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- The Brand Refresh Trend ๐ค Spotify Chases YouTube ๐โโ๏ธโโก๏ธ๐โโ๏ธโโก๏ธ FAST Platforms On The Rise ๐
The Brand Refresh Trend ๐ค Spotify Chases YouTube ๐โโ๏ธโโก๏ธ๐โโ๏ธโโก๏ธ FAST Platforms On The Rise ๐
Also: A16Z Stashing GPUs To Win AI Deals
Happy Friday Marketing Engineers!
If youโre new, welcome aboard ๏ปฟ๐๏ปฟ. If you're a seasoned Engineer, thanks for sticking around! Coming up today: optimizing for AI Overviews, the psychology of the Empathy Gap, and 14 amazing large company blogs to inspire your content marketing.
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๐ Adam
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๐ Marketing News
Marketers are increasingly focusing on rebrands, refreshes, and repositioning to stay agile and relevant in a rapidly changing landscape, allowing them to long term brand build and adapt to consumer behavior changes | There is a notable shift from short-term performance marketing to brand-building activities, as over-reliance on performance marketing can lead to a weak brand identity and lack of consumer connection, with 36% of marketers planning to increase their investment in brand marketing this year. Effective rebrands are driven by consumer insights and design, enabling brands to engage with new markets, modernize their brand stories, and build an emotional bond with consumers, ensuring their brand identity remains flexible and relevant.
Chasing YouTube, Spotify Adds Comments To Podcasts [4 min read]
A new feature allowing listeners to leave comments on podcast episodes aims to create a more interactive and community-like experience | Podcast hosts have the option to enable or disable comments for each episode, approve comments, and engage with listeners, while Spotify is testing systems to help scale comment moderation. This new feature, along with other interactive tools like polls and Q&As, is designed to increase listener engagement and retention.
TikTok is prohibiting personalized ad targeting for users aged 13 to 17 and restricting advertisers to broad targeting options like location, language, and device-related information | Also, new ad personalization controls allow users to manage their ad experience more precisely, including the ability to disconnect advertisers from using off-TikTok activity data. In addition, TikTok has introduced an AI-generated content disclosure tool for advertisers, requiring them to label AI-generated ads to promote transparency and responsible content creation.
LinkedIn Rolls Out Sponsored Newsletters [2 min read]
LinkedIn is expanding its sponsored articles ad option to include sponsored newsletters, enabling brands to generate leads by boosting newsletters created by company pages | Over the past year, LinkedIn has seen a 47% increase in newsletter engagement, with over 184,000 newsletters being published, highlighting a strong user interest in periodic updates. Also, LinkedIn plans to allow member-authored newsletter articles to be sponsored in the future, with sponsored newsletter articles available in brand awareness and engagement campaigns through the "Content Library" in Campaign Manager.
FAST platforms like Tubi and The Roku Channel have seen significant growth, outpacing some subscription-based services | They appeal to younger demographics by offering quick, on-demand, and niche content similar to YouTube and TikTok, without requiring a subscription fee. To continue their momentum, FAST platforms must incorporate live sports, create engaging ad experiences, and overcome perception challenges regarding content quality.
๏ปฟ๐ค๏ปฟ AI
Optimizing For AI Overviews [5 min read]
AI Overviews come in three types: informational, shopping, and local, each serving different user intents with varied content formats | Google's AI selects relevant content based on mathematical values rather than traditional SEO factors like authority or backlinks. Optimizing for these overviews involves ensuring content relevance and using an authoritative tone, but the benefits are uncertain due to risks to organic rankings and the current limited and volatile nature of AI Overviews.
Does AI Change How Much My Data Is Worth? [3 min read]
Individual datasets have traditionally been seen as commercially insignificant, with companies deriving value from aggregated data to spot trends and monetize insights through targeted ads | However, a growing market for consumer data specifically for training large language models (LLMs) is emerging, with significant deals being made to acquire this data, suggesting an increase in its aggregate value. While individual data remains relatively low in value, there is potential value through data collectives and cooperative models, allowing individuals to participate directly in the economic benefits of their data's use.
A16Z Stashing GPUs To Win AI Deals [1 min read]
Venture Capital firm Andreessen Horowitz has purchased and stored thousands of GPUs, including many of Nvidia's H100 processors, to support AI startups in their portfolio | They have rented out these GPUs to their portfolio companies and plan to expand the initiative, known as "oxygen," to more than 20,000 GPUs. This strategy reflects a broader trend of using GPUs in non-traditional ways, exemplified by CoreWeave's $2.3B debt raise with Nvidia's H100 GPUs as collateral and its plans for an IPO in 2025.
๐ง Hacks & Tactics
The Psychology Of The Empathy Gap [3 min read]
People often misjudge their future emotions and actions due to a cognitive bias known as the Empathy Gap, which results in poorer decisions during heightened emotional states | Effective marketing leverages this understanding by focusing on customers' past behaviors rather than their predictions. Examples of this approach include personalized product recommendations, ad campaigns addressing immediate emotional needs, and subscription services that anticipate and fulfill customer needs before they arise.
Turning 1200 Employees Into A Buzz-Generation Machine [10 min read]
A successful advocacy program where employees use their personal LinkedIn networks to amplify the company's reach and credibility | A detailed nine-step playbook featuring ready-made posts, internal contests, a super-advocate club, LinkedIn workshops, and AI tools, all designed to maximize brand exposure and engagement. Central to this program's success is fostering a strong company culture that values and encourages employee participation, making them feel valued and excited to share company content.
โ๏ธ Machine Shop
The demand for user research within product teams is increasing, driven by continuous product discovery and the need to mitigate risks in uncertain times | An exploration of research democratization, empowering various teams to conduct research and make confident decisions based on insights, the integration of AI technologies in user research, and automating tactical tasks while emphasizing the continued importance of skilled researchers in uncovering nuanced insights.
Exemplary company blogs spanning various industries, illustrating their diverse approaches to engaging audiences |Learn common traits of successful blogs, including customer-centric content, segmentation based on audience interests, and the delivery of actionable insights while maintaining brand identity.
Before diversifying into new content channels, itโs essential to successfully scale and generate a positive return on investment (ROI) from one primary channel to avoid diluting resources and ensure a strong foundation | Understanding your audience, including their preferences and behaviors on different platforms, is crucial for creating relevant and engaging content. Also, having realistic expectations about the timeline and resources needed, along with securing leadership support and buy-in, is vital for ensuring adequate resources and protecting the new channelโs growth efforts.
Understand user journeys and adoption funnels to identify key usability issues that can profoundly impact overall user experience | Also, effectively communicate the potential consequences of inaction, especially in relation to project goals or benchmarks, as a means to drive action and engagement.
๐ฎ The Future
There's been a substantial rise in the number of marketers considering or using this method to measure campaign outcomes | However, less than half of marketers are actually implementing econometrics due to budget constraints, as it tends to be an expensive option suitable for brands with larger budgets. Also, there is a noticeable shift in marketing budget allocations, with more cuts reported in long-term investments compared to short-term ones, reflecting a focus on immediate returns in the current economic climate.
61% Of Marketers Still Relying On Third-Party Data [2 min read]
Many marketers still rely on third-party data, highlighting difficulties in finding reliable data sources, with top sources being customer insight, first-party, and transactional data | Marketers struggle with data activation, as only 48% track Customer Lifetime Value (CLV), 59% lack real-time data, and even with access to real-time data, 59% require IT assistance, indicating a lack of accessible data tools or skills. Also, while 32% of marketers are already using AI and 43% are experimenting with it, security and customer trust issues persist, and only 32% are fully satisfied with their personalization efforts, with 43% employing a fragmented approach.
Games Are Everywhere Now, Here's How To Play Them [4 min read]
Media companies like Netflix, YouTube, and Sling TV are incorporating games into their platforms to retain users and tap into the $221 billion global gaming market | Netflix offers nearly 100 games, YouTube launched "Playables" with over 75 minigames, and Sling TV introduced "Arcade" for playing classic games while watching TV. Also, LinkedIn has expanded beyond professional networking by launching three games to foster user connections.
The dominance of walled gardens in digital advertising is beginning to shift as new performance engines on the open internet leverage high-quality content, addressability, reach, and improved measurement and attribution models | Innovations like alternative identifiers, modeled cohorts using AI and ML, and advanced contextual solutions are driving privacy-conscious advertising, providing more relevant and high-ROI ads while addressing privacy concerns and the deprecation of third-party cookies. Also, the open internet is becoming more attractive to advertisers by offering performance-advertising opportunities around professionally created, brand-safe content, contrasting with the user-generated content in walled gardens, and improving its contextual targeting capabilities using first-party data.
๐ Learn More
Master fundamental AI concepts and develop practical machine learning skills in the beginner-friendly, 3-course program with Andrew Ng | Learn to build and train supervised models for prediction and binary classification tasks using NumPy and scikit-learn, and neural networks for multi-class classification using TensorFlow. The course also covers decision trees, tree ensemble methods, best practices for machine learning development, unsupervised learning techniques like clustering and anomaly detection, and the creation of recommender systems and deep reinforcement learning models. Skills gained include logistic regression, artificial neural networks, linear regression, decision trees, and recommender systems.
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