Over the past decade, blockchain has been pitched as a game-changer – not just for finance, but for everything from healthcare to logistics… and yes, even marketing. But in 2025, with AI dominating headlines and digital strategies, widespread that uptake for marketing is yet to take place so can blockchain ever truly live up to the hype for marketers?
š Innovation Trigger
The rise of blockchain technology started in the shadow of the 2008 financial crash, when trust in traditional institutions was crumbling prompting a surge in demand for a decentralised currency and in 2009 Satoshi Nakamoto publishes āBitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash Systemā, which proposes a way to remove the elements of faith or trust in the processing of transactions in favour of absolute cryptographic proof.
(But what did Blockchain actually do?)
The key innovation was solving the “double spend” problem in a decentralised way. Instead of relying on a central bank or authority to verify transactions, blockchain uses a network of computers (or ānodesā), each storing a complete history of every transaction ever made. When a new transaction occurs, it’s broadcast to the network, validated through consensus, and added to the chain as a new block of data. Once added, it’s permanent and tamper-proof. This system made digital money like Bitcoin viableābut it also sparked interest in applying this transparent, unchangeable ledger system to other industries, including marketing.
š¤Æ Peak of Inflated Expectations
By the mid-2010s, optimism ran high. A survey from 2017 found that 88% of marketers believed blockchain would have a positive impact on digital marketing. The industry was filled with predictions about how it would completely change the game. Marketers imagined a world where blockchain could restore trust, eliminate fraud, and even hand control of personal data back to consumers.
The use cases being floated were vast:
- Ad Fraud Prevention ā Blockchain could stop bots in their tracks, ensuring that ad spend only reached real humans.
- Universal Reputation Scores ā Sellers on platforms like Amazon or eBay could carry trust across marketplaces via immutable digital histories.
- Loyalty Programs ā Points and rewards could be tokenised, consolidated, and even traded between brands.
- Data Ownership ā Users could āownā their data and selectively share it with marketers in exchange for tokens or benefits.
- Decentralised Content Platforms ā Creators could publish and monetise content without gatekeepers like Google or Facebook taking a cut.
Antoniadis, Kontsas and Konstantinos (2019)
šŖ« The Trough of Disillusionment
Fast forward to 2024, and most of those predictions havenāt materialised. Blockchainās marketing revolution is still āpending.ā Why?
1. Itās Complicated.
A recurring theme in the research: marketers just donāt get it. Nearly half of marketers in one study said blockchainās technical jargon was too confusing. Over 70% admitted there were critical knowledge gaps in their teams.
2. Itās Pricey.
Building private blockchain systems isnāt cheap. Medium-complexity projects can run from $30k to over $90k, and public blockchains like Ethereum come with their own fluctuating āgasā fees.
3. Itās Risky.
Blockchains are unchangeable by design. Thatās great for securityābut not so great when a marketing team sends a promo to the wrong list and canāt undo it. Thereās also the issue of privacy: blockchainās transparency could clash with GDPR and customer expectations.
š The Slope of Englightenment – Is There Hope on the Horizon?
We may never see blockchain as the silver bullet it was once thought to be, but there are areas where it still shows promise.
š Post-Cookie Targeting & Zero-Party Data
With third-party cookies on the way out, marketers are scrambling for alternatives. Blockchain offers a privacy-first approach, enabling users to tokenise their own data and share it on their terms.
š” IoT Integration
Smart homes and connected devices are booming – but also vulnerable. Blockchain can secure these ecosystems, and marketers could tap into token-based systems to build new kinds of digital relationships with customers.
š Ad Fraud Prevention
Fraud in digital advertising is still a massive problem. Blockchain can help validate ad interactions in real time, giving marketers much-needed transparency and accountability.
š¤ So… Can Blockchain Still Make a Difference?
Not without a few caveats.
AI continues to grab headlines and budgets, so blockchain faces an uphill battle for attention. Itās secure, yes – but complex. Itās trustworthy – but not user-friendly. In short, Blockchain is a complicated area to functionally understand and practically difficult to integrate by design, for marketers and customers alike, but to simplify it is to lose its core purpose of infallibility. It is infallible because it is complicated and because it is complicated it is difficult to understand.