There’s a potential analysis trap brewing as businesses see decent sales / revenue performance to start the year.
Highly likely this is pull-forward spending as consumers try to beat tariffs.
Embrace the boring stuff.
Internally, people usually want to do the flashy, exciting stuff. But boring keeps the lights on (and typically has a longer shelf life).
Externally, what’s boring to you is interesting to others. Because they aren’t in it every day like you are. Your boring is the hook.
Maslowvian marketing
“Human beings,” writes [Drew Eric] Whitman, “are biologically programmed with the following eight desires…”
- Survival, enjoyment of life, life extension.
- Enjoyment of food and beverages.
- Freedom from fear, pain, and danger.
- Physical companionship.
- Comfortable living conditions.
- To be superior, winning, keeping up with the Joneses.
- Care and protection of loved ones.
- Social approval.
By creating ads that appeal to these things, you are tapping into Mother Nature, harnessing the power of our inborn motivators to compel and sell.
via Very Good Copy
Trust boosts purchase potential. And transparency boosts trust.
I love this example from the Nudge newsletter:
This is especially true in food, but sectors have opportunities.
Peel back an element of your sector people assume the worst about, are suspicious of, or want made clearer.
Buyers are willing to pay more for things sellers are willing to charge less for.
Why?
Because the seller enjoys making it.
From the abstract for the paper Production enjoyment asymmetrically impacts buyers’ willingness to pay and sellers’ willingness to charge:
Buyers are willing to pay a higher price, are more likely to click on ads, and are more likely to choose a product or service when the seller signals that they enjoy producing it.
In contrast, sellers are willing to accept lower prices, and actually charge less, for products and services they enjoy producing.
Both buyers and sellers make the inference that production enjoyment leads to higher quality products/services, but only buyers rely on this inference when forming their pricing judgments relative to sellers.
Pricing is hard. The fulcrum is value.
It’s not the magnitude, it’s the trend.
For the first time since 2015, Google’s global share of the search market fell below the 90% threshold
The search giant’s global market share has dropped below 90% in six of the previous seven months
The splintering continues.
via ADWEEK
Consumer sentiment isn’t great, Bob.
According to the Behind the Numbers podcast the animal spirits at play include:
- Expected unemployment growth
- Tariff/economic uncertainty
- Expected inflation (see above)
in particular, people are really concerned about the constant changes and the constant movement of economic policies and consumers are finding it very difficult to deal with this uncertainty. It makes it really difficult to plan.
Humans really don’t like uncertainty.
BeReal
brought to you by BetterHelp
That’s right, the drop everything and take a pic app snagged themselves a TikTok exec and
announced the launch of its native advertising platform in the United States
The goal is to pull a Snapchat and “focus on positivity”
ad formats are meant to mirror the user experience, according to the brand. Targeted in-feed ads are integrated into the flow of the platform’s content for low-friction engagement, while takeovers offer brands exclusive ad placement for one full day.
Of note in the Marketing Dive post, 40 million monthly active users, heavily Gen Z
So…what is the tariff rate on China now?
I shared 125%, but I’ve also seen 110% and 145%.
Seems like the messaging on this could have been better.