaces. 2018 promises to be a year of significant change in the way marketers are approaching their customers,” he added.

However, the survey also revealed that marketers are divided about the merits or otherwise of blockchain, the digital ledger technology.

Just 3% of respondents said they had any blockchain-based technologies in operation, although 10% are developing plans to use it. Interestingly, a full fifth (19%) of marketers reported that they didn’t know what blockchain is.

Sourced from Netimperative; additional content by WARC staff