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THE SECRETS BEHIND REVOLUT’S $33B VALUATION

Revolut’s success can be attributed to 2 growth loops that helped it expand its user base by 250X in 6 years. The company made its product viral through referral programs.

X STOPS SHOWING HEADLINES BECAUSE OF ELON MUSK

Claiming aesthetic reasons, Elon Musk removed headlines and subheader text from links shared on X, leading to widespread criticism from users and employees.

THE FUTURE OF SEO

This article walks through predictions on the future of SEO and how to benefit from these trends. The author predicts that AI will both enhance and hurt SEO, content with E-E-A-T will win the SERPs, and ‘system SEOs’ will outlast the AI rush. The overarching theme is that SEO is not dead. To continue earning search traffic, marketers should optimize an SEO system with efficient processes and focus on their target customers above all else.

MARKETING

Ten by Three didn’t see results from a typical Mother’s Day promotional email, so it tested a series of story-focused emails instead. This approach allowed it to tell the story of the product and connect emotionally with its audience. The email series resulted in a 2X increase in open rate and a spike in bundle sales.

7 COMMON MISTAKES IN EMAIL MARKETING

This post provides tips on how to avoid or correct 7 common email marketing mistakes. Not segmenting email lists based on behavior, demographics, or purchase history or not designing emails with a mobile-first approach leads to missed engagement opportunities.

Canva has launched Magic Studio, an AI-powered suite of design tools aimed at enhancing and streamlining content creation. Magic Studio contains a series of features such as Magic Switch, which allows users to instantly transform designs into various formats, Magic Media, which generates short videos from text prompts or images, and Canva Shield, a set of safety, privacy, and security controls to prevent AI misuse and unsafe content creation.

4 USES OF GOOGLE’S URL INSPECTION TOOL

The URL Inspection Tool within Google Search Console has powerful capabilities for SEO optimization. You can use this tool to identify reasons for not indexing, learn how Google discovered a page, confirm Google can render all page elements, and submit your URL for indexation. Each of these is valuable for diagnosing SEO issues.

90% OF RETENTION ISSUES STEM FROM INCORRECT ACTIVATION

Activation is taking a user from signing up to establishing a habit around your core value proposition, but many B2B brands define this incorrectly. Activation is not just user engagement, nor is it account activation. This guide runs through what activation is and isn’t, as well as why it’s vital to get it right.

THE HYPER-PERSONALIZATION OF EVERYTHING

Consumers now expect every experience to be personalized. If the 20th century was about mass consumption, the 21st century is about ‘bespoke consumption’. The rise of AI is making new degrees of customization possible. Soon, everyone will get their own personalized healthcare plan, learning path, and relationship mentor.

TV REACH

This post discusses Amazon's decision to include limited ads on Prime Video. It highlights that while this move will benefit Amazon, estimates of its potential seem overly optimistic.

CAN YOU ANSWER THESE 5 QUESTIONS ABOUT YOUR BRAND?

This post challenges that most big brands can’t accurately answer these 5 questions about their own customers.

HOW SMALL BUSINESS ARE KEEPING UP WITH THE TAYLOR SWIFT EFFECT

Taylor Swift’s top-selling Eras Tour has led to a boom in sales for small fashion brands selling all things sequined and sparkly. This article shares how these brands are flexing new marketing opportunities to ride the Swiftmania wave.

META DEBUTS GENERATIVE AI FEATURES FOR ADVERTISERS

Meta has introduced its first-gen AI features for advertisers, enabling them to create backgrounds, adjust images, and generate multiple versions of ad text based on their original content. These tools aim to assist brands and businesses, with early results suggesting they could save advertisers up to one month per year in work hours.

THE STATE OF CONTENT SERPS: A 250,000 KEYWORD ANALYSIS

The main insight from this analysis of 250,000 EN keyword search results is that large media companies own content-focused websites that achieve first-place rankings 86.1% of the time, while independent site owners attain just 13.9%, despite being more numerous in the dataset. The article also covers 7 other insights from the data and a top-20 list of domains by ranking dominance.

4 FIELDS TO REMOVE FROM LEAD FORMS TO INCREASE CONVERSION

This post is a reminder to remove irrelevant fields on forms that create more friction for potential customers to convert. Common fields that should be removed are phone numbers and emails you don't actually need, a superfluous "how did you hear about us" question, a checkbox only sales or legal understands, and a vague and confusing CTA button.

WHEN TO DELETE CONTENT FROM YOUR SITE

Many marketers worry that deleting content will harm topical authority and SEO performance. However, deleting content that isn’t ranking or generating traffic is probably the right call. If you have pages on your website that don't contribute to your traffic profile, then you very likely don't have the topical authority to rank for that term. And if that’s the case, those pages are just wasting crawl budget.

100 GROWTH QUOTES FROM 70+ GROWTH EXPERTS AND PRACTITIONERS

This document is a consolidation of 100 quotes or “gems” that Sylvain Gauchet, a growth marketer at Babbel, collected from hundreds of marketing videos and podcast episodes. It features quotes from over 70 growth experts—from CMOs to product marketers to UA leads— on branding, organic and paid acquisition, onboarding and activation, and retention marketing.

USE TRIGGER EVENTS TO REDUCE COSTS AND DRIVE SALES

Marketers spend 80% less on direct marketing costs when they understand the specific events that get users to enter the buying journey. This guide covers when B2B and B2C buying triggers are likely to occur, a list of tools to track triggers, and examples of how brands have been actioning on buying triggers.

14 CONTENT MARKETING CASE STUDIES WITH STRATEGY BREAKDOWNS

This post walks through 14 content marketing case studies from the past year, exploring the content strategy behind each of them. Examples include Exploding Topics, which created hundreds of list posts for industry trends to naturally highlight the product’s capabilities, and GoPro, which runs “challenges” to engage users and generate UGC.

HOW INSTAGRAM CAROUSELS CAN TELL A BRAND STORY

This post shares how the rock band, Hundredth, used the 10-slide Instagram carousel for long-form storytelling through static imagery. It breaks down slide by slide how the band used a combination of graphics and copy to bring their curated anecdotes alive. The author also shares a few other trends with carousels for brands to consider.

HOW TO FIND YOUR NORTH STAR METRIC FOR GROWTH

A North Star Metric is a single metric meant to create focus, but it is commonly misidentified. This post gives real world examples.

CHEAT SHEET FOR CLEAR B2B MESSAGING

This cheat sheet explains how to craft a message for each customer stage (demand generation, demand capture, and value delivery).

STUDY

This study explores how Cracker Barrel is struggling to address multiple customer segments as its target demographic shrinks.

Meta is planning to offer ad-free access to its platforms in Europe for a monthly subscription fee of $14 for the Instagram app and $17 for both Facebook and Instagram on desktop. Users can still use the platforms for free but would need to consent to targeted advertising. This move follows discussions with EU regulators aiming to address concerns about the use of personal data for targeted ads.

INBOXES

Google is implementing stricter rules for bulk senders of emails in an effort to reduce spam and unwanted messages. Starting in 2024, bulk senders, defined as those sending over 5,000 emails to Gmail addresses in a day, will need to authenticate their emails, offer an easy unsubscribe option, and stay below a reported spam threshold.

HOW COGNISM INCREASED ENGAGEMENT ON LINKEDIN ADS BY 200%

Cognism found that its leads pipeline included more job titles than what was in its LinkedIn ads pipeline. This meant its targeting was too narrow and didn’t fully cover its ICP. Therefore, it switched from targeting by job titles to targeting by job functions and seniority and saw a 200% lift in engagement rate.

A CHECKLIST FOR THE ABOUT US PAGE THAT CONVERTS

Users that visit an About Us page spend 22% more time on a site and are 5X more likely to make a purchase. The page should include a strong headline, a compelling value proposition, a unique company story, social proof, and easy-to-follow CTAs. This information should be communicated concisely so that it gets the points across without overwhelming the user.

ENCOURAGE CUSTOMERS TO HOLD YOUR PRODUCT

Research shows that when people hold a product, they are up to 48% more likely to choose it or a product of the same shape and size. Brands like Apple are known for allowing customers to touch, hold, and interact with their products. These principles can be applied to online sales by showing a hand touching the product, a graspable product in the product’s field of vision, or providing vivid descriptions of how the product would feel when touched.

GOOGLE SEARCH STATUS DASHBOARD

This dashboard provides a history of official algorithm updates as well as current incidents related to crawling, indexing, and serving. If you notice issues with or changes to your SEO performance, this dashboard might provide insight into why. It also provides an RSS feed URL to help keep track of updates more easily.

TOOLS USED FOR 1 SEO BLOG POST

This post shares 10 tools the author used to write a single blog post. There are also several other tool suggestions mentioned in the comment thread worth noting down.

5 KEYS TO PERSUASION MARKETING

This author’s think piece is a self-reflection of lessons he picked up on persuasion marketing in his career. He provides anecdotes and examples from past brands he worked with to highlight 5 concepts: overcoming consumer indifference, storytelling trumping data, and the power of social comparisons, convenience, and effective messaging.

5 WAYS TO MONETIZE DURING THE HOLIDAY SELLING SEASON

As inflation abates, consumers are reportedly still going to spend cautiously this holiday season. This article highlights the importance of emphasizing pricing and value propositions in ads and campaigns, personalizing offers via loyalty programs, and offering sustainable product fulfillment options.

THE IMPLICATIONS OF GOOGLE USING CLICK DATA IN RANKING

Leaked documents in Google's antitrust lawsuit confirm that Google uses click data in its ranking algorithm, despite previous denials. This revelation reinforces the importance of design, user experience, and meaningful engagement in SEO efforts.

OCTOBER 2023’S KEY EMAIL SUBJECT LINE WORDS

A fun graphic of the top email subject line words that increased open rates when used.

ADVANCED B2B CHURN RATE BENCHMARKS FOR NERDS

A quick anecdote on PayPal, where revenue retention may be more important than customer numbers. This is true if you have value concentration in your customer base (e.g. making 80% of revenue from 20% of customers).

X PARTNERS WITH GOOGLE DISPLAY NETWORK

Following a steep decline in advertising revenue, X has started outsourcing the sale of some of its ad space to the Google Display Network. Advertisers will be able to reach X’s audience of over 200 million active users via the X home feed inventory with Google Ads Display campaigns.

TIKTOK IS REPORTEDLY TESTING A PAID, AD-FREE VERSION OF ITS APP

TikTok is reportedly testing a paid ad-free version of its app, giving users the option to pay $4.99 a month to avoid seeing ads. This move is part of TikTok's efforts to diversify its revenue sources, including promoting its in-app marketplace and pushing ads and coupons to encourage purchases.

HOW TO GET BACKLINKS FROM COLD EMAIL

It’s feasible to earn backlinks through cold email outreach. The process starts with topic research in an SEO tool, such as Ahrefs Content Explorer, then prospecting and outreach. This post explains each step in more detail and includes 2 email templates to use for outreach.

This article outlines how to utilize Google Analytics 4 data to enhance content marketing efforts. Key metrics to understand to optimize content include page views, engagement rate, average engagement time, exits, bounce rate, and scroll depth. Details on how to leverage Google Tag Manager to analyze content performance directly into your GA4 property are also provided.

BLOSSOM ESSENTIALS: HOW TO SCALE A SKINCARE BRAND

In this podcast transcript, the founder of Blossom Essentials shares their wins and losses via Facebook advertising, email marketing, partnerships, and influencer marketing. They also stress the importance of investing in a good content organization tool—it makes repurposing content easier and more efficient.

FREE SINGLE PAGE SEO AUDITOR

This AI and Python-powered tool provides SEO recommendations for a single page. It’s useful for quickly analyzing and spotting issues on high-priority pages. The report covers internal links, accessibility, Core Web Vitals, and more.

11 COLD EMAIL TEMPLATES SURE TO ATTRACT HOT LEADS

This article provides guidance on writing effective cold emails. It includes 11 pre-written cold email templates for various purposes, such as guest post outreach, press outreach, link building, influencer collaboration, and follow-up emails. The templates also offer tips on personalization, clear value propositions, and strong calls to action to improve the chances of getting a response from recipients.

MAILCHIMP & CO BENCHMARK REPORT 2023

This report is a comprehensive collection of perspectives and feedback from a global community of agencies and freelancers designed to help marketers scale businesses and service clients efficiently. It covers current marketing trends, insights on pricing services, and getting new business leads. It is 63 pages long and requires an email for download.

ADVERTORIALS VS. CONTENT MARKETING

Hear.com uses advertorials to sell its hearing aid product via content that reads like a news article. This tactic differs from content marketing in its approach, intent, and presentation. Advertorials are designed for an immediate sale, while content marketing prioritizes value and relationship-building.

MICROSOFT CEO: AI WILL MAKE GOOGLE MORE DOMINANT

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella believes that Google's dominant position in the search engine market cannot be challenged due to its monopoly. Nadella expressed skepticism about Google's argument that there is actual choice in the search engine market and suggested that AI would not provide an advantage to new entrants. He also raised concerns about Google's exclusive content deals with publishers, which could further solidify its dominance.

THE PSYCHOLOGY OF THE PRATFALL EFFECT

There’s a difference between admitting the odd mistake vs. perpetually messing up. The ‘pratfall effect’ only works if the person or brand in question is already seen as skillful or an above-average performer.

5 MISTAKES THAT COST SIMPLE MODERN MILLIONS

The co-founder of Simple Modern, a leading omnichannel drinkware and CPG company, shares 5 mistakes that propelled them to national brand status.

ARE YOU UPDATING OLD BLOG CONTENT?

This post shares easy steps in getting quicker blog traffic through existing content optimization vs. only creating new content.

INTERVIEW

X CEO Linda Yaccarino faced a disastrous interview during Vox Media's Code 2023 event. The interview garnered attention for several reasons: X had lost millions of daily active users since Elon Musk's acquisition, Yaccarino was observed not having the X app on her smartphone's home screen, and there were discrepancies between her claims of advertisers returning to the platform and Musk's statements about declining ad revenue.