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GOOGLE CHROME SECURITY UPDATE

Google has released an update for Google Chrome, patching a new zero-day high vulnerability CVE-2023-7024 that has already been seen exploited in the wild. It is recommended to update ASAP.

TOP 15 SANS SUMMIT TALKS OF 2023

A collection of the top-rated talks from SANS Summits in 2023. The talks cover a broad range of topics in the industry.

RITE AID BANNED FROM USING AI FACIAL RECOGNITION AFTER FTC COMPLAINT

The FTC has banned Rite Aid from using AI facial recognition software in its stores for 5 years due to a lack of comprehensive safeguards. The FTC alleges that Rite Aid’s technology falsely tagged customers, with a bias against women and people of color.

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GOOGLE MIGHT ALREADY BE REPLACING SOME AD SALES JOBS WITH AI

Google reportedly has plans to consolidate staff at its large customer sales unit that works with major advertisers. The division has over 30,000 employees and some positions are being reduced potentially due to new AI tools that automate some of their tasks. One of the ad tools that may be driving the replacement is PMax, which helps advertisers create content, find the best format combination, and make changes automatically based on ad performance.

TIKTOK TESTS NEW DESKTOP-BASED TOOLS FOR CREATORS AND MARKETERS

TikTok is working on new tools to help creators maximize their performance. There’s a new Creator Center UI, which provides more analytics insights and updated discovery tools that utilize conversational AI. It’s also much easier now for social media managers to manage TikTok from their desktop PCs.

INCREASE REVENUE WITH A SECOND CTA THAT ADDS MULTIPLE PRODUCTS TO THE CART

Instead of displaying a “buy more and save” offer and letting customers select the product quantity to reach it, try using a second “add to cart” CTA to encourage larger orders. The CTA should include the text of the offer and add the exact product quantity needed to qualify for it. Using this tactic can lead to a 13% increase in average revenue per user when compared to a page variant showing just the offer and a single CTA.

10 DO-IT-YOURSELF SEO TASKS

Many companies can and should do some SEO work in-house. Keyword research is not only used for optimizing pages to rank – it also helps you understand your customers’ wants and needs. Internal linking is critical to organic search visibility and is easily scalable with content widgets. Creating genuinely useful content helps with SEO and potentially has other marketing applications. This article contains ChatGPT prompts to make each of these tasks more efficient.

GOOGLE AD EXTENSIONS: 12 ASSETS TO ENHANCE YOUR CAMPAIGNS

Google Ad Extensions (aka ‘Assets’) are optional content pieces that provide searchers with more information, making your ads more appealing. This guide reviews both automatic and manual extensions and shares best practices on how to use them. The 12 assets include Sitelink, Callout, Location, and more.

DRIP’S 2024 CONTENT CALENDAR TEMPLATE (GOOGLE SHEET)

This marketing template includes holidays, national days, and resources to prepare for seasonal campaigns. It includes helpful notes on differences in holiday dates globally, as well as several heritage months to consider. The link will require you to make a copy in Google Drive.

SOLOIST: WEBSITE CREATOR

Soloist is a simple and free website creator that uses GenAI to compose a website based on a few simple inputs. It’s designed to help solopreneurs and SMB owners. Its template includes useful features like a client contact form, review import, booking, and SEO optimization.

HERE’S WHAT WENT WRONG AND HOW I’D SAVE ALLBIRDS

Allbirds were once the “it” shoes. It expanded its product line too fast and scaled beyond its core customer base. Instead, it should’ve focused on its first shoe, which was a success and even deemed as “The World’s Most Comfortable Shoes” by Time Magazine. Allbirds only has 15% aided brand awareness in the US, which implies that it has a communication problem. Ways it could amplify its brand include making co-founder Tim Brown the face of the brand, collaborating with influencers to promote a lifestyle, and creating long-form education campaigns around key sustainability initiatives.

THE UPCOMING 2024 BLOODBATH IN SAAS

Misunderstanding the difference between acquisition and growth will cost you revenue in 2023 – but in 2024 it will cost you your business. The current AI boost to productivity will mostly bring competition but not more market size, which means generic messaging or lackluster products won’t be able to survive. Brands need to focus on growth holistically, which means thinking beyond acquisition metrics alone.

'ACTIVE LISTENING': THE CONTROVERSIAL NEW AD TARGETING TACTIC

CMG, a marketing company, raised concerns after claiming it could listen to customers through smartphones, smart speakers, and other devices for targeted advertising. Through Active Listening, it was able to capture keywords or targets and provide that information to businesses. CMG claims the practice is not illegal, but it may not be ethical and it is unclear how customers would perceive brands using that tactic. This article contains the original announcement from CMG.

GET INSIDE YOUR CUSTOMER’S MIND

There are 2 fundamental customer mindsets: Promotion and Prevention. Someone with a promotion mindset is focused on what can be gained, whereas someone with a prevention mindset is focused on avoiding negative outcomes.

10 EMAIL NEWSLETTER EXAMPLES THAT SELL WITHOUT THE SELL

10 newsletter examples that balance the product highlights with the informative—and sometimes even delve into the entertaining.

WHAT MARKETERS NEED TO STOP, START, AND CONTINUE DOING IN 2024

Thoughts on which behaviors, approaches, and practices should be reconsidered, ramped up, and maintained for 2024.

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PRODUCT PREDICTIONS 2024

This post shares 10 predictions for product in 2024. Topics range from product roles to trajectories of team processes, to how generative AI will influence PM. It calls out hopes, worries, and uncertainties heading into 2024.

WE HAVE TO SUPPORT EVERY LINE OF PRODUCTION CODE FOREVER

In the rush to secure enterprise deals, there can be a tendency to underestimate the long-term costs of accommodating one-off customer requests and specialized features. Despite the significant short-term gains for the sales team, the often overlooked ongoing expenses for product, engineering, and support can accumulate, leading to productivity issues and a potential impact on overall R&D efficiency.

LOOK BACK TO LEAP AHEAD: 7 QUESTIONS FOR YOUR END OF YEAR REFLECTION

Reflecting on the closing year is an essential exercise, encompassing both quantitative metrics and intangible accomplishments. Evaluating the efficacy of projects, revamping meetings for productivity, aligning priorities, seeking impactful feedback, recognizing shifts in your role, and contemplating readiness for a career move are key aspects to consider in setting oneself up for success in the coming year.

SIX TYPES OF COMPETITION THAT YOU MUST BE AWARE OF

Understanding who and what your real competition is can be critical in defining a product strategy. Direct competition, alternative products, in-house development, manual solutions, on-paper competitors, and doing nothing are all forms of competition that should be taken into consideration when building a winning product strategy.

DEPENDENCIES IN FAST(ER) GROWING COMPANIES

This article addresses dependency challenges in faster-growing companies, where scaling intensifies issues. As organizations expand, the widening gap between those doing the work and goal setters leads to increased cognitive load, conflicting priorities, and challenges in decision-making, affecting speed, trust, and information flow. The core problem is managing dependencies in fast-paced, growing environments without succumbing to premature convergence and trust issues.

WHY PEOPLE MIGHT NOT WANT YOUR PRODUCT (EVEN IF IT SAVES THOUSANDS OF LIVES)

Everett Rogers' "Diffusion of Innovations" highlights five key factors for successful tech innovation adoption: relative advantage, complexity, compatibility, trialability, and observability. Addressing these factors is crucial for bridging the gap between early adopters and the broader market.

THE BEST OF PRODUCT MANAGEMENT GPT

This resource covers a variety of GPTs with a range of purposes, from daily PM tasks to interview preparation, to enhancing technical/design skills.

THE ESSENCE OF PRODUCT MANAGEMENT (90 MINUTE PODCAST)

This article explores the product manager's role in creating valuable, usable, viable, and feasible products. It emphasizes the significance of engaging with reference customers for product-market fit and addresses the often negative perception of product management due to premature promotions and inadequate leadership exposure.

HOW TO BUILD AN EFFECTIVE TRIAL FOR YOUR PRODUCT

MANAGING ACQUISITIONS

Product leaders should focus on how a potential acquisition will enhance their product line, as seen in TripAdvisor's strategy of acquiring startups for different phases of its growth. It's essential to be aware of the risks and challenges, including overpaying and integration issues, and to adopt a "pull" rather than "push" approach, allowing the acquired company's leadership to make key integration decisions.

7 FALLACIES AND BIASES THAT PRODUCT FOLKS FALL PREY TO

This post highlights 7 biases that PMs can fall prey to: tailwinds fallacy, comparative overestimation bias, the curse of knowledge, uniformity bias, static needs fallacy, attribution bias, and alignment fallacy.

THE MOST UPVOTED LIFE ADVICE FROM REGULAR PRODUCT PEOPLE ON REDDIT

This thread shares a compilation of the 8 most upvoted life advice posts from product folks on Reddit's r/ProductManagement.

PRODUCT STRATEGY LAYERS

“Vision”, “strategy”, and “product initiatives” are all terms that can often get mixed up. This post clearly defines the different product strategy layers and the time horizon each layer typically focuses on.

EXPLAINING PRODUCT MANAGEMENT TO A 5 YEAR OLD

It is like being the captain of a ship.

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A CRASH COURSE ON CACHING FUNDAMENTALS

The primary reason for caching is to improve performance. Other benefits include faster loading times (users get their pages faster), improved efficiency, and reduced loads on the server. This article dives into different types of caching, such as page, content, data, instruction, browser, and query caching. It also describes the trade-offs of caching, such as how caching reduces latency but also reduces data consistency, which can make certain applications unusable.

GETTING STARTED WITH WEB PERFORMANCE

A look at how to improve your website’s performance with strategies, tools, and tips to help you make notable improvements. It’s a guide for everyone with topics for beginners, like why web performance is important and the core web vitals, advanced tips on performance techniques, and tools on testing that can help find performance gaps in websites.

DIVING INTO SERVER ACTIONS IN NEXT.JS 14

Next.js 14 introduced Server Actions, functions that execute on the server side. Server Actions allow developers to offload responsibilities like data fetching and mutations to the server, avoiding security concerns related to client-side data manipulation. This article provides a practical example of how to use Server Actions to handle form submissions and interact with a database, demonstrating the benefits of this approach.

I LOVE RUBY

Ruby has been a constant in the author’s extensive career as a software developer. Although Ruby has lost popularity in recent years, she still vouches for the language’s usefulness and amazing developer experience. In this article, she explains why she loves Ruby, including points that highlight its expressiveness, ease of use, and supportive community.

WHAT WE NEED INSTEAD OF “WEB COMPONENTS”

Web Components have various problems, such as their lack of semantic value for search engines, suboptimal performance, and clunky APIs like customElements.define and Shadow DOM. Browser makers should focus on solving real problems faced by developers, such as improving reactivity, optimizing DOM rendering, and addressing the need for self-sizing iframes.

dashboard, and more. Get the full details on the Vercel blog

SVELTEKIT 2.0

SvelteKit is the official framework for creating apps with Svelte. This version release includes many highly anticipated changes. Version 2.0 adds support for Vite 5 along with many other small improvements. SvelteKit 2.0 smooths the way for Svelte 5's release in 2024.

CASIBASE

Casibase is an open-source domain knowledge database powered by ChatGPT, Casbin, and Casdoor. It has a separate architecture for the frontend (React) and backend (Golang). Casibase supports high concurrency, integration with existing systems, and mainstream databases like MySQL and PostgreSQL. It has a web UI for managing the database.

PENX

PenX is an open-source note-taking app designed for structure and ease of use. It prioritizes local-first data and user privacy with end-to-end encryption and comes with GitHub-based version control out-of-box.

THE YEAR IN COMPUTER SCIENCE

Computer scientists made significant progress in various areas of the field this year. AI demonstrated remarkable advancements in generating text and art, with large language models like ChatGPT gaining attention. Computer scientists also made improvements to Shor's algorithm for factoring large numbers, delved into the behaviors emerging from large language models, and explored a vector-driven approach to AI. Scientists researched questions related to computational complexity, error correction in quantum computing, and the intersection of cryptography and AI, revealing backdoors in machine learning models.

GOOGLE OAUTH IS BROKEN (SORT OF)

A Google OAuth vulnerability allows former employees of organizations to retain indefinite access to applications like Slack and Zoom even after they have been off-boarded and removed from the company's Google organization. The vulnerability arises from the ability to create non-Gmail Google accounts using corporate Google organization email aliases and email plus sign forwarding.

THE COMPANIES THAT SHAPED POSTHOG

There are various ways enduring companies become successful. For example, GitHub’s success was based on giving away its core product for free, which created easy developer adoption and made it easy for enterprises to pay for it. HubSpot had product diversification and great inbound marketing. Zapier is an expert in programmatic SEO and is a self-serve application. The article also mentions lessons from GitLab, Atlassian, and Y Combinator.

DEEP CLONING OBJECTS IN JAVASCRIPT, THE MODERN WAY

The structured clone function, which is built into the JavaScript runtime, can be used to make deep copies of objects in JavaScript.

HOW TO WRITE GREAT TECH SPECS

A complete guide to writing a technical specification. This article covers who should write it, what the tech spec should cover, and when/why you might or might not need one.

I SALUTE EVERYONE ON CALL WORKING THROUGH THE HOLIDAYS (HACKER NEWS THREAD)

A thank you to the developers charged with keeping systems available and safe so everyone else can enjoy the holidays with ease.

INTRODUCING THE NEW WASMER JS SDK

The new Wasmer JavaScript SDK makes the execution of various WebAssembly-related programs, like UNIX programs, easier in the browser.