MARKETING-INTERACTIVE wishes you happy holidays, catch you in 2026!

If 2024 was the warm-up act, 2025 was the year everything went turbo.

And somehow, in the middle of an industry consolidation wave, a few billion AI hot takes and a tech news cycle powered by everything from Pokémon to Magicbrief, we managed to pull off one of the biggest market expansions in our 20-plus year history: The launch of MARKETING-INTERACTIVE Australia.

Australia has quickly become one of our fastest-growing markets, and the response from readers has been unreal. Thank you. The July launch feels like five minutes ago and five years ago at the same time, but set the tone for the entire year.

Across the region, the team didn’t just keep up - they hit another level.

Our Digital Marketing Australia conference became a true regional force this year, with events in Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand and The Philippines, landing with packed agendas and bigger conversations. Our inaugural attempt at bringing Digital Marketing Asia to Malaysia saw a room full of passionate marketers owning the stage with bold ideas, fresh perspectives, and a shared drive to shape the future of digital marketing in the region.

We also broke new ground with our PR Asia conference this year, adding The Philippines into the line up of Singapore and Malaysia get-togethers. Despite a year of rapid change, economic headwinds, and shifting media landscapes in 2025, the PR community came together with resilience, creativity, and renewed energy to share best practices, build deeper connections, and chart bold new directions. Their passion and professionalism proved that even in challenging times, the Philippine PR community continues to shine.

On the awards front, the Marketing Excellence Awards broke new ground again, cementing its status as one of our biggest regional event platforms that celebrate the incredible work being done by CMOs and their agency partners. Events also proved their unmatched power of connection, with our MEvents achieving unprecedented growth in 2025. Nothing rivals the impact of real experiences.

We also doubled down on formats. Our podcast series Marketing Connected grew into its own community while our weekly Gen Z Perspective wraps, primarily on Instagram, took on a life of their own. Let’s just say: if you ever want the truth, find the Gen Z perspective - often fuelled by iced matcha and a healthy dose of chaotic optimism.

Next year, we’re taking things to new heights. With new formats and more ways to help marketers make sense of a world moving at an unreasonable pace. Which brings us neatly to the industry itself: holy hell, what a year.

We witnessed levels of consolidation we haven’t seen in a very long time. And yes, AI and agentic systems have now well and truly entered the chat.

We are not being dramatic when we say that AI will be the biggest opportunity and the biggest disruptor the modern marketing industry has ever seen. It’s exhilarating. It’s chaotic. It’s occasionally terrifying. And we’ll continue breaking it down for you without the hype haze.

So, what got you all clicking and scrolling in 2025? The range was wild.

One of our most-searched stories (240K searches) was Facebook’s advertiser identity verification (the joys of scam ads in an election year). Close behind was McDonald’s Hong Kong’s BABYMONSTER collab, followed by the inside story of KFC Listens.

And of course the tech news surge: shopping on ChatGPT, Canva buying Magicbrief, Google teaming up with Pokémon and how can we not mention CHAGEE – all of it fed your curiosity at scale.

What’s next?

Well, Australia will be back in the spotlight next year as we host our first big event for senior brand leaders and agency innovators - details imminent. At the same time, we'll keep pushing boundaries across Hong Kong, Singapore, Malaysia, The Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand and beyond.

On the “traditional” side, our newsletter and website audiences in The Philippines and Indonesia also grew rapidly in 2025 with our dedicated content reaching you in a timely manner. You can rest assured, in 2026, the content will remain just as bold and engaging as we aim to bring you more insights and analysis pieces.

But before we get stuck into planning meetings, scriptwriting, speaking slots and far too much cold brew… we’re taking a breather and we hope you will be too. It’s time to slow down (just a bit) after a year that moved faster than any of us planned.

From all of us at MARKETING-INTERACTIVE: thank you for reading, sharing, debating, eye-rolling, emailing, DM-ing and being part of this community in the most energetic, unpredictable year we’ve seen in a long time.

Happy holidays, and see you in 2026!

With love,
The MARKETING-INTERACTIVE team