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?