See How These Holiday Ads Are Predicting 2023 Video Marketing Trends

It’s the holiday season, and brand advertising has kicked into full-on festive mode. Brands hire the crème de la crème of production talent to make their ads, and the spots are often a culmination of the year’s creative learnings. We look at the ads creating buzz this season: What can they tell us about next year’s trends? Hang tight because we’re sharing the storytelling techniques you can integrate into your next brand campaign, no matter the time of year.

Share a powerful storytelling campaign around a cause

This is LEGO’s “biggest ever” Christmas campaign, and the first time it features a celebrity. The toy company tapped American pop icon Katy Perry to help spark the imagination of its audience. In the ad, Katy Perry and her “LEGO helpers are on a mission to remind the world that kindness and creativity are the gifts that keep on giving.”

The ad’s message centers around its Build To Give campaign. How does the initiative work? Simple. Make something magical out of your LEGO bricks (maybe it’s a vehicle that’s part spaceship, part castle and part giraffe!), share it on social media with #BuildtoGive, and then LEGO will donate - for each build shared - a set to kids who need it most.

In the same way, you can tell a creative story around a cause your company cares about.

Invent and build your own advertising tradition

As a brand, you want to create and share a sense of magic through your holiday commercials. If this feeling is captured and communicated, you can turn it into something grander.

In a 1995 ad, Coca-Cola debuted its Christmas Caravan. The image of an endless caravan of lit-up Coke trucks passing through hillsides, valleys, and towns, resonated with viewers. The beverage company capitalized on the response by reusing the ad year after year.

In 2001, Coca-Cola brought the Christmas Caravan to real life with a trip across the United States, and now the Caravan traverses the globe spreading holiday magic.

The company was able to create a powerful transmedia experience. And today, the Christmas Caravan has become synonymous with the start of the festive season.

Coca-Cola not only created a holiday tradition, but also helped save the environment.

Stir up holiday magic using animation

A magical cookbook full of memories. In its animated ad, Kroger, a leading grocer in the United States, tells the story of an older man, Jack, who comes across his late wife’s cookbook. He tries to make a few dishes, and after each taste, he relives a holiday memory. The minute-long ad ends by showing Jack carrying on his favorite food traditions with his granddaughter.

"We know families look to food to make lasting memories during the holidays," said Kroger's Senior Director of Brand Marketing Emily Hartmann. "This sentiment carries so much emotion, and we wanted to capture that feeling in this campaign. Customers will see it come to life in a beautiful story told through elevated characters and environments."

Kroger created magic through detailed animated storytelling. How did they do this? They added minute features and elements like more texture to clothing, hair and skin, plus new hand shapes and movements for the characters. They brilliantly blended reality and fiction to create a one-of-a-kind atmosphere. Here, only your imagination is the limit.

Create holiday cheer through music

Brands like Frito-Lay and PepsiCo intimately understand the power of music to move audiences and are choosing tracks to evoke a deep sense of nostalgia, joy, and hope.

Music has the power to transport us to different times and places and to expand our imagination. It also helps form connections with others. In its holiday TV ad, Pepsi selected Hall & Oates’ timeless 1980 classic “You Make My Dreams (Come True). The ad plunges the viewer into its festive atmosphere through the catchy music. The brand’s core mission, after all, is to “create more smiles.”