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Because it’s still human to human
in the rush to embrace AI tools, it’s easy for marketers to lose sight of what advertising is truly about—building trust, evoking emotion, and connecting with consumers.
AI can help advertisers generate content faster, cheaper, and at a greater scale than before. But volume alone doesn’t make ads remarkable. As Mirella Crespi, founder of the agency Creative Milkshake reminds us, “The goal isn’t just to make ads faster—it’s to make people feel something.”
Accelerate, not replace. Free up your time for your mind.
via Motion (Authenticity Renaissance card)
Add this to the interesting pile:
Google Shopping ad clicks surge 18% in Q2 as Amazon, Temu pull back
The big low price players dropped spend (thanks tariffs) opening up room in the auction competition for other retailers. And shoppers seemed to like it.
🍵 Reading the tea leaves, people aren’t searching Google Shopping to find products on cost competing aggregator platforms. They either don’t want to buy on Amazon or already searched there and the came to Google.
Amazon (and other platform) discovery doesn’t happen via other shopping channels, it happens before shopping searches start.
Gary Washburn gets it, generations are garbage:
I think it’s stereotypical of people putting millennials, like all millennials should all be hanging out and doing all the same things and listening to Drake and playing video games and posting on Snapchat.
They’re not all the same. They’re different.
Similar demographics do not mean similar psychographics do not mean the same needs, wants, dreams, and aspirations.
Don’t fall for the proxy trap.
Amtrak on creating a viral messaging campaign
We need to be really different and captivate … attention
Similar with a twist is the recipe for algorithmic attention.
Being the same doesn’t stand out.
Being too different might backfire.
Using a familiar hook (Friday! Friday! Friday!) in a new context provides an on ramp to curiosity.
🚂
via EMARKETER
Partnerships and ad buys with prestige names confer status internally in the businesses that make the buy. “No one ever got fired for choosing IBM.”
Your audience doesn’t care that you paid to be on the top / hot channel. They care that you met them where they are.
Vanity / scale metrics are lazy proxies and ladder climbing fodder.
44% of the U.S. podcast audience who do not listen to shows within the top 1,000 have ever purchased a product as a result of hearing it on the medium, similar to the rate (47%) of U.S. podcast listeners to shows in the top 1,000 who say the same.
via Edison Research
The work of marketing is not the selection of suitable messages. The work is the task of engaging another mind. It is a constant dance between understanding your subject and understanding how a future customer will react to it - a customer you can never know, but which you still have to intuit.
vandalizing a quote from John Higgs
”By Humans, For Humans”
How long until this is a positioning signal?
How long until this is a signal of the new luxury?
If you can prove it in 5 seconds, don’t explain it in 20.
We’re all tired of explanations and promises, we just want results. Your marketing is no different.
via DTC Daily
The clock circus continues
TikTok is reportedly developing a separate version of its app for U.S. users, with a planned launch date of Sept. 5, according to reports. The current app would stop functioning in the U.S. by March 2026.
I’ve stopped paying attention to this charade for the time being, but a separate US-only TikTok could have interesting ramifications for advertisers.
Will it function the same?
Will the discovery algorithm be less effective?
Will advertisers still be able to target international markets?
Apple is bringing in the big guns to power Siri: now with AI!
OpenAI and Jony Ive are thinking screen-free.
Google and Perplexity are powering assistants elsewhere.
Smart glasses are spilling from every nook and cranny.
As the ambient computing future draws nearer, what does your brand sound like?
Many decisions people make are part of a status game—whether explicit or implicit in the decision.
How does your brand and messaging fit into the status signaling of your ideal customer?
What’s the difference between this flop of an Apple commercial:
And this hit:
Story
A story that’s clear. That the viewer wants to see themselves in.
Story is sticky.
See also: Significant Objects
via Nudge
CTV CPMs are down.
Why?
more inventory, more buyers looking for performance and a growing appetite for efficiency over exclusivity.
Digital rewired adveristers’ expectations. There’s a large class of marketers (myself included) who have basically no traditional media buying experience.
To whom minimums and exclusivity and static runs just seem weird.
via Digiday
If your advertising works, what does it say about the group of people who respond to it?
This is why it should be brand + performance marketing.
Brand obsesses about message and alignment.
Performance about results.
Either one alone can focus on metrics to the detriment of long term goals.
Don’t obsess over getting attention.
Focus on earning it.
Remember when a big deal was made about Gen Z using Instagram and TikTok to search for places to eat? Well…
Gen Z consumers are starting their purchase journeys more often on Google…
But this isn’t a Google Search comeback story:
properties, including YouTube and Gemini
While Gen Z shoppers have moved away from Google Search as their primary method of discovery, those losses have been more than offset by YouTube’s growing importance as a channel for product discovery and research
The former search company is quickly becoming the YouTube company.
via EMARKETER
Early indications suggest that legacy SEO tactics —such as aggressive link building, keyword stuffing, or micro-optimization—will likely diminish in effectiveness. In their place, Google is prioritizing content that demonstrates topical authority, real-world expertise, and clear value to the end user