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Discover what 2,000 consumers say currently earns their attention when it comes to direct mail and other marketing channels. Here's a sneak peek at Lob's new State of Direct Mail: Consumer Insights 2026 Report [4]: > 87% of economically strained consumers DO THIS AFTER RECEIVING DIRECT MAIL > 89% of direct mail conversion is driven BY ONE SURPRISING FACTOR > 82% of consumers do something you MIGHT NOT EXPECT every single day
Moderate social media use is associated with better well-being than either low or high use, though differences are generally small. 81% of adults used social media in the past week, rising to 95% among ages 15-29. High use of 2 or more hours daily is linked to more anger, loneliness, and sadness. 47% of young adults are high users compared with 12% of adults aged 50+. High use is also associated with lower life evaluations than moderate use in high-income countries, but not elsewhere.
TikTok's first microdrama partnership, with Issa Rae's Hoorae Media, produced Screen Time, which has pulled nearly 580 million views since April. The new deal shifts the focus to creators, with the production arm of management company Made By All co-producing vertical series built around talent that already has an audience, for both TikTok and its PineDrama app.
Use Google AI Mode to identify content gaps on local service pages. Search for a service with a city name and review the follow-up questions to understand what information Google considers relevant when matching customers with businesses. Interview the business owner about their services, pricing, and processes, then add those original insights to service pages to answer customer questions and give AI context competitors can't easily replicate.
AI agents produce generic outputs when their context is poorly organized, not because they need better prompts or models. To improve results, separate context into 3 layers. Keep brand voice and audience profiles in a lean knowledge base. Store transcripts and playbooks in a searchable library that retrieves relevant passages on demand. Fetch changing metrics like traffic and pipeline directly from APIs. Map recurring questions to their data sources before building workflows, remove outdated content, and assign owners to maintain accuracy.
Trial users revisit a SaaS pricing page several times in their first 30 days, and each visit asks something different, from whether the product is a serious option to what an upgrade unlocks right now. Build the page for repeat scrutiny with a full plan-comparison table and trust signals. Keep one price framing synced across banners, emails, and checkout. Hold upgrade pitches until users have made something, then spread them out rather than stacking them in the trial's last 48 hours.
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Learn how to audit your brand's representation in AI search and create consistent on-brand content at scale. The 60-minute webinar also covers turning email signatures into targeted campaigns using HubSpot audience segments. It will take place on October 20 at 9 AM ET.
Frameworks like OKRs can fail when they don't fit a company's culture, team dynamics, or existing processes, even when implemented correctly. After four failed attempts at OKRs, WP Engine found success with a metrics framework that let teams choose goals they personally valued and could directly control. Teams started with one metric for a quarter, then added one or two more based on what they learned. Rather than rolling out a framework company-wide, test it with one team, gather feedback, and adapt it or try another approach if it does not work.
Contextually relevant backlinks had the strongest correlation with AI rankings across 17 AI search channels. For GPT-6 Astra, the correlation averaged 0.57 across industries and was positive in all 100. Unlinked brand mentions also correlated with rankings at 0.41 compared with 0.55 for total backlinks. The findings suggest prioritizing links and coverage from relevant industry sources over simply increasing backlink volume.
Saie builds products around specific needs it spots in public, then uses how the product came about as the marketing story. Its Bellini eyeshadow was developed in its Italian lab with a creator whose followers had watched her test over 50 shades in three years, while its City Set spray was named after the Knicks dancers and led to an official team partnership. The approach shows up in how consumers see the brand, with 53% saying Saie meets their needs against a 43% category average.
AI is now involved in 11.4% of US path-to-purchase volume, a load that merchant and issuer systems weren't designed to handle.
Since GPT-6, ChatGPT opens links with no tag and no referrer, so analytics tools now file its clicks as direct traffic.
This interactive site from Google contains the year's top trending Halloween searches, led by horror-character costumes, cauldron crock pots, and gothic and mascot horror movies.
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Webinar registration isn't the problem, attendance is. But it doesn't have to be. Vidyard's Video in Motion report [5] breaks down the pre-event video strategy [6] getting teams to over 50% attendance rates, complete with blueprint scripts and benchmarks to measure against. In a matter of weeks, you'll have: 🎥 Personalized video event reminders that lift attendance to +50% ✉️ Confirmation emails hitting 77% open rates 🏆 Scripts that dramatically reduce time spent on outreach 📖 Follow-up plays that keep no-shows in the funnel
Brands that find creators on TikTok and then use Meta's targeting to reach a wider audience may lose that route, since Meta reportedly now rejects third-party ads that send people to TikTok and other ByteDance properties. The ban took effect October 8 in seven markets, including the US and Canada, and also covers ByteDance's own ad buying on Facebook and Instagram. Campaigns that run across both platforms may now need Meta-native destinations, neutral websites, or separate creative and measurement for each platform.
Facebook is using AI to let users shape Feed and Reels recommendations by describing their interests in their own words. Its new “Your” algorithm tool lets users add and manage topics, while expanded feedback options let them explain why they want more or less of certain content. Large language models combine this direct feedback with existing engagement signals to update recommendations in real time, including during the same session.
B2B case studies often underperform because they document completed projects instead of telling compelling customer stories. Audit your last 3 by checking whether they explain the customer's original problem. If the stories feel interchangeable, interview a customer stakeholder for 30 mins to uncover what went wrong and what improved. 3-5 distinctive case studies can be more persuasive than 20 generic ones. Use anonymous stories when needed and repurpose them across newsletters and social media.
AI influencers are seen as less trustworthy because they can't actually use the products they promote. Showing them in everyday moments with real people, like grabbing coffee or going for a run, helps close that gap. In a study of 9,500+ posts and 4 experiments, these scenes drove 20.7% more engagement and made people up to 17.5% more likely to choose the product.
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This free virtual email and digital marketing event is hosted by Constant Contact on November 12-13. Keynote speakers include actor and writer Molly Ringwald and Emmy-winning creator Dan Levy. Marketing experts Ann Handley, Amy Porterfield, and Jay Schwedelson will share industry insights alongside Kath Pay and Ross Simmonds.
Growth in Public is an experiment by Chenell Basilio to gain 3K email subscribers from social media in 90 days. The site tracks subscriber growth by platform in a live scoreboard and documents which tactics drive signups. After posting just 43 times in the past year and seeing newsletter growth stall, Chenell plans to post daily across LinkedIn and other social platforms to test whether social can become a reliable growth channel again.
AI is changing e-commerce discovery by presenting shoppers with product shortlists instead of sending them to search results. A study on AI Mode found that 74% of participants chose the top-ranked product, while only 10% chose a product ranked third or lower. The author outlines a five-stage organic growth loop: earn AI recommendations through product feeds and third-party signals, convert visitors with tools such as quizzes, encourage user-generated content through packaging and product experiences, generate repeat purchases through customer relationships, and build brand recall. Shopping infrastructure and marketing automation are increasingly table stakes, while customer relationships, creator partnerships, community, first-party data, and brand recall create longer-term advantages.
Creativity comes from experimenting and adapting rather than simply generating a finished result. As AI makes content production faster, marketers risk losing the problem-solving and creative judgment that come from hands-on work. A study in 2024 found AI-assisted stories were rated as more creative but also more similar to one another. To stand out, teams should automate repetitive tasks while protecting time for play and experimentation to develop distinctive taste.
AI is making websites cheap enough to build for short-term experiments and one-off events that previously weren't worth the cost. However, enterprise websites still require complex integrations. AI can automate production and support decision-making but cannot eliminate the human effort needed to align stakeholders. Generative tools also create collaboration challenges when multiple companies need to edit the same work. As production costs fall, experimentation will expand while complex projects remain expensive because coordination still requires people.
The share rises to 43% among Gen Z, and 37% of Americans say they already use their streaming service more since it added vertical video clips.
Duolingo is effectively building an entertainment arm around characters that bring in an estimated 15% of new users through organic social.
Lessons from 4 years of building AI products at PostHog.
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Marketing teams target and optimize for channel-specific performance everywhere except creative. Unsurprisingly, that's where a huge amount of budget waste happens.
that forecast the best-converting asset 81% of the time. They found: * Reallocating existing budget could grow conversions 2.2X * Briefing against winning guidelines delivered 4X average
* Predictive creative scoring leads to better ecommerce results at the same level of spend
YouTube is now the most-used individual source for political and election news in the US at 16.5%, narrowly ahead of TV news at 16.1%. Social platforms collectively lead traditional news sources 60% to 32%, while 61% of Americans trust independent news creators as much as professional journalists on political topics. Credibility depends more on reporting than credentials, with 67% saying the quality of the reporting matters more than formal journalism training. Publicly correcting mistakes is the strongest trust signal, with 86% saying it increases their trust in independent creators.
More than 90% of marketers use AI, but many still rely on copying and pasting outputs instead of integrating AI into their workflows. Disconnected tools and poor data quality limit its effectiveness, while generating more content creates extra review work and can hurt customer experience. Teams need better workflow integration and data governance to realize AI's business value.
Analyze Meta ad creative performance by exporting daily ad data to a CSV and uploading it to Claude or ChatGPT. Generate 3 charts to track monthly creative churn, weekly production versus hit rate, and spend share from ads under 30 days old. Use 20-30% monthly churn and a 10-15% hit rate as benchmarks. If older ads still drive significant spend or hit rates fall while production stays flat, refresh creative before performance declines.
Improve retention by separating pre-purchase education from post-purchase guidance. Before buying, explain features that build confidence in the decision. After buying, share tips that help customers get more value over time. Teaching customers things they didn't know about owning a product encourages long-term engagement.
This webinar explores why ChatGPT and Claude often produce generic marketing recommendations despite strong prompts. It explains why judgment-heavy work requires specialized marketing expertise beyond language skills and access to company data. It will take place today at 11 AM ET.
Gemini's citations shift between runs, so a single answer says little about which pages it actually relies on. This free checker asks Gemini the same question 5 times with Google Search grounding on, then counts how often each source and claim comes back. It compares the recurring claims with a page's raw HTML, labels each one as stated, touched, or missing, and turns the biggest gaps into suggested edits using wording from cited pages.
X rebuilt its API Exhibit website to showcase apps that use X data and encourage more developers to integrate its API. The updated site features official partners and public utility apps alongside agentic use cases. Developers can customize listings and submit Grok Bot templates and agent skill files.
As AI makes specialized skills obsolete, career resilience comes from 3 things. Preserve transferable behaviors like curiosity and strategic thinking beyond job titles. Learn new skills driven by genuine interest rather than pressure to chase every trend. Retain the taste and judgment developed through experience.
Brands can stay relevant without chasing Gen Z trends or trying to look young. Older consumers offer greater spending power and less competition for attention. Tactics include creating distinctive mascots and featuring diverse ages and skin types. Brands can also control their retail experience and design products for everyday use. Choosing relevant celebrities and highlighting scientific expertise can build credibility without relying on influencers.
Ask homepage visitors only for what they already have, like an email or a URL, and move open-ended AI prompts inside the product after sign-up.
X's algorithm now surfaces less unwanted political content and Musk-related posts.
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Brands are told Reddit is key to AI search, and plenty of agencies promise to "game" it with volume. (Spoiler: that ends badly.) Get the inside story from Evan Hamilton, who led community at Reddit for five years before building HubSpot's presence, and Rob Fawkes of Standing on Giants. They'll cover replying before posting, earning trust with moderators, and why AI search shortcuts backfire. → JOIN LIVE ON OCTOBER 20TH [5] at 12pm ET / 9am PT / 5pm BST (or
68% of major US brands have no AI-specific crawling rules. Newsrooms are more likely to block AI bots, with 75% restricting at least one compared with 6% of other brands. None of the 52 accessible robots.txt files fully blocked OpenAI's or Anthropic's AI search bots by name, though some blocked training crawlers. Forbes blocks training bots while allowing AI search, while GEICO explicitly allows all 12 AI crawlers it names.
92% of US households plan to celebrate Halloween in 2026, with average spending expected to reach $285 per household. 56% of retail shoppers plan to start shopping by September, while early shoppers expect to spend 1.7X more than others. Price and value drive purchase decisions, and 32% of Halloween shoppers expect to use generative AI for product recommendations and comparisons.
A South American gift company increased orders by 9% by adding 2 free services to its checkout summary without offering a discount. Research showed customers hesitated at the final price and wanted better value. The test highlighted existing benefits, including premium gift wrapping and a satisfaction guarantee, with both listed as free beside the total. This reframed the purchase around what customers received rather than just what they paid.