MARKETING
The world isn’t back to normal, but April Fools’ Day is
If you think back to last year at this time (sorry for the quarantine flashbacks), you might remember that April Fools’ day was relatively nonexistent on the internet.
But, this year, brands were back to basic with April Fools’ jokes. Here were a few of the best ones:
+ Teletubbies launched a fake cryptocurrency, called TubbyCoin. This takes the cake as being the most unexpected joke this year. Plus, it went for a good cause: For each tweet using #TubbyCoin, the Teletubbies parent company promised to donate $1 CAD to a kids’ counselling service, Kids Help Phone. This was good for up to 10k tweets.
+ Duolingo advertised some language-learning toilet paper. They even created a landing page for the fake product on their site. When you click ‘Buy Now’, it directs you to create an account. It’s a clever way to generate signups, but there were some angry people in the Twitter comments – who were expecting some real-life toilet paper.
+ Bud Light came up with a ‘Pizza Anchovy’ seltzer flavor. They didn’t actually produce these, but there were some people in the comments who were ready to make a purchase.
The Crew’s take: April Fools’ is always a polarizing day. There are people who like the jokes, and people who don’t. But, done right, it can be a fun way to generate some attention (and maybe sales!) for your brand.
This is a welcome surprise
Pinterest has made big strides with its ads platform this year. And now, it looks like the company is rolling out a feature called Business Access – which seems to be Pinterest’s version of Facebook Business Manager.
Here are the details:
- Business Access aims to be a place where you can manage everything advertising. From employees and partners to ad account access, Pinterest is looking to put everything in one place.
- It’s replacing current multi-user permissions. If you have a system with the current multi-user permissions on Pinterest, you’ll need to re-add those users to Business Access.
To learn more, check out the official Business Access page here. It looks like a great feature that’ll make life easier for advertisers on the platform.
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MARKETING
What marketers can learn from Ed Sheeran and Neil Gaiman
Have more bad ideas!
That’s the juice of this post from Julian Shapiro. It’s actually a piece of his writing handbook (which is worth a read, on its own). But Julian’s advice can be applied to every area of marketing or business, not just writing.
Julian starts with Ed Sheeran and Neil Gaiman. These two are in the top 0.000001% of their fields. They consistently generate blockbusters. And, they share the same creative process.
Julian calls their approach Creativity Faucet.
Basically, he says, you should visualize your creativity as a backed-up pipe of water. The first line of the pipe is backed with bad ideas. And to get the best ideas, you must first throw the bad ideas out.
Ed Sheeran and Neil Gaiman don’t worry about jotting down bad ideas. They just let them out, because they know that once the bad ideas are emptied, strong ideas begin to arrive.
Why does this process work? Because once you’ve generated enough bad output, your brain starts to reflexively identify which elements cause the badness. Then it begins to avoid them.
What does it mean for you?
Do you need a killer headline for your sales page? Write 50 of them.
Are you brainstorming selling angles for your ads? Come up with as many angles as possible.
Do you need a new video for your Facebook Ads? Don’t stop at the first 3 scripts. Squeeze your brain.
Does it take time?
Yes!
Does it work?
Well, ask Ed Sheeran…
FROM THE CREW
Welcome aboard!
We don’t do this often… But we’re looking for someone for a part-time role as a daily news writer.
What that means: You’ll be responsible for writing part of, well, what you’re reading at this very moment.
If you’re a damn good writer and love all things marketing, this is for you.
ROUNDING UP THE STACK
MARKETING: A new report showed that iPhone users spent an average of $138 on in-app purchases in 2020, with that number expected to increase to $180 this year.
ADVERTISING: Here’s a great thread from Mathias Schrøder about why optimizing for conversion rate isn’t always smart.
TWITTER: Spaces is testing some expanded notifications for users. As long as it doesn’t become the Clubhouse notifications barrage… It might be OK.
BRAIN TEASER
Why are people with March 31st birthdays so easy to trick on April Fools’?
You can find the solution here.
POOLSIDE CHAT
Cool tech, (funny) business, lifestyle and all the other things marketers like to chat about while sipping cocktails by the pool.
From tears of joy to… Normal tears
he internet’s most popular emoji has changed, and not entirely for the better.
In a blog post yesterday from Emojipedia that is, supposedly, not an April Fools’ joke, the website announced that the loudly crying face 😭has overtaken the tears of joy face 😂 for the most popular emoji on Twitter.
You can see the month-by-month chart in Emojipedia’s full blog post. But, overall, the tears of joy face has been losing popularity over the years. And, finally, it’s been overtaken.
The Crew’s take: While the tears of joy and loudly crying emojis are great, we’re partial to the ROFL emoji: 🤣. Maybe it’ll overtake them both in a couple of years?