Today's Marketing Pulse
McKinsey predicts agentic AI will power two‑thirds of marketing activities
McKinsey’s new report forecasts that agentic AI could drive up to two‑thirds of marketing activities, shifting AI from a productivity add‑on to a core campaign engine. Early adopters are already using generative tools, while the next wave will involve autonomous agents that coordinate decisions across workflows. The firm outlines a five‑step roadmap for implementation.
When Everything Looks Like AI, Being Real Becomes the Advantage
Brands are confronting a flood of AI‑generated content, which now accounts for roughly 57% of online material. A Gartner survey shows 68% of U.S. consumers frequently question whether digital ads are real, and half prefer brands that avoid generative AI. Companies like Le Creuset, Aerie, Coterie and Dove are marketing human‑crafted visuals as a trust signal, while platforms such as Pinterest have introduced tools to filter AI images. New York’s upcoming disclosure law underscores the regulatory push toward transparency.
Taboola’s DeeperDive AI Hits 7 Million Monthly Users in 8 Months
Taboola’s generative AI answer engine DeeperDive has amassed nearly 7 million monthly active users just eight months after launch. The tool is live on major publisher sites such as USA Today Network, India Today and BuzzFeed Asia, with up to 17%...
For Creators – What Brands Actually Look For In Creator Partnerships
Brands now prioritize niche alignment, authentic engagement, content consistency, audience demographics, and professionalism over raw follower counts. Nano and micro creators (1K‑100K followers) consistently out‑perform macro influencers on engagement and trust, according to the Influencer Marketing Hub 2026 Benchmark Report....
Belong Turns Reddit Hacks Into National Media Campaign via OMD and Pembleton
Belong, an Australian telecom brand, launched the “Simple Solutions” national campaign with OMD and Pembleton, converting Reddit conversations into a media‑led showcase of its “Just BE” platform. The activation curates authentic community‑sourced advice and amplifies it across Reddit, out‑of‑home billboards...
Starbucks Debuts a New Drink to Take on Energy Brands
Starbucks launched Energy Refreshers nationwide on April 7, a fortified version of its Refreshers line that adds 75 mg more caffeine and B‑vitamins. The drinks, offered in six new flavors and a caffeine‑free option, are marketed as a natural‑caffeine alternative for the...
Great American Media Partners with Minivela to Develop and Distribute Micro-Drama Slate
Great American Media’s Pure Flix division has partnered with Minivela to create Pure Flix Familia, a Spanish‑language and bilingual micro‑drama streaming destination launching later 2026. The deal leverages Minivela’s mobile‑first, vertical‑short production model and its deep ties to U.S. Hispanic and Latin American...
John Demsey’s American Beauty
Gap Inc., amid a broader corporate turnaround, is reviving its once‑iconic beauty line under the leadership of former Estée Lauder executive John Demsey and newly appointed beauty GM Deb Redmond. The rollout will debut Gap‑branded fragrances this summer, priced around...
Pop Culture Mentions, Direct-to-Consumer Strategy Drives Levi's Earnings
Levi Strauss & Co. reported a 9% organic revenue increase and 14% growth on a reported basis, driven by high‑profile pop‑culture collaborations with Beyoncé, Blackpink and other artists. CEO Michelle Gass highlighted the brand’s shift toward a direct‑to‑consumer (DTC) model...
Every Company Is Now a Media Company—And Every Boss a Star
OpenAI is wrestling with a public‑relations image problem, needing to persuade both investors and the broader public of its long‑term profitability and humanity. Rather than hiring conventional corporate spin doctors, CEO Sam Altman is turning himself into the brand’s primary...
Svedka's Fembot Returns With $5 Y2K Flip Phone To Ease Digital Burnout
Svedka has introduced the Svedphone, a $5 chrome‑blue flip phone that strips away all digital frills, offering only calling and texting. The low‑tech device is marketed as a remedy for digital burnout, encouraging users to be present at festivals and...
YouTube Tests 90-Second Unskippable Ads on CTV
YouTube is piloting 90‑second unskippable ads for content streamed on connected‑TV (CTV) devices. The test follows earlier experiments with hour‑long ad blocks that only appear when ad‑blockers are detected. YouTube’s CTV audience now exceeds a billion hours per day, putting...
GrowthRise Mastermind Recap Apr 7, 2026
The GrowthRise Mastermind call on April 7, 2026 tackled five core B2B marketing challenges. Participants learned to treat LinkedIn thought leadership as a demand‑generation tactic measured with view‑through and API‑based conversion tracking. The panel outlined a cost‑effective media mix—leveraging Meta for cheap...
TikTok Launches Updated Integration for Wix Users
TikTok has released an updated integration for Wix, now available through the Wix App Market, that lets merchants connect their sites directly to TikTok for Business. The upgrade simplifies adding the TikTok Pixel and Events API, enabling real‑time visitor data...
Snapchat Makes a Push for Snapcodes as a Marketing Tool
Snapchat is promoting its Snapcodes—a branded QR‑code format that embeds logos and links to interactive experiences—as a core tool for advertisers. Available since 2017, Snapcodes now support AR lenses, instant coupons, and detailed performance analytics. The company argues that these...
Canva Acquires Simtheory and Ortto in a Twin Deal Aimed at Turning a Design Tool Into an End-to-End Work Platform
Canva announced the simultaneous acquisition of Simtheory, an agentic AI collaboration platform, and Ortto, a customer‑data and marketing‑automation suite. Both firms were founded by Australian brothers Chris and Mike Sharkey, who will now lead Canva’s AI and marketing‑technology groups. The...
Evergreen Content Cuts Costs, Boosts Advisor Reach
The challenge of "successful" social media marketing is that success often hinges on two distinct but rarely simultaneous goals: reach and conversion. Making matters more difficult, social media platforms are increasingly saturated, making it harder for advisors to stand out...
Top 7 Local Businesses That Need SEO Services
Local service firms—from cleaners to lawyers—are losing leads because they aren’t visible in Google’s local results. The article explains how local SEO places businesses in front of high‑intent customers at the exact moment they search, turning organic rankings into a...
Creative Dive: How Doritos’ ‘Cilantro Swap’ Became a Snack Moment in Taiwan
Doritos’ limited‑edition cilantro flavor sparked fierce debate in Taiwan, prompting Starcom Taiwan to embed the snack into a popular TV drama during a rare typhoon‑induced cilantro shortage. The eight‑minute scene showed a character swapping Doritos for fresh cilantro, creating a...
Gemini in Chrome Becomes My Daily AI Assistant
How did I ever live without Gemini in Chrome before? It appeared yesterday and I am finding myself using it all day long: -Help me understand this paper. -Is this a new page? There's no date on it and I can't tell. -Look...
Slack‑Integrated AI Closes $239K Deal Without Cold Calls
I know a founder that closed a $239K deal in 2 weeks. Never sent a single cold email or made a phone call. Here's what happened: He runs a B2B company doing a few million in revenue. Just him. Doing sales is so far...
Whitney Leavitt Says This Utah Company Is the New Stanley Cup
HydroJug, a Utah‑based water‑bottle maker, is being hailed as the new Stanley cup after a design tweak—flexible, lock‑able straws—won over celebrity Whitney Leavitt and Gen Z consumers. The brand surged 9,032% since its 2017 launch, hitting over $10 million in revenue within...
Give Value, Skip Intro, Automate Freebies for Reel Success
I've been testing Trial Reels... and I finally had one "pop off" 👀 What I've seen working so far: ✓ give a TON of information away in the video ✓ these aren't posts for people to get to know you ✓ use a ManyChat...
Links Earn No Boost, Others Gain Algorithmic Advantage
Let me give a precise model of "link deboosting," which I believe is, for all intents and purposes, real. Forgive me, modest longpost for the full model. Jeff Bezos has argued that when anecdotes and data disagree, the anecdotes often hold the...
‘Influencer Marketing Is Replacing The Role TV Once Played’
Influencer marketing is rapidly eclipsing traditional television as the primary channel for brand building, a trend highlighted at a recent gathering of digital creators hosted by Sunshine Socials. Two young marketers shared data showing that influencer‑driven campaigns deliver higher engagement...
How SharkNinja Builds Loyalty with Agentforce Commerce
SharkNinja, known for high‑performance home appliances, partnered with Salesforce Agentforce Commerce to overhaul its e‑commerce stack. The brand rolled out the new platform in ten months, launching first in Canada and then the U.S. ahead of the 2025 holiday season....
PepsiCo Brings Dirty Soda Trend to Shelves with Dirty Mountain Dew
PepsiCo has rolled out Dirty Mountain Dew and its Zero Sugar variant, a ready‑to‑drink take on the booming dirty‑soda craze. The beverages combine Mountain Dew’s signature citrus with a smooth, creamy finish and are available nationwide in 20‑ounce bottles and...
Schiaparelli Begins Harrods Takeover
French couture house Schiaparelli has launched a multi‑area takeover at London’s flagship Harrods, revamping window displays and creating pop‑up installations on the first floor. The activation features the brand’s iconic golden key‑hole motif and promotes a new coffee‑table book, "Anglomaniac,"...
HG Insights Unveils Unified Revenue Growth Intelligence Platform
HG Insights announced the Revenue Growth Intelligence (RGI) Platform, a unified AI‑driven system that consolidates technographic, buyer intent, IT spend, buying‑center and contact intelligence. The launch includes the early‑preview RGI Agent Builder, which turns fragmented GTM data into shared context...
Why Every Streaming Service Suddenly Wants a Podcast Strategy
Late last year Netflix kicked off a streaming‑podcast rush by striking deals with Spotify and iHeart Media to host popular shows as video series. Since then, Tubi, MS Now, Roku, Amazon and others have announced multi‑million‑dollar partnerships or acquisition talks to...
Inside Back Market’s Strategy to Break Into U.S. Market
Back Market, the refurbished electronics marketplace, is promoting a “downgrade now” message in the United States with text‑heavy out‑of‑home ads placed where commuters have time to read. The campaign stresses sustainability and cost savings, and U.S. test markets grew more...
Calabro Cheese Unveils New Brand Identity
Calabro Cheese, a U.S. maker of Italian‑style fresh cheeses, unveiled a new brand identity in early 2026. The refresh introduces a new logo, the “The Art of Cheesemaking” payoff, updated packaging, and a redesigned website, built on consumer research. While...
From Thought Leadership to the LexBlog Library: What We’ve Built with ProVisors
LexBlog partnered with ProVisors in 2020 to syndicate member blogs, growing the Thought Leadership site to over 20,000 posts from 800+ contributors. A new single‑post submission form now lets advisors publish without maintaining a personal blog, granting them platform credentials...
What Most Brands Get Wrong Measuring Influencer Marketing ROI
Influencer marketing ROI should be measured by engagement, user‑generated content, intent signals, and retail impact rather than mere impressions. Brands that focus on engagement rates above 1% and total interaction volume capture genuine consumer interest. Leveraging UGC not only reduces...
Current TikTok Trends to Try in 2026
TikTok now serves as the primary discovery engine for 61% of its users, a rate 1.5 × higher than other platforms. The 2026 trend forecast reframes trends as early signals of shifting consumer behavior, emphasizing real‑process videos, search‑led answer content, comment‑driven...
Brand Prompts Guarantee Mentions, Non‑brand Halves Output
🚨 Brand Bias in Prompts: An Experiment by Dr. Pete Meyers: How often did each type of prompt result in the presence of a brand in the output? * Every prompt (100%) that included a brand returned one or more brand mentions...
Places to Get Your First 100 Users:
In a concise Substack post, Sifu Yik Chan lists fifteen online venues where founders can attract their first hundred users. The roster spans community forums like Reddit and Hacker News, product‑launch platforms such as Product Hunt and BetaList, and social...
Interview: Karen Nelson-Field, Author of The Attention Economy, on Why Not All Reach Is Equal
In this episode, Dr. Karen Nelson‑Field explains why traditional media metrics like impressions and time‑in‑view are misleading, arguing that not all reach is equal because they don’t reflect actual human attention. She describes her biometric research that shows a large...
Founders Who Monetize AI-Driven Marketing Lead Revenue Growth
Who's making more money with AI? Not people selling spades, but existing founders shipping more marketing work that's driving revenue? I see lots of founders running more experiments, trying new things, and saving time. But who can attribute extra revenue to work delivered...
Consumer Electronics Are Innovative but Lack Imagination
Consumer electronics remain technically innovative but are losing imagination as brands default to specs‑driven marketing. The industry’s engineering focus has produced incremental improvements, yet messaging often fails to explain why products matter, making them forgettable. Apple’s minimalist aesthetic has become...
Google's Traffic Dip Fuels Surge in Paid Ads
Google lost ~5% of traffic share in the past 10 months (35.11% → 30.53%). Everyone thinks AI search ate it. Well… ▪️ AI search: 0.22% → 0.26% (+0.04pp) ▪️ Social: 7.67% → 8.24% (+0.6pp) ▪️ Paid: 13.99% → 17.15% (+3.2pp) ^ that’s across ~75k websites in...
Bad Data, Dark Data, & Why Your North Star Keeps Moving
In a recent Office Hours episode, Jacqueline and Juan expose a deep‑seated measurement crisis in enterprise marketing, noting that only 3% of CMOs can reliably prove ROI on more than half of their spend. They attribute the gap to fragmented...
Simplify Campaigns, Cut CPA 42% in Three Weeks
On a recent audit, $3,500 was spread across 10+ campaigns. Everything looked active… but nothing was efficient. There was overwhelm — “We’ve tried everything.” The issue was fragmentation and audience overlap. We simplified structure + focused signals. CPA dropped by 42% in 3 weeks —...
Choose Your AI Stance or Face Brand Crisis
Pick a Side or Get Left Behind: The Looming AI Brand Crisis by @Timothy_Hughes https://t.co/wjmKxBqwE0 @DLAIgnite #SocialSelling #DigitalSelling #Sales #Leadership #Marketing #MarketingStrategy #MarketingSuccess #ArtificialIntelligence #AI #ContentMarketing #MarketingTips #MarketingEthics
AI‑automated SEO Agency Scales Profits and Efficiency
Automating every single action of my SEO agency with AI so that I can make more money with each of the different pieces of the puzzle. That's how you want to make money with Claude Cowork and Code. Trimming down so that...
Adidas Gains Global Favor as Nike Reputation Falters
Here's proof that in business, as in life, reputation matters. Adidas Is Winning The Hearts And Minds Of Consumers Globally As Nike Falls via @forbes https://t.co/niLDqCPjnx
Kit Kat Deploys SUV Convoy for Toronto Delivery Stunt
Kit Kat gave one of its delivery trucks an SUV security convoy to deliver bars in Toronto. The marketing team has officially squeezed out every last drop of attention from that 12-ton heist. https://t.co/qUeXdKkSEb
Google's Core Update Pushes YouTube to AI Overviews Dominance
Just checked a client that ranked in AI Overviews last week and now the top 4 links in AI Overviews are all YouTube. Let me guess: the core update was another way for Google to boost YouTube, like it did with...
Three Persuasion Principles Boost Email Conversions Instantly
Every high-converting email I've written uses at least 3 of these. These 7 Principles of Persuasion are how humans actually make decisions. Understand them, and your marketing will feel helpful instead of pushy. Save this. You'll reference it more than you think. https://t.co/i7Ze7md5gS
MLB Launches YouTube Hub for Young Fans
Inspiring to see sports leagues like @MLB meeting the next generation of fans where they are ⚾ Check out MLB Clubhouse, their new @YouTube channel where kids can learn more about baseball and softball: https://t.co/kldfCvbCz4
Upper-Funnel Spend Drives Sales, Not Just Retargeting
Mejuri shifted 25% of their ad budget to upper-funnel campaigns. The result? A 12.9% lift in incremental sales and a 57% boost in iROAS. Meanwhile you're pouring all your ad spend into bottom-of-funnel retargeting and wondering why your new customer...