The top digital trends for 2024

Many predicted a return to normality in 2022. But normality did not arrive. Many predicted the same in 2023. But, again, it did not arrive. We seem to have entered an era of permacrisis, with new crises emerging, one after the next. The challenge for organisations is to work through the crises.

 

Digital provides solutions. It helps organisations to pivot, to practice agility, to move quickly, to slow down, to find answers to new questions, and to meet the demands of the moment. And the digital trends of 2024 follow that dynamic: each is a reaction to a problem, each can add significant value.

 

So, without further ado, here are five digital trends for 2024.

 

Skip to: The importance of digital during the cost-of-living crisis

Skip to: Digital priorities shift during economic hardship

Skip to: Virtual reality becoming a widespread reality

Skip to: The era of generative artificial intelligence

Skip to: The importance of digital sustainability and green tech

 

 

The importance of digital during the cost-of-living crisis

 

The cost-of-living crisis refers to the fall in ‘real’ disposable incomes. The crisis has been driven by labour shortages, an energy crisis, various geo-political crises, and myriad other factors.

 

The cost-of-living crisis has hit almost everyone. According to the Office for National Statistics, for example, 91% of adults have experienced an increase in living costs. And that has a knock-on effect on charities, with 55% of the public stating that their financial situation makes it more difficult to donate.

 

There are some positive economic signs, as we move into 2024. For the first time in two years, wage growth caught up with rising prices in September 2023. The Bank of England predicted that inflation will drop to around 5% by 2024, continuing to fall towards a target of 2% in the first half of 2025.

 

And, according to the Resolution Foundation’s annual Living Standards Outlook for 2023, the cost-of-living crisis should generally ease throughout 2024, with costs headings down in various areas.

 

But, while there is light at the end of the tunnel, organisations need to be prepared for another tough financial year. Organisations need to first mitigate any shortfall in funding.

 

That might mean, among other things, practicing income diversification, finding new revenue or fundraising streams, cutting expenditure, auditing your processes for potential cost reductions, and so on.

 

A shift towards digital will help alleviate issues raised by the cost-of-living crisis. Digital can help tackle the cost-of-living crisis in various ways.

 

It can ensure a greater return on investment, reduce operational costs, drive operational efficiency, improve overall service delivery, overcome geographical boundaries, and reach more people with less expenditure.

 

In times of economic hardship, digital becomes essential. Indeed, according to Lloyds Bank UK Digital Index, digitally aware charities are 28% more likely to report an increase in turnover or funding than less digital charities. And more than half of charities cite cost saving as an advantage of digital.

 

 

Digital priorities shift during economic hardship

 

One of the trends we have noticed, pushed by the cost-of-living crisis, is a shift of priorities. In times of hardship, organisations tend to focus on revenue-generation and forget other areas, such as cyber security and climate action. Deprioritising such areas creates risk.

 

Reducing spend on cyber security, for example, makes organisations vulnerable to cyber-attacks. Cyber criminals are aware of that fact: they tend to become most active during moments of economic hardship, precisely because they know that organisations are less covered. Indeed, we’ve seen a huge surge of cyber crime since the beginning of the cost-of-living crisis.

 

So organisations need to protect themselves, even if that means investing in cyber security during difficult financial periods. The alternative might prove far more costly in the long-term.

 

Another area that tends to be neglected is climate action. Environmental, social, and governance (ESG) credentials are all the rage during moments of prosperity, but they are often forgotten during economic hardship.

 

Too many organisations see ESG as a nice-to-have, not a must-have, ignoring the myriad benefits ESG brings to your organisation and the risks it reduces or mitigates.

 

The benefits of ESG policies are clear. ESG attracts investors, donors, and users. According to a Business Wire report, over a third of global consumers will pay more if a product or a service has sustainable credentials. The same report found that 85% of consumers have become “greener” in their purchasing.

 

ESG policies will make your organisation more sustainable – and not just environmentally. Organisations that take ESG seriously are better able to identify cost-saving opportunities, minimise energy consumption, reduce resource waste, and so on.

 

Indeed, research by the NYI Stern Center for Sustainable Business and Rockefeller Asset Management found a positive relationship between ESG and financial performance in 58% of corporations.

 

That’s the carrot, but there is also a stick: companies that ignore ESG policies may face legal, regulatory, reputational, and compliance issues down the line.

 

So ESG provides huge benefits, and mitigates substantial risks, but still seems neglected. Organisations may see a trend of further neglect in 2024, as priorities shift due to the ongoing cost-of-living crisis. Our advice is to buck that trend and continue to ensure long-term sustainability is a priority.

 

 

Virtual reality becoming a widespread reality

 

Virtual reality (VR) has been on the cusp of widespread use for years. It saw an uptick during COVID-19, as people experimented with new ways of tech application. The NSPCC, for example, pioneered a computer simulation programme to help tackle child abuse. They teamed up with gamification provider Attensi to create an immersive simulation to help children who may be victims of abuse.

 

But, despite various examples of successful VR, we have not seen VR take off in quite the way many predicted. Meta and Apple recently released VR headsets, which were much talked, but sales seemed to dissapoint.

 

Metaverse VR headset sales shrank in 2022, for example, and overall shipments of VR headsets, as well as augmented reality devices, dropped more than 12% in the same year.

 

But VR is changing. It is repositioning. VR historically dwelled on the epic, providing people with incredible experiences, depending on the heightened sensory experience.

 

But the shift in recent years has moved towards more practical application. VR devices now allow people to work from anywhere, with multiple monitors, checking out emails, CRM systems, spreadsheets, and so much more.

 

You can still use VR for gaming and entertainment, but the rise of work and training applications might boost the VR appeal. VR provides opportunities for more personal remote meetings, with avatars and notable body language; real-world simulations that allow training to feel more authentic; sharing quick presentations with bodily interactions; and so on.

 

In short, VR has moved towards more obvious vocational application, which drastically boosts its appeal in the long-term.

 

The uptake is still slow. But, as the focus shifts towards work, it is possible that organisations may find VR devices part of a standard tech toolkit. But, it is worth noting, that digital trend articles over the past few years have consistently predicted the drastic rise of VR. So, will it prove another year with a lot of talk and not much uptake? Or will the new applications make VR the latest must-have tech?

 

 

The era of generative artificial intelligence

 

Artificial intelligence (AI) has long occupied space in the human imagination. Prior to the birth of AI in the 60s or earlier, science fiction grappled with concepts of artificially intelligent robots: The Tin Man in Wizard of Oz, for example, or the War-Robot in Master of the World.

 

The idea of AI developed in later science fiction involved machines that possessed characteristics that seemed indistinguishable from humans, as seen in Philip K. Dick’s Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? or Ian McEwan’s Machines Like Me.

 

But real-life AI has recently become a major tech talking point, perhaps the major talking point of 2023. And it will continue to be talked about long into 2024, particularly generative AI.

 

Generative AI depends on fast processing and intelligent algorithms, alongside huge depths of data with which it produces results based on prompts. Generative AI is supposed to learn from patterns in the data, using that information to improve process and, in turn, improve the results.

 

We are seeing new iterations every month, new platforms every week, new applications every day. Generative AI has so many applications that someone has created an AI- dependent AI aggregator to compile AI applications. There’s an AI For That shows the depths of applications, with small talk, hairdressing, and everything else included.

 

But most of the applications are more common and by now familiar. Organisations are regularly using AI to generate text (ChatGPT and Jasper), images (DeepAI and DALL·E 2), audio (Soundraw and Jukebox), video (Synthesia and Pictory), and so much more.

 

Organisations can use generative AI in so many ways. They can, for example, churn out copy at an extraordinary rate. The copy lacks originality and often depends on quite a generic tone, but with some editing and a little re-writing, the AI can automate at least the early stages of drafting.

 

Or, better still, the AI is great for sparking the imagination, giving direction and inspiration to the writing process. 

 

Generative AI systems can improve Chatbots. The benefit for organisations is that chatbots are 24/7, always on, always ready to respond. They answer potential user questions, direct them to relevant information, and even push them to engage with pre-existing content on your site.

 

Organisations can also leverage AI for routine and monotonous tasks, conserving both time and resources. Such tasks could encompass managing donations, updating donor databases, orchestrating consistent communications, or scanning social media for prospective donors.

 

By streamlining tedious tasks, charities can allocate more time to creative endeavors, tasks that require the personal touch.

 

Generative AI will become a common digital trend in 2024. It will ensure that organisations reach new audiences, help you to produce more content, find new people, leverage analytics, and so on. And, on top of that, AI will automate or optimise areas of operations.

 

So organisations should find how they can best make use of generative AI. That is particularly important during the cost-of-living crisis, as we will all need to achieve more with less.

 

 

The importance of digital sustainability and green tech

 

Each crisis offers different challenges and each demands a different reaction from us. But the climate crisis poses a constant and looming threat, one that governments and organisations have failed to effectively tackle. We should all re-evaluate our relationship with tech and question how our use of tech contributes (positively and negatively) to the climate crisis.

 

As we’ve written previously, tech can prove both the problem and the solution. It is suggested that, according to a study by the Shift Project, the world’s digital carbon footprint accounts for approximately 4% of all greenhouse emissions, comparable to levels emitted by the aviation industry.

 

In simple terms: we need to start considering the environmental impact of tech. And we need to start embracing green tech. But what exactly is green tech?

 

Let’s start with a definition. Green tech is an umbrella term, broadly used to define any tech that boasts green credentials. The term encompasses any tech that aims to mitigate, reduce, or reverse the effects of human-caused climate change.

 

Green tech is best divided into groups. The first group is the day-to-day tech, the eco-friendly and energy-efficient devices, often small-scale, often used at a personal level. Examples include:

• Smart metres
• Energy-efficient lightbulbs
• Thermostatic radiator valves

The second group exists at a larger scale. It is usually applied at an organisational level:

• Vertical farming to use less land and less water
• Self-sufficient buildings that produce their own power
• Electric transport in various forms

The third group, the so-called heroic green tech, is very large-scale tech that requires billions in investment and aims to drastically reduce, or even reverse, emissions:

• Carbon capture and storage
• Wave energy management
• Smart city infrastructure

All of the above tech plays a vital role in protecting the environment. Individuals and organisations need to audit the current tech they use, consider the green tech that would reduce their carbon footprint, and broadly think about the best ways to implement and use that tech.

 

To implement green tech, or to find where you can make tech more sustainable, consider a tech audit. Tech audits allow you to track emissions and monitor your carbon footprint.

 

Sage offer an easy guide for tracking your footprint and online calculators can help you to calculate your greenhouse gas emissions, too. These include The Carbon Trust and The McKay Carbon Calculator.

 

Do not overcomplicate the audit. Just track the tech that gives the highest emissions, then make decisions based on the emissions levels. That allows you to make the decisions that help you to become more sustainable organisations, while minimising the complexity of such decisions.

 

You can make the audit really simple. Just track the tech that gives the highest emissions, then make decisions based on the emissions level. That allows you to make the decisions that help you to become a more sustainable organisations, while minimising the complexity of such decisions.