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Will Higham keynote speaker, reveals tomorrow's consumer behaviour patterns today. Experience how this future trends expert transforms business strategy.
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The simple dynamics of supply and demand no longer explain why people buy, switch, or remain loyal. Businesses now have to consider shifting values, technological disruptions, and cultural shifts that impact consumption.
Will Higham's presentations as a keynote speaker will help turn uncertainty into a competitive advantage for every business leader. Higham, an expert in consumer behaviour, is a leader in turning predictions in markets into profitable opportunities. He is a global authority on future business strategy and one of the UK's leading futurist speakers.
William has spent two decades leading Next Big Thing. Through his consultancy, he has guided major brands to decode consumer shifts. He serves clients from Amazon, Walt Disney, HSBC, and MTV — expertise that positions him as the consumer trends speaker who bridges research with action.
His book, "The Next Big Thing: Spotting and Forecasting Consumer Trends for Profit," is the first must-have handbook in trend strategy. The purchase of the book reflects the book's simplicity, a simplicity that William brings to the stage. Be it leaders at Barclaycard or creatives at Estée Lauder, his references are living examples. His talks are fun not only because of the insight he brings, but also the energy.
Higham's career began in music marketing at Sony, Virgin, and Universal. He managed communications for artists — we’re talking Michael Jackson and The Rolling Stones. Music consumption patterns often predict broader social movements. Working with global superstars taught him to read cultural shifts quickly. This consumer-facing experience is what sparked his fascination with trend analysis.
Consider this: knowing how people consume entertainment really provides an understanding of consumer behaviour on a broader scale. Artists are successful because they listen to the audience, even before the audience knows what they want. But it is marketers who take these concepts and desires and apply them to a project. The same skills that made him successful in launching records are now used to develop businesses so that the employees have well-being, and the products are launched properly.
He transitioned to consulting in business when brands like Levi's and BT asked him to share his expertise on the consumer. We're pretty sure that his deep understanding of data analysis methods can be attributed to his one-year role as Managing Director of OnePoll, one of the leading research companies in the UK.
The expert marketer doesn’t offer predictions for prediction’s sake. Instead, he brings into awareness patterns in culture, technology, and behaviour that incline employees and consumers to adapt before the rest of the market catches on. He once warned the drinks industry about New Sobriety before it became mainstream. He spotted Wellbeing Consumers years ahead of the curve. And if you’re a fan of the BBC’s ‘Strictly Come Dancing’ (‘Dancing With The Stars’), we can thank William for its success.
This is why companies trust Will Higham keynote speaker — he delivers actionable intelligence. Predictions that materialise into market realities.
William emphasises that the future of consumer behaviour goes beyond theoretical futurism. He provides practical frameworks for real business challenges. Audiences leave his presentations with tools they can implement immediately to handle tomorrow’s buyers and workers.
In a recent keynote on the topic ‘Seize the Uncertainty Advantage: How to plan with confidence in an unpredictable world,’ William says, “It’s not just a passing phase. Hard data suggests the world really is getting more uncertain.”
The secret is in his vetted research process. His research is informed by behaviours, not by technological speculation. So he studies how the market — and the workplace — shifts with conditions. His approach finds opportunities that others miss. This human-centred approach takes the best path to reliable forecasts compared to technology-driven forecasts alone.
Consumer expectations accelerate rapidly. Traditional strategies, like focus groups, fail to capture authentic consumer behaviour. People often say one thing but do another. That’s because the future of consumer behaviour is seldom shaped by one factor alone: Social movements interact with technology, health trends merge with economic pressures, and generational differences sit at the heart of many market shifts.
William excels at making sense of these intersections. His foundational premise is to decouple complexity into direction. He looks at both micro-changes, such as a surge of demand for plant-based foods, and macro-changes, like where artificial intelligence has entered our everyday experience, with painstaking detail to distill all these nuances.
Businesses must anticipate changes rather than react to them, and it’s generational trends keynote speakers who inspire organisations to become proactive rather than defensive in their market approach. Here’s how:
“If you can see what the change in customer attitudes and behaviours are, then you can safely navigate. That’s what you need to keep your eye on.” William Higham speaking on ‘How Businesses can Prepare for Uncertainty’.
We cannot overstate the value of foresight. Knowing how consumers might act tomorrow informs the design of products and services that are relevant. As such, we cannot overstate the value of foresight. This calls for more than intuition.
William combines data assessment with cultural inspection. He specializes in identifying emerging patterns well before they are clear to competitors, and methodically arms leaders with this same model. Companies that use his insight and counsel attain a first-mover advantage with respect to customer desires, emerging employee expectations, and changes within the market.
Our futurist speaker UK excels at decoding generational behaviour differences. In his sessions, William evaluates the intersection between generational preferences and technological adoption. By comparing values and expectations, we see how each generation shapes industries, from retail to entertainment.
We learn about the intersection of why Gen Z approaches loyalty differently from their parents and how Baby Boomers embrace digital banking as they see fit. His analysis illuminates how digital natives engage with content, access information, make decisions, and engage with brands.
Any organization that is interested in the future would do well to understand how to identify where these intersections create lucrative niches because these trends expose everything from workplace requirements and expectations to buying behaviours. Organisations that are targeting a wide range of demographics will especially find value in William's analysis.
Hybrid structures, quiet quitting, and Gen Z’s arrival at work all feature in William’s sessions on the future of work. He maps out how businesses can adapt rewards, training, and structures to retain employees and attract fresh talent.
William examines how global events reshape markets. Environmental regulations, data privacy laws, and export restrictions create new operational challenges. Trade wars, regulatory changes, and international sanctions reshape entire industries overnight. Smart companies monitor these developments proactively to retain competitive positioning.
By linking these developments to supply chains, customer expectations, and investment patterns, our future trends speakers demonstrate that we shouldn’t treat politics as background noise but as a direct influence on employee and consumer trends. That awareness helps businesses act sooner and prepare more effectively.
Companies preparing for future challenges benefit enormously from William’s unique combination of marketing experience, trend analysis skills, and presentation ability. His ability to translate complex market dynamics into clear action plans makes him indispensable for leadership teams.
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