Today's Digital Marketing Pulse
Accenture Song acquires creator agency Whalar to boost influencer capabilities
Accenture Song announced the acquisition of Whalar, adding a 170‑person global creator and social team while keeping co‑CEOs Emma Harman and Jo Cronk in place. The deal includes a three‑year strategic partnership that gives Accenture access to Whalar’s talent‑management, technology and venture assets, integrating the creator network with Accenture’s data and AI tools.
Google Ads Retargeting: A Guide to Your Data Segments
Google Ads now labels all retargeting lists as “Your data segments,” covering website visitors, app users, Customer Match, and content engagers. These lists not only power classic retargeting but also feed signals to Smart Bidding and Optimized Targeting across Search, Shopping, Display, Performance Max, and Demand Gen campaigns. Marketers can apply Targeting, Observation, or Exclusion settings depending on the campaign type, and even without active retargeting the lists improve bid calculations. The biggest pitfall is over‑segmentation, which dilutes data density and hampers Google’s AI learning.
Omnisend’s Lifecycle Stage Map Highlights Key Email Segments
Can I just say how much I love the Lifecycle Stage Map on Omnisend. Right there are your important segments to email.
Vudoo Announces Partnership with PubMatic to Simplify Activation of Commerce-Enabled Advertising
Vudoo has partnered with PubMatic to embed its commerce‑media technology into PubMatic’s AI‑powered programmatic platform, enabling shoppable ad experiences across verified inventory. The integration lets agencies and brands activate commerce media with a single deal ID, supporting display, video and...
You Can’t Automate Trust: Why AI Still Needs Human Strategy in Marketing
Marketers are discovering that AI can automate data‑heavy tasks, but it cannot set strategy or build trust. The most successful teams pair AI’s speed with human judgment, using automation to execute a clear, human‑crafted vision. Without human direction, AI‑driven campaigns...
Content Creators Didn’t Kill Publisher Video. They Rebuilt The Ad Model
Creator‑led companies like Donut Media are reshaping digital video advertising by building an integrated, 360‑degree ad stack that spans long‑form YouTube, short‑form social, podcasts and real‑world activations. The firm sells custom‑branded segments, 45‑ to 60‑second host‑read pre‑rolls and official partnership...
Meta's GR2 Leverages LLM Reasoning for Better Ad Ranking
Can LLMs be used for ads ranking? Meta's GR2 architecture utilizes reinforcement learning and LLM world knowledge to improve ad ranking performance through structured reasoning. https://mobiledevmemo.com/can-llms-be-used-for-ads-ranking/
Turn SEO Impressions Into Clicks with Unique Internal Content
Your SEO impressions are going up, but clicks keep dropping. This is the reason 👇 For the last 15 years, anyone doing SEO focused on informational searches, how-to guides and beginner explainers. It worked, there was an increase in traffic,...
Creator Agency NewGen Signs Streamer xQc for Social Publishing Deal
London‑based creator agency NewGen has signed Twitch star xQc to a social publishing services agreement, brokered with Evolved Agency. The partnership will repurpose xQc’s live streams and YouTube videos for distribution on additional platforms, aiming to broaden his audience and...
Free App FanVids Turns Live Fan Videos Into a Marketing Asset
FanVids.io launches a free app that lets musicians capture fan‑generated videos at live shows, turning spontaneous clips into first‑party data. Artists receive a dedicated domain where fans can upload and view content, bypassing social‑media algorithms. The platform integrates with CRMs,...
Why Most Enterprise SEO Operating Models Are Structurally Broken via @Sejournal, @Billhunt
Enterprise SEO is failing not because of tactics but due to downstream operating models that treat SEO as a post‑launch audit. Most large firms place SEO inside marketing, relegating it to ticket‑driven fixes after product, content, and development decisions are...
ChatGPT's GPT-5.3 Instant May Show Fewer Links In Web Search Results
OpenAI unveiled GPT‑5.3 Instant, promising more accurate, context‑rich answers while deliberately showing fewer web links. The model blends its internal knowledge with live web data, aiming to reduce dead‑ends and overly declarative phrasing. By surfacing the most relevant information up front,...
New Google Help Doc About Google's Web Crawling
Google has released a new help document titled “Things to know about Google’s web crawling,” outlining nine key points about how its crawlers operate. The guide explains the existence of multiple specialized crawlers, repeat and frequent crawling, automatic optimization, and...
Google Confirms Discover Feed Shows More Social Posts
Google has confirmed that its Discover feed is now showing a higher volume of social media posts, including content from Instagram, TikTok, X and other platforms. The change was announced by John Mueller at the Google Search Essentials for News...
Ad Agencies Are Embracing ‘Vibe Coding’ to Build GEO Products for Clients
Ad agencies such as Havas, Broadhead and Supergood are rapidly creating generative engine optimization (GEO) tools by "vibe‑coding" on top of large language models, often within a single work session. Havas’ Brand Insights AI, built with Anthropic’s Claude Code and Replit,...
Submit Every Sitemap Individually for Complete Indexing Insight
SEO Tip: don't just submit the sitemap index file in Google Search Console, you'll need to submit all important sitemaps individually also. When I get access to a client's GSC, often for very large sites, I unfortunately don't always...
How to Focus on Topics (Not Keywords) in Your SEO Strategy
The article argues that SEO should prioritize topics over isolated keywords, leveraging semantic search and AI‑driven vector embeddings. It introduces a three‑tier framework—clearly defined, ambiguous, and expansive topics—to match the scale of a brand’s content universe. Practical steps include auditing...
All‑in‑One Free Scheduler & Growth Engine for Threads
BlackTwist is the scheduling and growth tool built specifically for Threads. What we do: - Schedule and queue posts - AI Post Generator (write posts in your voice — beta) - Analytics and engagement tracking - Engager (reply to your audience faster) - Threads100 Challenge (100...
Yoast SEO’s New Schema Aggregator Improves Entity Disambiguation via @Sejournal, @Martinibuster
Yoast SEO 27.1 introduces a Schema Aggregation feature that creates a single "schemamap" endpoint delivering the entire site’s schema.org data in one response. The endpoint deduplicates entities, preserves relationships such as author‑to‑article, and respects existing privacy settings. Responses are cached...
Bupa UK Picks Start-Up for Customer Centricity Drive
Bupa UK awarded its marketing and advertising account to start‑up agency Ace of Hearts after a competitive pitch. The insurer reported a 16% revenue increase to £16.9 bn and a 59% jump in underlying profit to £914 m, driven by strong private‑health...
Research: 85% of European Viewers Use Streaming Ad Tiers
FreeWheel’s Voice of the Viewer study shows that 85% of European streaming users watch ad‑supported tiers, with 83% satisfied overall. Content choice drives satisfaction, cited by 73% of respondents, while 47% exclusively use ad‑supported plans and 49% deliberately chose them....
How Can Retailers Use Micro-Influencers?
Retailers such as Disney Store, ASOS, Zara and others are shifting to micro‑influencers for campaigns. These creators have modest followings but are deeply embedded in niche communities, delivering higher engagement and authentic storytelling. Agencies like Coolr and Iris note that...
ASA Pulls Plug on British Gas and Hive Green Energy Ads
The UK Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has banned British Gas and Centrica Hive ads that promoted green‑energy savings, finding the claims misleading and insufficiently substantiated. British Gas advertised up to £546 savings from a heat‑pump tariff, yet ASA’s model showed...
Real-Time Ad Bidding Systems (RTB): Designing for <100ms Responses
Real‑time bidding (RTB) powers billions of ad auctions daily, each demanding sub‑100 ms end‑to‑end responses. Major exchanges like Google AdX and Amazon AAP handle over 10 million bid requests per second, allocating roughly 50 ms for demand‑side platforms to compute bids. To meet...
Customer Joint Value Creation with Bimbo Bakeries USA's Jeff Hendrix
In this episode, Jeff Hendricks, Chief Customer Officer of Bimbo Bakeries USA, discusses how the company is leveraging real‑time customer and POS data to close the gap on missed sales and improve supply‑chain execution in an omni‑channel environment. He explains...
IAB Europe Publishes 2026 Readiness Report Highlighting AI, Regulation & Sustainability Challenges in Digital Advertising
IAB Europe released its 2026 State of Readiness – Sustainability in Digital Advertising report, the fourth edition covering both environmental and social dimensions. The study’s double‑materiality analysis finds social issues such as privacy and media plurality outweigh environmental impacts. AI...
Vodafone Egypt Brings Loved Ones Closer Despite Hectic Schedules During Ramadan
Vodafone Egypt launched a culturally focused Ramadan campaign to counteract the growing fragmentation of family time caused by hectic work schedules and digital overload. The 360‑degree rollout combined TV, digital, OOH, radio, influencer collaborations and a new Bluetooth‑based "Nearby" feature...
How Creator Talent Agencies Are Evolving Into Multi-Platform Operators
Creator talent agencies are abandoning the legacy deal‑brokering model in favor of multi‑platform operations that place creators at the core. Companies like Shorthand Studios and Night Media have demonstrated rapid audience growth and secured sizable funding, such as Night Media’s...
SEANs: Opinionated Software Unifying Marketing and Finance
Another way to think of SEANs is software with a point of view If you think about Ads Manager, as a traditional software, Ads Manager is agnostic to your strategy. You can go in there, click whatever buttons you want, and...
Google Favors Frequent Crawling, Discover Posts, Higher Ad Budgets
It’s New 3/4: ChatGPT gets stingy on links by @mordyoberstein new Google crawler doc says frequent crawling is good, @gregfinn on social posts in Google Discover and @TheMarketingAnu Google Ads minimum budgets for Demand Gen https://t.co/beO0sHq3WD
Television’s Value Is Not Decided In The Ad Break
The television industry is moving from an advertising‑centric view of value to an upstream focus on intellectual property (IP) as a capital asset. While ad yield still matters, executives are now assessing financing structures, rights ownership, and extension potential before...
Google Adds Doc Confirming Frequent Right‑URL Crawls
Yep, frequent crawling (OF THE RIGHT URLs) is a good sign. :) New page added to Google's "Crawling Infrastructure" documentation. https://t.co/qMQRYGeknj
Google Experiments with Bolded Site Names in Snippets
Google is testing bolding the site name in the search result snippets https://t.co/kR0PreeBrZ via @SachuPatel53124 https://t.co/DA2SWt5hP6
X to Take Action Against AI Deepfakes of the Iran War
X announced a revision to its creator revenue‑share program to curb AI‑generated deepfakes about the Iran war. Users posting AI‑created videos of the conflict without a disclosure will be suspended from revenue sharing for 90 days, with permanent bans for...
Repeat Your Message: Fear of Redundancy Keeps You Poor
Being afraid of sounding like a broken record… keeps you broke By the time you're sick of repeating your message, your audience is juuuust starting to hear it Say it again
X Usage Declined in the EU in the Second Half of 2025
X reported a 15% decline in EU active users, dropping from 76 million in the first half of 2025 to 64.8 million in the second half. The dip appears despite Elon Musk’s public assertions of record‑high global engagement. Under the EU Digital...
Meet Yeti Boo, the AI Bigfoot Helping KANE Footwear Rethink Influencer Marketing
Yeti Boo, an AI‑generated Bigfoot persona, exploded on TikTok, reaching over 439,000 followers and catching the eye of brands. KANE Footwear signed the character as an “AI athlete” to promote its Revive AC recovery shoe, pairing the mascot’s off‑beat wilderness...
Meta Tests Shopping AI Chatbot in US
Meta is piloting a shopping research feature inside its Meta AI chatbot for U.S. users. The tool returns a carousel of product images with brand, price, and website details, plus brief recommendation bullet points. The move mirrors similar experiments by...
Koah Bags $20.5M Series A Round
Koah, a native monetization platform for generative AI, announced a $20.5 million Series A round. The round was led by Theory Ventures, with Tomasz Tunguz joining the board. The funding builds on a $5 million seed round raised in September 2025 and signals confidence in...
Pinterest Creators Now Link Direct Amazon Storefronts
🚨 NEW 🚨 Pinterest and Amazon Influencers have teamed up on a new integration that allows select Pinterest creators to link their Amazon Storefronts to their profiles. By connecting their accounts, creators can: 🔗 Feature a Storefront link on their Pinterest profile 🏷️...
Audio and Podcasts Best Venues for Consumer Engagement in Sports (Audacy)
Audacy’s new "State of Audio: Sports Fandom" report reveals that the most avid sports fans are younger, more diverse, and increasingly reachable through audio channels. The study shows a 40% lift in purchase and usage among the fandom cohort when...
Influencer Marketing 2025: Balancing AI Efficiency, Budget Pressure, and Human-Centric Creativity
Influencer marketing in 2025 is being reshaped by AI-driven tools that automate influencer discovery, content creation, and performance analytics. Brands confront tighter budgets and heightened demand for measurable ROI, prompting a shift toward performance‑based contracts. Despite technological advances, human‑centric creativity...
GrowthRise Mastermind Recap Mar 3, 2026
The GrowthRise Mastermind call highlighted three core growth levers for B2B firms: optimizing outbound email cadence, leveraging Meta’s ad platform over LinkedIn, and tightening pixel event tracking. Email sequences spaced every three to four days lifted open rates to 21%...
Evidence of Effort
The author argues that the most compelling online content today highlights genuine effort, leveraging the effort heuristic that equates visible investment with quality. While AI‑generated imagery can spark mixed reactions, brands face higher scrutiny when using the same tech in...
AI Hype Inflates Expectations, Not Reduces Workload
"AI gets celebrated like the messiah of productivity, but instead of actually offsetting the workload, it's just raised the bar on what people are supposed to accomplish" Thanks for including my thoughts Katelyn Chedraoui https://www.cnet.com/tech/services-and-software/social-media-professionals-burnout-ai-metricool-news/
How To Start a Substack To Promote Your Small Business
E‑commerce brands are turning to Substack to publish editorial‑style newsletters that feel like personal essays rather than sales blasts. The platform offers free publishing, a 10% revenue share on paid subscriptions, and permanent web URLs that can be shared beyond...
Turn Every Call Into Instant Copywriting Gold
Every team call and customer meeting is now a copywriting gold mine. Let's riff on the topic right now. On the call. Take the transcript later. Work with Claude. Create briefs for events, webinars, emails, landing pages. If you can talk it...
B2C Brands Excelling on LinkedIn Over Other Channels
For an article: looking for an example of a B2C brand that is doing as good or better on LinkedIn performance-wise than any other owned social channel. Know of any??
Leverage Ads to Scale Your Meta Success
Every time I read something like this. I just think. That's great.... and massive congrats to you, but what could you have done if you ran ads. Take what's working and apply it to Meta.
Third‑Party Praise Beats Ads for Brand Breakthrough
Time Magazine called Allbirds' Wool Runners the 'world's most comfortable shoes' in 2016. That single endorsement launched the brand into the mainstream. Meanwhile you're relying solely on paid ads with zero third-party validation. That's the gap.
Google Still Dominates Search While AI Reshapes It
Google still runs search. Lots of gurus on here are lying to you by suggesting that Google is dead. The reality says otherwise. Remember: Two things can be true at once. • Google still owns search • AI Search is...