The Biggest Marketing Moments of 2025
Source: Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash
Every year I count down what I consider to be the biggest marketing moments. To my eye, this year was perhaps one of the most dramatic in years, with lots of brands fueling debate about their activities whether it’s a new logo or a celebrity spokesperson. Having people weigh in isn’t necessarily a bad thing, it means they are engaged, so bring it on!
Here goes, from #10 to #1, which might just surprise you! These opinions are my own, wink wink.
#10: HBO Max … HBO Max brings back the HBO to their name and logo after taking it off. The HBO name has a lot of equity, so the brand was smart to capture it back and own it. Own it!
#9: Barbie with Type 1 Diabetes … Brand Barbie tends to always makes my list as she continually reflects and shapes culture year over year, and here she goes again with another first for a community needing representation. Brava!
#8: Lady Gaga at Coachella … she opened the famous music festival and her concert tour, showing the world how she continues to innovate her brand, her music, and her performance art. It was a launch of the next phase of Gaga, and she took the desert by storm. And over delivered over and over again, city by city on tour.
#7: Parker Posey for Gap … Parker Posey had a great year thanks to her performance in “The White Lotus,” and this brand extension with Gap just proved her multiple levels of influence.
#6: “The Life of a Showgirl” Album Release by Taylor Swift … in a different kind of way than Lady Gaga, Taylor Swift is a marketing genius and she knows how to ignite her fans! Her latest album showed her marketing engine and fan network at work, swiftly.
#5: Jonathan Bailey as “People Magazine’s Sexiest Man Alive” … the first time an openly gay man gets the prize and BTW he was the biggest box office draw of the year too. A role model for so many. We didn’t have role models like this when I was a kid!
#4: The New Cracker Barrel Logo … it was actually much more than a logo but in my opinion the intense reaction didn’t reflect the business transformation underneath it all. But that’s what happens when communications get out of control, which the company ultimately turned around.
#3: Gwyneth Paltrow as Temporary Spokesperson for Astronomer … what a great, fast response from a little known tech company suddenly caught in an unexpected executive leadership crisis.
#2: Sydney Sweeney’s Jeans for American Eagle … everyone had an opinion about this one, in and out of marketing circles. The brand later did a great followup campaign with Martha Stewart, for the holidays. Smart.
#1: Chat GPT at the Super Bowl … for the first time, we saw AI positioned in a mass way, and it was certainly not the last time. Not sure many saw the cultural significance as they chugged their beers and chewed their chips, but wow it was there.
There you have it, another marketing year for the record books. As I always say, marketing is a spectator sport and we can learn a lot from observing each other’s work.
What is your biggest marketing moment? Do let me know!
What’s your experience? JIM