Part of the abstract from the paper The Rank Length Effect:

The same ranked items elicit more positive judgments when the rank length is longer (vs. shorter), although the differences in judgments between the ranked items are smaller. This effect is driven both by consumers’ tendency to narrowly focus on the rank list and by the manner in which they map the rank list onto their mental number line. The rank length effect extends to willingness to pay, and choice.

Translation: ranking well is more impressive if the list is longer (Top 25 vs Top 10).

Performance PR professionals take note.

A business enterprise has two basic functions: marketing and innovation

-Peter Drucker

Marketing is the act making a promise—or a series of promises. Good marketing delivers on that promise. Bad marketing pisses people off.

Daring Fireball breaks down how Apple Intelligence broke Apple’s promises.

The fiasco is that Apple pitched a story that wasn’t true, one that some people within the company surely understood wasn’t true, and they set a course based on that.

You can stretch the truth and maintain credibility, but you can’t maintain credibility with bullshit.

Apple either drank its own Kool-Aid or forgot who its real customers were.

A slew of earnings reports last week from the consumer discretionary sector raised the specter of sapped spending as executives discussed the possibility of increasing prices on goods to offset the costs of tariffs on shipments from Canada, Mexico, and China.

Retail roulette continues

via The Daily Upside

Word of mouth is always the best marketing…but after your first impression doesn’t go as planned, it’s the only type of marketing that makes a difference.

So make it cool and less risky for your fans to re-tell their friends.

-Gabe the Bass Player

I love this ad

Not because it’s especially good or cool.

Because instead of rambling on about features or tech specs, it frames things in terms of the emotional benefit to the customer.

Shoppers don’t care about the technical stuff until they’re about to make the purchase.

Grabbed tacos with some coworkers last week from a restaurant that opened in an old UPS Store space. Even if we hadn’t known (we only knew because one of the crew remembered it being there), it would have been obvious as soon as we walked in.

All the UPS Store fittings were still there—counter, table, shelves, carpet—with some thematic decorations and touches layered over the top.

This wasn’t a place to sit and eat, it was a grab-and-go counter. And it was delicious (bonus points for having beef tongue tacos, not often seen on menus around here).

They could have put money into renovations and appearance, or they could focus on the food—the actual product.

I’d go back, so I guess they focused on the right thing.

Plus, the absurdity of the interior makes it more likely that I’ll talk about it and remember it.

“Hey, let’s go get tacos at the old UPS Store.” 🌮

More findings from Podscribe’s recent podcast performance report:

• Ads bought per episode (“episodic”) outperform buying across shows (aka “run of network”)—more conversions on more efficient spend
• Host-read ads drive more purchases but cost effectiveness might be a wash
• Mid-roll ads are more efficient per impression, pre-roll are on a per dollar basis—and post-roll are trash
• Longer ads deliver better performance, especially on a per dollar basis