Marketing leaders are reallocating spending toward social, prioritizing user engagement, and reducing focus on traditional SEO tactics. The shift reflects marketers’ desire for speed, flexibility, and clear ROI signals. But it also shows the growing need to balance long-term brand building with short-term, engagement-driven wins. Brands should rebalance—not replace—channel mix by defining engagement benchmarks and KPIs that tie directly to brand lift, evaluating influencer impact beyond vanity metrics, and protecting core SEO efforts that support long-term discoverability.

Australia has enacted the world’s first nationwide ban on social-media accounts for anyone under 16, forcing platforms like TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, and Snapchat to remove underage users or face major penalties. Policymakers and researchers will study the effects on mental health, offline behavior, and migration to unregulated platforms—insights that could influence US policy, where similar proposals are already gaining traction. For advertisers, the implications are significant: removing millions of teen users would constrict future reach curves, shift youth attention toward gaming-adjacent spaces, raise competition for compliant inventory, and complicate early brand-building. Australia’s experiment may foreshadow US market disruption.

Holiday shoppers in Asia-Pacific are decisively digital-first, with online intent outpacing in-store browsing throughout the region. However, there are notable variations in consumer behaviors across markets.

Australia’s ban on social media accounts for under-16s, which will take effect on December 10, is the clearest signal yet that the youth web is being rebuilt. Under the new rules, platforms will be compelled to block or remove minors or face fines up to AUD 49.5 million ($32.6 million)—a world first that other governments are watching closely, per The BBC. Brands will need to future-proof their playbooks by looking at alternatives like connected TV (CTV), offline events and sponsorships, and other privacy-safe campaigns.

Consumers (68%) and senior marketers (75%) expressed an increasingly positive outlook on the possibilities of generative AI this year, according to a September report from Kantar.

Media habits in East Asia and Oceania are being redefined. Streaming outpaces broadcast, creators rival traditional TV, and new devices—from wearables to smart home tech—are reshaping how audiences spend time and money on content.

34% of social media users would be more likely to purchase products based on creator recommendations if those reviews appeared more authentic and included negative reviews, a March 2025 impact.com and EMARKETER survey found.

Most (63%) of global social media users prefer short videos from creators, according to a March impact.com and EMARKETER survey.

Over half (52%) of consumers in Australia, the UK, and the US are most concerned about brands posting AI-generated content without disclosure, tied with mishandling personal data as their top social media worry, according to Q3 data from Sprout Social.