The Best One Yet - ❤️ “Elmo the Influencer” — Sesame Street’s Instagram strategy. Uber’s new Costco run. Google is killing Google Search with AI.

Episode Date: May 16, 2024

Elmo, Big Bird, and Mr. Snuffleupagus are trending on social media because of Sesame Street’s new strategy — Sometimes you’ve got to do things that don’t scale.Uber just launched its newest form of transportation: A bus — Because public transportation can’t take you to a 10pm concert or a 6am Costco run.And Google’s new artificial intelligence announcement is actually going to kill Google Search — Because technology can retire an entire industry.Plus, the hot new place to work these days? It’s not your home or your office… its Disney World — Disney’s become the new productivity coworking space for Millennial techies, lawyers, and finance folks.$UBER $COST $GOOGWatch us on YouTubeGet the Saturday Newsletter: tboypod.com/newsletter  Submit Shoutout Requests Submit The Best Fact YetFollow us: on InstagramAnd connect with us on Nick’s LinkedIn & Jack’s LinkedInAbout Us: The daily pop-biz news show making today’s top stories your business. 15 minutes on the 3 biz stories you need, with fresh takes you can pretend you came up with — Pairs perfectly with your morning oatmeal ritual. Hosted by Jack Crivici-Kramer & Nick Martell. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is Nick. This is Jack. It's Thursday, the new Friday, May 16th. And today's pod, today's pod is the best one yet. This is a T-boy. The top three pop business news stories you need to know today. But first, Jack, the celebrity of economic reports, the inflation report. How's it looking, man?

Yesterday, we got an update that inflation finally eased to its slowest, lowest, lowest pace in three years. Boom, core inflation dropped to its lowest level since 2021. So yes, you can now buy that Big Mac. And Wall Street loved it. Stocks rose to a record high yesterday. Oh, you know what else is that an all-time high, Jack? This podcast? This podcast.

Jack, three stories for today's show. What do we got, man? For our first story, Google's new AI announcement actually kills Google search. What we're saying is that Google is killing Google to save Google. For our second story, the number one brand winning in social media right now is Sesame Street. Elmo, Big Bird, and Mr. Snuffalo. I guess have a three-part social media strategy, and Jack and I are going to tell you what it is. And our third and final story is Uber. Uber just launched its newest form of transportation,

which is the Uber bus. Yeah, Uber bus. Uber is getting into buses. And Uber is getting into Costco. Same story will explain. Yes, we do. But Yeties, before we hit that wonderful mix of stories to kick off the Thursday. No one else is doing this stories, Jack. Wonderful mix for the new Friday. There's a new office in town we need to tell you about. Yes, and it's not work from home, and it's not work from work from work,

and it's not work from wherever you think we're working from. It's work from Disney World. Get this, yet is Disney World is seeing a surge in remote workers working from Disney. Apparently the most magical place on Earth. It's also the most productive place on Earth. Here's the story. Adult workers see that Friday. They have almost no meetings in their calendar, so they decide to spend Friday at Upcott. But here's the thing, Jack.

They have almost no meetings because they have a couple of meetings. Because they have a couple meetings, but they're doing them from Disney World, baby. So they pack their laptop and they find a Wi-Fi hotspot in between roller coaster ride. Clickety clock. Sorry, Indiana Jones. I got to get on this call. Lawyers, engineers, big tech product managers. They're clocking in from Mickey's Clock Tower. And they're taking that conference call from Captain Hook's Lair. Sorry, Larry, what is that in your background? It's probably a princess. Don't worry about it, man.

In fact, CNBC interviewed a savant of Disney remote work who happens to live in Orlando. He goes to Disney World Weekly to clock in. And this 33-year-old attorney created a list of work from Disney best practices. And Jack and I, we got our hands on it. What are we looking at, Jack? Where's the best Wi-Fi at the Magic Kingdom? That would be in the lobby of the Wilderness Lodge, Jack. Who has the most power outlets?

That would be the Magic Main Street bakery over by the Magic Kingdom. And what's overall the top spot for a laptop? Jack, it's the Polynesian village. If you know, you know. Call out of Newman Yeties. Disney World is looking like we work. And besties, nothing screams promotion quite like a PowerPoint presentation taken from the Peter Pan ride. No, seriously, Larry, what is that in the background?

I want to know. I told you, it's a turkey leg and I'm done talking, Frank from finance. File of question here. How much does Disneyland season pass cost? I'm checking the numbers, Jack, $1,500 bucks. Perfect price to expense. It's a write-off. Just write it off.

Yet he's right it off. Jack and I, we're going to hit on three stones. Fifteen years before this song, two boys from the Northeast met in the dorm. They had an idea that caused a cultural storm. It's the best one yet, but the best is a norm. That's it. I don't even think they need to practice. 50% that's a fat tip.

Tea Boy City on your at list. If you know, you know, because we're ready to go. We can't wait no more. So just start the show. Start the show. First, a quick word from our sponsor. For our first story, Google just killed Google search. Google is replacing Google search with AI search instead.

This could be the biggest change to the internet since Google. And it's going to disrupt a whole lot of online businesses. Well, Jack, this is an artificial intelligence story. So like all AI stories, let's just begin with Sam Altman. What do you think, man? That's the safe approach with these stories. Sam, you're everywhere. I think he's over here.

I think I see Sam Altman. There we go. Just a couple days ago, we covered Sam Altman's Open AI, which had just announced their latest chatbot, which is called GPT4O. And Jack, what was our takeaway on chat GPT's newest version? It's not the best AI that's going to win the AI arms race. It's the AI that's easiest to use. Well, Bestie's emergency update.

Google's new AI is officially the easiest AI to use. On Tuesday, at Google's I.O event, they announced that the... they're putting their AI at the top of every single Google search. Yet he's tried out right now. Go on Google. Search for how to cook white rice like it usually would. And the first thing you're going to see is an AI response. The top search result in Google is going to be from Google's AI chat box.

And that chat bot is going to be talking to you kind of like a human being would. Only after that chat bot's attempt to answer your question, will you see the usual Google stuff, like the links to cooking recipes that tell you how to cook white rice. So, Yetis, we know what you're thinking here. Google is transforming Google search that we all use every day. What does that mean for us consumers, Jack? It sounds pretty amazing. It means we won't get stuck in the Google Search Forest every time we're looking for information on the web.

Jack, I'm so glad you brought up the Google Search Forest. We've all been there. We've all gotten stuck in it. And it's not fun. When you search for something like how to cook white rice, you're going to have to dodge the paid ads and slosh through the pages of links and then scroll down. finally get to the answer that you're actually looking for. It's like you're stuck in a heavily wooded forest, but now with Google AI, no machete is needed. If you need information, Google's AI has already read the entire internet. They know the answer to your question, and they're going to

give you an efficient response at the top of the page. One response, Google's AI will efficiently and clearly tell you what you need to know in a huge time saver, no more lost in the Google search Forest. Let Google do the Googling for you is how Google execs put it on Tuesday. So, besties, this new Google AI will be rolled out to all of America next week and to the whole world by the end of the year. But side note, Nick and I are already seeing it on our Google.coms. A little bit of a humble brag there, Jack. Apparently I'm in the beta test. But Jack, let's take a step back for a second. Not only what does this mean for consumers, but what does this mean for like the whole internet? It means that Google.com won't be a gateway to the web anymore.

Yeties, Google.com instead will now be like a butler. Alfred is going to be eliminating the need for you to browse the web and we'll simply tell you what you need to know. Each of us having our own digital Alfred telling us the info we need, that sounds amazing. Oh, and guess what? It's free to use, by the way. Although, Jack, I'm just thinking about it. It feels like we're coming full circle and going back to ask Jeeves from 1999. Great point, but it's going to function way better than that. So Yeties, everything Jack and I described, this sounds amazing, this new,

version of Google search. It sounds amazing for consumers, but for everyone who needs to make money on the internet, this is terrifying. And that's why Jack and I whipped up this takeaway. So Jack, what's the takeaway for all our buddies over at Google? Technology can retire industries. Amazingly, AI could retire the web. Ladies, if you need to read a cooking recipe, you're going to love this new Google feature. But if you write cooking recipes, you're terrified right now. Because news websites, It's how-to videos, shopping reviews, they all depend on you clicking from Google search. Google was the front door to the web. But now an AI chat bot is standing in front of that front door.

And that means that companies that depend on SEO search engine optimization will be massively disrupted by Google's new AI search. We expect a whole bunch of lawsuits from publishers arguing that these AI chat bots are stealing their copyrighted articles, giving them to people for free. Okay, so all those people, they're going to be affected. But, Jack, ironically, who could actually be hurt the most by the new Google AI? Google. Yeah, Google.

Because Google Search depends on ads, and you might not get to the ads if there's a chatbot up top. And his Google Search brings in $160 billion in annual ad revenue for Google. And Google AI threatens all of that. So why would Google do this? Why would they threaten their top money-making product, Google Search? Well, because if they didn't, Open AI would. Google is disrupting themselves before OpenAI does. Technology, it can retire industries.

And amazingly, this technology could retire the entire web. For our second story, Sesame Street has been thriving right now, but not on TV. Sesame Street is thriving on social media. Sesame Street shows that just because something doesn't scale, doesn't mean you shouldn't do it. All right, Jack, let's go back to the beginning of the year. Remember when Elmo became America's therapist? Elmo tweeted in January, Elmo is just checking in. How's everyone doing?

First of all, stuck the landing on that, Jack. Second of all, what were the responses to Elmo's epic Freudian tweet? Emotions. 218 million people viewed that single tweet, which was just text, by the way. There was no image or no jiff. Now, some of us replied that we were doing pretty good, But most of us replied that we were doing pretty tired and worried and suffering. And thank you for asking Elmo.

In response to Elmo's tweet, America looked less Big Bird, more Oscar the Grouch. But yet is, Elmo wasn't just America's free Twitter therapist when he tweeted that. He also revealed a brand new social media strategy. Because Nick and I jumped in T-Boy style. Sesame Street's top 12 characters each have their own social media accounts. And they're all driven by the same overarching social media strategy. And that strategy is working. Get this.

Just on Twitter, all of those individual Sesame Street accounts reached 242 million followers. And just that one Elmo tweet generated 47 news articles covering what a great job it was. Can we count this as number 48, by the way? Yes, we can. I got a cookie monster right here. And listen what he has to say. I have almost as many followers as Oreo does. Holy snuffalof against.

Elmo is now an influence. And so, Bert and Ernie are the new Kardashians, Yetis. So, Yetis, on this show, we've covered like Addison Ray's makeup selling influencer strategy. We've covered Taylor Swift's surge across Instagram. And we've covered Mr. Beast's famous Mr. Beast's face. But we know what you're wondering right now. What is the secret recipe to Sesame Street's social media strategy? There's actually a three-part social media strategy for Sesame Street.

Jack, are you saying there's a one, two, three-part recipe to Sesame Street? Street strategy. Yes, and we read about it in the newsletter, Future Social, written by Jack Appleby. So yet he's here is Sesame Street's three-part strategy. First, tactic number one, own the trends. Each Sesame Street character did their own, like, personality-accurate version of memes that were trending online. They lean into the memes with each character. Like when Taylor Swift did her era's concert tour, Elmo leaned into that era's concert tour, right, Jack? He posted like 12 picks of Elmo from different perspectives saying Elmo's in his red era. It was a take on the Taylor Swift meme and that single tweet got 2.6 million views.

Technic number two is Muppet to Muppet chatter. The characters of Sesame Street, they interact with each other on Twitter so you can watch them interacting in this whole new world. So after Elmo posted that Taylor Swift meme in his red era, Big Bird shared it, replying, I'm in my big and yellow era. Yeah, they made it feel like more than just characters. They made it feel like you had a relationship with them and you saw it play out. Those two simple strategies used across all 12 Sesame Street accounts done purposely and consistently.

One Sesame Street, a shorty award for social media. Those are numbers that the count can count on. But the third part of Sesame Street's social media strategy was most interesting to us. Yes, it was. It was that big bird, BM's back. Yes, he does. So Jack, what's the one the takeaway for our buzz? Everybody's over at Sesame Street.

Do things that don't scale. Yeti's one year ago, Sesame Street's social media team deployed part three of their new social media strategy. Their characters now respond to fans in the DMs and in the comments. Yeah, that was part three. Sesame Street characters started responding to the fans whenever the fans contacted them. Sesame Street said that they increased their response right

to everyday users who reached out, creating memorable interactions for those users. Yeties, Jack, and I can tell you, because we get a lot of DMs, That is not easy. Like the social media team had to sit at a computer. Check their notifications. Reply thoughtfully and in character to each of those DMs.

To the thousands and thousands of comments and DMs that they get. And we know what you're thinking. Does that idea scale? Well, the answer is no. Replying individually to every single user does not scale. But it does work. Yes, it does. And reminded Jack and me of an article 11 years ago,

written by the famous venture capitalist Paul Graham when he said, do things that don't scale. Paul Graham said that you should take extraordinary measures to make your users happy. He said that delighting customers scales better than expected because ultimately they'll return that love back. Think about it. If you got a reply from the official verified Elmo Twitter account, that was time consuming for Elmo.

But it's like an autograph for you, a digital autograph that you'll have forever. So you don't just retweet it. You don't just reshare it. You tell the whole world about it. Jack. And that love is contagious. Yeti's Sesame Street's social media success is a huge reminder for all of us. Just because it doesn't scale doesn't mean you shouldn't do it.

Now a quick word from our sponsor. For our third and final story, Uber's stock just jumped 2% on a huge day of Uber announcements. Because Uber is building a bus to Costco. First, Jack, can you write me a letter of recommendation to the world's least exclusive? Club, please? All you have to do is give me cash check or money order for $89 and you can join Club Costco. I think that's what you're getting at. Club of Costco, it is the world's least

exclusive club, but I'm unfortunately not a member. I'm trying to get Jack to get me into this thing. I gave Nick my guest pass. Jack is a proud card carrying Costco member. So Jack, why don't you tell us the big news? Uber Eats just partnered with Costco to deliver Kirkland to your casa. Yet he's Costco just became Uber Eats's biggest foray into gross suit delivery we've ever seen. You can now sneak into Club Costco without being a Costco member by ordering your Uber Eats app.

Boom, that rotissory chicken is showing up at your door in an ETA of 5 to 50 minutes. But just like Instacart's partnership with Costco, non-Costco members are going to pay higher prices if you try to order from these delivery apps. Yeah, so that rotissory chicken is going to cost you about 15% more. And we

should point out that gold bars and hot dogs are not available for this delivery. Yeah, if you want to get those, you got to go in person when you get your double chunk chocolate chip cookies. Still, Costco membership, Costco Nation is strong. So this is good news that Uber gets access to them. And that's why yesterday Uber stock rose to an all-time high. Uber stock is now up 50% from their IPO days back in 2019.

Pause the pod for a second because that's not all that Uber just announced. Uber just announced something bigger. Literally. We're calling it the Uber bus. Ah, the Uber bus. Actually, Uber calls it Uber Shuttle because they probably think that's fancier. But we're going to call it the Uber Bus. Tech companies love to pretend that they invent new things that already existed for decades or centuries.

And also, tech companies love shuttles. They're always shuttleing people, like Cupertino and Metlo Park. So now we have Uber Shuttle. You can reserve a seat on a bus going to major points of interest between cities. Uber coordinated with local shuttle services for big buses with up to 50 seats. And where are these Uber buses going? Well, I'm glad you asked Jack, because it's a lot. actually is surprise. These Uber buses

aren't going to your usual spot. They're going to concerts and sporting events and airports. So now, with the Uber app, you can choose a seat on a bus. 4B. When you arrive to the bus, you can scan your QR code to the driver. Hello, sir! And then you can get there way cheaper than an Uber ride

would have been. Uber, it's going full Greyhound to get you to that Green Day concert. So buses are now Uber's cheapest option. They're a fraction the price of an Uber X ride. Because consumers want value right now, Uber is delivering a cheaper option for value. So Nick and I got to ask, why did Uber decide it's necessary to reinvent the bus?

Is this going to feel like those Chinatown buses that cost 15 bucks to get to Boston and that would break down on I-95? The worst is when you pay $1 to get from Boston to Port Authority in New York City, but then you take a taxi to your hotel that was like $71. And all they give you are saltines. So Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies over on the Uber bus? Between the public sector and the private sector lies on. opportunity. Yet it is the wonderful thing that we love about public transportation is that it's efficient, it's accessible, and it's environmentally sustainable. The bad thing about public transportation is that there's a lot of red tape and government red tape can make it economically

unviable. Yeah, for example, bus drivers often are in union, so they require eight-hour shifts anytime they're driving a bus. The rigidness of that eight-hour shift makes it hard to hire a bus driver just for a concert because a concert only lasts three hours. And that is where Uber found opportunity, serving heavily traveled routes that for whatever reason public transit can't serve. If there's anything that Uber's gig driver business model offers, it's flexibility. And that is why Uber Bus is partnering with, get this, live nation, yeah, the ticket company for concerts. And they're inviting mayors to partner up to shuttle people from the city to the airport in the Uber Bus. So besties add it all up and Uber can fill a market gap that public transportation can't because of red tape.

Between the public sector and the private sector lies opportunity. Jack, can you whip up the takeaways for us for the new Friday? For our first story, it's Google's AI chatbot. It now has the top real estate on the internet. It's at the top of every Google search. Don't forget that technology can retire industries and AI could retire the web. For our second story, it's Sesame. Street. They're investing in social media DMs, even though they don't scale. Because doing things that

don't scale offers a high ROL. Return on love. And our third and final story is Uber Eats. They just partnered with Costco. And Uber is driving buses now to concerts and airports. Because between the public sector and the private sector lies opportunity. But Yeties, this pod's not over yet. Here's what else you need to know today. First, it's official. There will be a presidential debate, between Donald Trump and President Joe Biden. The first presidential debate is set for June 27th on CNN. There's going to be one debate in June on CNN and then another in September on ABC. Second, Netflix will officially live stream their first NFL game on Christmas Day this year.

Yeah, the biggest streamer is going to stream the biggest media asset on the biggest holiday of the year. It's a three-year deal and it makes Netflix the home of football on Christmas. And finally, we have a winner for Best in Show. And the winner is, envelope please, a poodle. The 148th Westminster Dog Show happened this week, and the winner is a three-year-old standard poodle. Named Sage. Sage won, and for the third time in 20 years,

a poodle is the top dog at the prestigious dog show. Now, time for the best fact yet. This one is from Jack and me, because when we jumped in T-boy style to that dog story just now, we found a really cool fact for you. Two dog breeds that have. never won the Westminster Dog Show are also the two most popular dog breeds in America. That's right. The two most popular dog breeds in the entire country have never won the most

important dog show in the country. What are those two dog breeds? What are they, Jack? You probably grew up with one in your backyard. And in a Frenchie, we're talking retrievers, baby. The Labrador Retriever and the Golden Retriever. There are more homes than any other dogs, but they've never been best in show. Yettys, you look fantastic today. And if you're listening to us from Space Mountain while you're doing some TPS reports. We see you over there. We see you. Leave a comment on Spotify or YouTube telling us the wildest place where you've done work. And the best way that you can grow the show is to tell your buddies today and your co-workers, H-YH-T-B-O-I. Have you had the best one yet? If you know, you know.

And before we go, a happy birthday to Noah Shikar, who's turning one-year-old in the 305 down on South Beach. Happy birthday to Leo Thompson, who's turning 11 in Seattle, Washington, and celebrating with a big game of Capture the Flag. And McKenzie Madden's got a 28th birthday in lovely Portland, Oregon, celebrating, though, in Palm Beach, Florida. Congratulations to Gavin Scholl from Paceon, Utah, who's taken the MCAT. And Amato Villarreal is graduating with an MBA from Berkeley Hoss, was taken on school, a full-time job, being an A-plus dad,

and a husband all through business school. Huge shout out to Liz Blevins from Sogertes, New York, who's actually had a batch weekend in Brattleboro, Vermont this weekend. Yeah, if you go to the Applebeast, then you're in Keene, New Hampshire, and you've gone too far. Get on back to Brattleboro. If you're looking for a place to pregame, hit up the rooftop at Wetstone Brewery, I actually cleaned dishes there as my first ever job when I was 15.

They got a plaque for Jack there. You're going to love it. And Emily Wang from Pearl River, New York just graduated with the near perfect GPA, and is going to be going to NYU for her data science masters in the fall. Congratulations to Ethan Coe from Dobson, North Carolina, who just got a new job at Truest Wealth. And Natalie Camargo from New York City just graduated with a master's from Yeshiva University. And Rachel Power is officially halfway to 28.

It's her half birthday, and she is looking to celebrate with any emergency responders who are available this evening. This is Jack. I own stock of Instacart, Netflix, and Disney.