The algorithm is the brain behind my opinion.

via the Digital Folklore podcast

See what I mean?

We are the messaging team on TikTok. Our team’s mission is to facilitate meaningful user connections through TikTok’s messaging experience, which is still in its infancy.

Collaborative creation is now creation and distribution.

Social media is splintering into content created by the few and private sharing by the many.

Or, all social apps are becoming messaging apps.

As it works to better align the app with evolving user behaviors, Instagram’s rolling out a new option to share feed posts with Close Friends only, providing another way to facilitate more enclosed group engagement.

Buzzword bingo: social is becoming a dark forest

Apple suddenly remembered it had a podcast app and wants to pull a Spotify and YouTube Music by diversifying the (non-music) content you can listen to.

Apple Podcasts becomes the best way for listeners to access many forms of premium audio content — podcasts, news briefs, narrated articles, radio shows with full music, educational courses, guided meditations, sleep sounds, and much more — all in one place.

We’ve had the golden age of TV. Time for the golden age of audio.

In the world of email marketing, clicks are more valuable than opens. Especially now that many email providers have anti-tracking measures that spoof opens (either inflating or deflating your number depending on implementation).

Reporting on open rates is like reporting on impression totals for paid ads.

This thread gets a lot deeper on this topic.

Speaking of holiday shopping season, it’s not all about the Black Friday Cyber Monday (BFCM) madness.

According to the new Capterra “2023 Retail Holiday Preparations Survey,” Labor Day is displacing Black Friday and Cyber Monday as the top-performing holiday sales event [for small-to-mid-sized retailers].

Holiday shopping is starting earlier and earlier (thanks pandemic supply chain shenanigans!) and BFCM is getting more and more dominated by big budgets and frothy algorithm auctions.

Once the online checkout process starts, you want it to be as easy as possible for the shopper.

Shopify is trying to help merchants out with its new one-page checkout.

If you can’t enable it yet, you should be able to within the next week or two. Perfect timing to iron things out before the holiday season kicks off.

Looking to grow your business? Here are 5 to-do's you can use to increase your customer count, according to Hubspot's CMO.

Pick 1, do them all, your call.

Let's dive in.

Better Conversion Rates

Chances are your current conversion rates are somewhere south of 100% (and if they're not, stop reading this and enjoy your success), which means they can be improved.

This is the best place to start since the changes happen on a platform you own and control. Plus, it means more customers without more traffic and any increases in traffic should scale this up.

Some places to start:

• Make sure your phone number is on your site
• Use a consistent message throughout the conversion journey
• Provide (way) more value than anyone else

Follow Up Faster

The best way to turn someone who is interested into a customer is to not let them lose interest.

This is what social users expect:

How can you respond faster?

• Automation (whether via autoresponders or AI)
• Better internal processes to incentivize more rapid responses

Customer Referral Program

Word-of-mouth always wins.

Turn your biggest fans into your best marketing and reward them for doing so.

(Assumes you've made something worth talking about in the first place, of course.)

Improve Net Promoter Score

What is net promoter score? It's that quick survey you've probably seen about how likely you are to tell a friend on a scale of 1-10. SaaS companies in particular love this metric.

I think it's a bit overhyped, but if it makes sense it can be useful data to have. Bonus points if you don't let people answer with 7, that's the cop-out answer on a 1-10 scale.

Beyond the specific tool used to collect/implement, listening to customer feedback is usually a good idea.

That doesn't mean you have to do everything they say, the customer is not always. But listening to what your customers say and how they say it can unlock insights to improve your experience, and create more customers.

All The Traffic!

You knew this one was coming. At some point, if you're still looking for growth, the only way is to get in front of more people.

But that doesn't mean you just start flooding every platform du jour with your brand.

Obsess about 1-2 core channels

Organic search and paid advertising are the classics. The first is for long term dividends, the second is for reach and sale.

If you have the capabilities, something like YouTube or a podcast could be a good channel for you. Content can create a moat via parasocial relationships. Similar to cultivating a community. These efforts are hard for other brands to duplicate and can create deeper relationships with your core fans. This also means these efforts are harder to make and maintain.

Don’t spread yourself too thin

Max out one or two channels that drive traffic and performance. Don't get distracted by new and shiny things or that one quick hack you saw in a headline, focus on your top channels and make sure they're finely tuned.

Once you've maxed those out you can think about other channels. Just make sure the new channels don't come at the expense of your top channels.

TL;DR:

5 ways you can get more customers (chances are there is at least 1 item on this list you aren't doing):

• Improve your conversion rates
• Respond faster
• Start a customer referral program
• Improve your net promoter score (/listen to customer feedback)
• Get more traffic

The person who tells the best story rules their corner of the world.

-James Clear

Brands are stories

More ads in more places, Microsoft is rolling out Conversational Ads in Chat.

First up:

Compare & Decide Ads pull all the relevant data of various car models into a succinct table so the user can easily evaluate different options based on the criteria they find most important.

Sounds like Wirecutter et al but as an ad placement directly in the search/chat results.

Interesting note from the announcement:

Our demographics data shows that Chat usage skews to young adults across all verticals

Update time!

Apple emergency updates fix 3 new zero-days exploited in attacks

I’ve been waiting for this:

Amazon brings generative AI to Alexa

I think once generative AI models and smart assistants are merged, we’ll view the previous iterations like we do old text-based dungeon crawler games.

Especially once we hit the SkyRim version of smart assistants.

ad copy:

American men are beginning to realize that it is ridiculous to buy good suits and then spoil the effect by wearing an ordinary, mass-produced shirt. Hence the growing popularity of Hathaway shirts, which are in a class by themselves.

Hathaway shirts wear infinitely longer—a matter of years. They make you look younger and more distinguished, because of the subtle way Hathaway cut collars. The whole shirt is tailored more generously, and is therefore more comfortable. The tails are longer, and stay in your trousers. The buttons are mother-of-pearl. Even the stitching has an ante-bellum elegance about it.

Above all, Hathaway make their shirts of remarkable fabrics, collected from the four corners of the earth—Viyella and Aertex from England, woolen taffeta from Scotland, Sea Island cotton from the West Indies, hand-woven madras from India, broadcloth from Manchester, linen batiste from Paris, hand-blocked silks from England, exclusive cottons from the best weavers in America. You will get a great deal of quiet satisfaction out of wearing shirts which are in such impeccable taste.

Hathaway shirts are made by a small company of dedicated craftsmen in the little town of Waterville, Maine, They have been at it, man and boy, for one hundred and twenty years.

At better stores everywhere, or write C. F. HATHAWAY, Waterville, Maine, for the name of your nearest store. In New York, telephone OX 7-5566. Prices from $5.95 to $20.00.

Obama’s speechwriter could be talking about marketing here:

The most important thing about speechwriting — besides being able to string sentences together — is having a sense of empathy. You have to understand your audience and try walking in their shoes. But there are limits to empathy, in terms of imagination… Speechwriters are never putting their own views into a speech.

(isn’t a speech a form of marketing?)

What do users want from your brand on social?

• Responsiveness
• Updates on new products / services
• Exclusive deals
• More authentic, non-promo content

Your social platforms are now your PR, loyalty, promo, and blog channels. (But please still have owned channels for these things too.)

Same As We’ve Always Done

It’s not about the platforms or the tactics (or the snake oil).

It’s about meeting the customer:

• where they are
• with a story that resonates
• while putting them at the center
• and sharing the energy you’re made of

In an effort to scale what customers love about your brand using the reach of digital.

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