70% of consumer purchase decisions are driven by emotion rather than rational factors. Customers with strong emotional engagement are more loyal and are more willing to spend more, recommend a brand, and promote it on social media. Ads that spark strong emotional responses are 2.6X more likely to go viral and 4X more likely to build long-term brand value. This guide covers how common emotional triggers like nostalgia, FOMO, individuality, and well-being can be leveraged to drive deeper connections.
Cluely built its reputation on viral stunts and creator-driven marketing. Its CMO, Daniel Min, has centered the company's growth on social media, relying on provocative videos, UGC, and local creators. Critics say Cluely's AI is either a cheating tool or just a “GPT wrapper”, but its ability to spark conversation keeps it relevant and reflects a shift where young founders act as influencers instead of engineers.
Social platforms present audience growth as empowerment but profit from free user labor, data, and content. Algorithms push creators to self-censor, simplify ideas, and chase scale. This leads to conformity instead of authentic expression. Real connection may come from smaller, intentional communities outside platform control, where resonance matters more than reach.
2025.09.09·
newsletter.aroundthebonfire.com·4 min read·TLDR Marketing
AI tools promise faster answers and smarter insights. But without real data and context, they're just confident guessing, and in marketing, guessing doesn't cut it.
Unlike traditional marketers who create individual assets, content engineers build AI-powered systems that scale content across channels. They embed brand voice into processes, orchestrate cross-platform ecosystems, design feedback loops that optimize performance, and scale personalization while keeping strategy intact. As martech moves from human-centric tools to agent-based systems, companies that adopt content engineering will gain an edge.
Trump's new “no tax on tips” policy opens an unexpected win for influencers and digital creators. Podcasters, streamers, and other online creators can now deduct up to $25K in tips, making platforms with tip-based revenue models more attractive. This new policy strengthens the financial case for mid-tier creators to scale tipping features and experiment with direct audience monetization.
The old limit of 6 ads per ad set on Meta is no longer as relevant. With the rollout of the Andromeda system and new creative AI tools, Meta now promotes creative diversification across formats, styles, and messaging angles. Advertisers are seeing success with ad sets containing up to 50 ads, thanks to Meta's ability to handle variation more intelligently. Meta's new algorithmic approach appears less sensitive to budget thresholds, allowing broad testing without the old distribution penalties.
Peach & Lily's latest launch skipped the usual influencer playbooks and opted for a blind test approach. The brand sent its new product in unbranded bottles to 14 experts across dermatology, esthetics, and cosmetic chemistry. These influencers received minimal ingredient details and were invited to share authentic first impressions on TikTok and Instagram before any brand name was disclosed. The content had no trending audio or effects and leaned fully into face-to-camera education. The campaign generated 5X the engagement of previous efforts and racked up over 1M impressions within two hours of the reveal at a New York City launch event.
Create AI-powered Slack bots to help your team move faster and eliminate distractions. Your new AI coworkers work with all the tools your business is using [10] every day - HubSpot, Google Sheets, Notion, Asana, and more. It's ChatGPT's brain inside your Slack,
The Reddit Pixel lets brands track behavior and run retargeting campaigns that re-engage high-intent visitors at a fraction of cold campaign costs. Retargeting works on Reddit because 42% of users say it influences purchase decisions more than any other channel. With CPCs of $0.50-3 versus LinkedIn's $7-12, Reddit offers a cost-effective way to nurture leads and drive conversions over longer sales cycles.
OpenAI is building a Jobs Platform to match AI-trained workers with companies, including small businesses and local governments, and launching OpenAI Certifications to validate AI proficiency through the free OpenAI Academy. With a goal of certifying 10 million Americans by 2030, starting with partners like Walmart, these initiatives aim to make AI training accessible, relevant, and tied directly to workforce needs.
AI agents could disrupt the retail media market if offline shopping shifts online faster and consumers adopt agent-driven purchasing. Ads in Copilot have 73% higher click-through rates, 16% stronger conversion rates, and 33% shorter purchase journeys than traditional search. In cases with purchase intent, Copilot increased purchases within 30 minutes by 53%. This performance threatens retail media's core revenue streams, particularly on-site and off-site advertising. For now, adoption of AI-enabled shopping is limited, leaving a window for retailers and brands to adapt.
AI search is changing the way customers discover brands. If your content isn't optimized for generative engines, you risk being invisible where it matters most.
Global linear TV ad spend is projected to fall to $139.1bn in 2026, its lowest since 2005, after declining 27.5% between 2014 and 2024 and 50.8% when adjusted for inflation. Audiences are shifting from linear to connected TV, which now accounts for nearly half of TV usage in the US, while YouTube earned $36bn in US ad sales last year, surpassing all four broadcast networks combined. Fragmentation and measurement gaps remain a challenge, but retail data integration is reshaping how advertisers measure outcomes and plan campaigns. Smaller brands, which allocate only 9% of ad budgets to TV compared to 38% for large brands, may gain new opportunities as CTV moves toward programmatic selling.
Tulpamancy and synthetic intimacy show how people are creating companions and relationships through imagination and AI, from Reddit communities building tulpas to users forming bonds with chatbots. These practices provide comfort, therapy, and connection, but also carry risks of manipulation and harm, as seen in cases linked to AI platforms. Trust in AI remains low, though use is growing among younger people who treat these interactions as real. Brands are beginning to explore similar dynamics through worldbuilding and attachment, raising questions about how far engineered intimacy can go before it undermines human agency.
Dollar stores are attracting more affluent shoppers as consumers across income levels look for value. At Dollar Tree, customers earning over $100K made up two-thirds of new shoppers in Q2, up from 50% in Q1. Dollar General also saw same-store sales rise 2.8%, fueled by higher foot traffic and basket size. Middle and higher-income shoppers are increasingly trading down, making them a larger force in overall retail spending.
Stripe processes $1.4 trillion annually, equal to 1.3% of global GDP, by positioning itself as the payments engine behind major platforms like Shopify and Lyft. Its success comes from frictionless integration, offering clean APIs, strong developer documentation, and self-serve tools that make it the default choice for engineering teams. It deepened platform lock-in by expanding into adjacent services like fraud prevention, billing, and lending, which increased switching costs and made it indispensable to partners. Stripe also built a win-win ecosystem through partner incentives, co-marketing, and technical support that fueled both its own growth and that of its platform customers.
Research shows that launching products unrelated to a brand's core category makes people view the brand as cooler. Across 4 experiments with 1,454 participants and over 5,000 social media comments, unrelated extensions like KFC's fried chicken-scented nail polish or a hot pot brand's spicy toothpaste increased perceived coolness by up to 20%. The effect is stronger for popular brands and co-branded products, such as McDonald's being rated 9.7% cooler with its Adidas sneaker launch, and weaker when extensions are too close to the core category. The strategy works because it surprises consumers, creates humor, and signals creativity and rebellion.
Every day, data is bought, sold, and pushed through martech. But none of it is as valuable as first party data - which is accurate, reliable, and most importantly - yours. This OneTrust guide [10] shows you how to operationalize first party data across channels to deliver better targeting, richer personalization, and measurable ROI. Read it
A wave of UGC gig platforms is emerging, with apps like Noise, Home from College, SideShift, and PayPer using TikTok-first strategies to recruit creators and grow. Noise, backed by venture funding, runs a network of accounts targeting moms, while Home from College focuses on Gen Z students. SideShift and PayPer experiment with clipping and direct brand mentions to capture users. Results vary, and the market is expanding quickly with self-serve marketplaces and full-service operations.
Nano Banana gives marketers and creators a free, AI-powered platform for precision editing, branding, and multimedia production. It turns simple images into Studio Ghibli-style visuals, product mockups, or even 3D models while keeping brand consistency across campaigns. This guide shares multiple prompts and tips that can help marketers leverage the tool across multiple design and production tasks.
Workers aged 22-25 in highly AI-exposed jobs, such as software developers and customer service agents, saw a 13% drop in employment since ChatGPT's launch. Meanwhile, older workers and less-exposed roles held steady or grew. Companies are not firing at scale but are slowing hiring, which hits new entrants hardest. Applied AI firms must address worker anxiety, build trust through clear benefits like time savings and cost reduction, and design simple products that focus on core features before expanding.
This discussion looks at whether genuine human emotion can survive in spaces increasingly co-opted by brands. It contrasts the noisy competition of public platforms with the intimacy of “Dark Forest” communities, where trust shifts to private spaces. It warns that brand intrusion erodes these safe zones, while authenticity and community cannot be manufactured. It also introduces the Bentoism framework, which balances near-term self-interest with long-term responsibility, while reflecting on cultural flattening, the limits of post-capitalist visions, and the ongoing search for meaningful online spaces.
Kraft Heinz has spent just 3.2%-4.6% of net sales on advertising and marketing since 2016, far below competitors like Constellation Brands and Hostess Brands that invest 7%-10%. Despite generating billions in cash, the company prioritized dividends and stock buybacks while writing down $37 billion in goodwill and intangibles since 2016. As Kraft Heinz prepares to split into two entities, its marketing investment strategy could be as critical as debt and dividend policies in shaping future performance.
Netflix manages over 550 social accounts across 17 platforms, including a finsta (@Netflix2), which reflects its push to connect directly with younger audiences.
Without trust, transparency, and strong privacy practices, innovation can backfire. As third-party cookies disappear and privacy regulations expand, marketers looking to build on the latest AI technologies must invest in first-party data.
Generational marketing based on birth-year labels is oversimplified. Instead, focus on factors like life stage, identity, fandoms, microcultures, and behavioral mindsets to understand real consumer motivations. Segmentation works best when it blends cultural nuance, data, and psychographics rather than relying on clichés. Generational cohorts can provide context, but shouldn't be the main lens. Marketing today requires interest-driven and culturally attuned approaches to reflect how people actually live.
AI has become a central part of marketing jobs, with many listings now requiring AI skills or experience. About 75% of workers report using AI because it is officially or unofficially expected, yet 95% of genAI programs at work are failing. New roles such as AI marketing program managers at large companies like Stripe pay up to $210,000, while startups like Firecrawl are experimenting with fully AI-driven agent roles offering $5,000 monthly retainers. The future of marketing jobs is splitting into three paths: fully AI-focused roles, traditional roles adapted with AI expectations, and fully AI agents replacing human work, leaving nearly 60% of marketers worried about job replacement.
2025.09.04·
newsletter.aroundthebonfire.com·6 min read·TLDR Marketing
A travel booking platform tested a “welcome back” prompt that reminded users of the last experience they viewed. The prompt helped visitors continue their browsing without restarting, which addressed a major friction point in vacation planning. The test showed a 16% increase in conversions among returning visitors. The results highlight the importance of continuity in multi-session decision-making.
AI search engines reward content that aligns with user intent and search language. Informational queries need precision, with 70% of cited pages matching at least 60% of query terms and over 60% using phrases like “how to” or “what is.” Commercial queries favor breadth, with 25% of titles using synonyms and 90% having under 30% word overlap. To improve visibility, match titles and slugs to user intent, keep phrasing clear for informational searches, and use synonyms and related terms for commercial ones.
Google has reintroduced Gmail Ads through Demand Gen campaigns, allowing advertisers to run campaigns exclusively in Gmail. Gmail Ads can appear as single image, carousel, video, or product feed ads, and they show in the Promotions or Social tabs with a teaser ad that expands into a full ad when clicked. Targeting options include demographics, in-market segments, custom segments, lookalikes, and retargeting, though content targeting is not available. Success is measured through engagement rate, click-through rate, and conversion rate, with strategies varying depending on whether the audience is warm or cold.
Use “input flows” when building custom GPTs to improve output quality. Instead of giving one big prompt, break the task into a series of structured questions, each with predefined answer options. For example, when creating a content marketing GPT, ask about audience familiarity, topic, primary audience, and key messages step by step. This approach mimics a human interviewer, ensuring the GPT receives a clear, detailed brief so it can deliver better results.
Listen Later converts written content, such as articles, blog posts, PDFs, newsletters, and email text, into audio podcast episodes. The service cleans up the content, removes ads, converts it to audio, and delivers it to a private podcast feed that works in any standard podcast app for listening on the go.
60% of searches now end on platforms like Google or ChatGPT. HubSpot launched “the Loop” to address shrinking website traffic and evolving customer journeys. The framework consists of four stages (Express, Tailor, Amplify, and Evolve) that accelerate campaign launches, improve personalization, and boost performance through AI-assisted iteration.
Google will be required to share parts of its search index and user-interaction data with qualified competitors, including AI platforms such as ChatGPT and Perplexity, marking a major regulatory milestone in the search market. While immediate effects on rankings may be limited because core algorithms and advertising data remain under Google's control, the decision signals a longer-term shift toward a more fragmented search ecosystem as Google's market share drops below 90% and AI-driven assistants gain momentum. For marketers, this creates a future where visibility will depend on building authority, securing placement across multiple discovery platforms, and optimizing for both search engines and AI assistants.