Today in Digital Marketing - 'Buy Now Pay Later' Gets a Huge Vote of Confidence

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Starting point is 00:00:18 starting at $19 per month at zensurance.com. Be protected. Be Zen. Today, if you're not offering buy now, pay later, now might be the time. at zensurance.com Language Day, Moldova. I'm Todd Matvin from EngageQ Digital, and here's what you missed today in Digital Marketing, episode 458. Well, first it was Twitter. Now it's LinkedIn's turn to bail out on stories. The ephemeral vertical format made popular by Snapchat and later ripped off by Instagram, was also copied by other social channels. But both Twitter and now LinkedIn have decided it's just not a fit for their users. Twitter called theirs fleets and they're already gone.

Starting point is 00:01:16 LinkedIn says they'll drop theirs within a month. And why? LinkedIn says its users didn't like the fact that the videos disappeared after 24 hours. Quoting their senior director of product, quote, in developing stories, we assumed people wouldn't want informal videos attached to their profile. And the temporary nature of these videos would reduce barriers that people feel about posting. Turns out, you want to create lasting videos that tell your professional story in a more personal way and that showcases both your personality and expertise, unquote.

Starting point is 00:01:48 This does have direct implications for media buyers, as LinkedIn's ad placement of stories will, of course, also be disappearing. This doesn't mean LinkedIn is done with copying what's popular. They're said to still be working on a Clubhouse live audio clone. It's not just LinkedIn cancelling things. Google Ads this afternoon also announced it would be dropping something. In their case, expanded text ads. After June 30th of next year, you will not be able to create expanded text ads.

Starting point is 00:02:21 If you still have some running, though, they will continue to serve alongside responsive search ads, and you'll also be able to get data reporting on those campaigns. You will also be able to pause and resume them, but after that date, you will not be allowed to edit them, or as I said, create new ones. Google recommends you have at least one responsive search ad in every group of your search campaigns by that date. Again, that's June 30th of next year. This is, of course, part of the industry's continued drunken infatuation with artificial intelligence making campaign decisions instead of, you know, advertisers. Quoting Google's announcement today, automation is the key to keeping pace with these trends. Responsive search ads are a great example

Starting point is 00:03:02 of how this is done. They combine your creativity with the power of machine learning to help you show more relevant ads to more people. This is a powerful combination. Advertisers that switch from expanded text ads to responsive search ads using the same assets see an average of 7% more conversions at a similar cost per conversion. If you've ever wanted proof that the buy now, pay later industry was going to form a huge part of e-commerce, here's the proof you were waiting for. Amazon has now bought in. Partnering with the BNPL company Affirm, soon customers will be able to pay in monthly installments on purchases over $50 on Amazon. A firm said there'd be no late or hidden fees, but would charge interest on certain products. They did not specify which products.

Starting point is 00:03:51 Amazon had been testing this for a while, and apparently they like the numbers. This will roll out widely in the coming months. This isn't the first time Amazon's partnered with a buy-now-pay-later firm. It's offered the service in Australia for a couple of years now, though through a different firm. But this is the first time they've offered it in the US. Other players in the game are Klarna and Afterpay, the latter of which recently got acquired by PayPal. As for Affirm, it raised $1.2 billion during its January IPO and says it has 12,000 merchants as clients. But one of those

Starting point is 00:04:22 clients makes up one fifth of its overall revenue. That client? Peloton. It's the season for new styles, and you love to shop for jackets and boots. So when you do, always make sure you get cash back from Rakuten. And it's not just clothing and shoes. You can get cash back from over 750 stores on electronics, holiday travel, home decor, and more. It's super easy. And before you buy anything, always go to Rakuten first. Join free at Rakuten.ca.

Starting point is 00:04:57 Start shopping and get your cash back sent to you by check or PayPal. Get the Rakuten app or join at rakuten.ca. R-A-K-U-T-E-N dot C-A. Do you have business insurance? If not, how would you pay to recover from a cyber attack, fire damage, theft, or a lawsuit? No business or profession is risk-free. Without insurance, your assets are at risk

Starting point is 00:05:21 from major financial losses, data breaches, and natural disasters. Get customized coverage today starting at $19 per month assets are at risk from major financial losses, data breaches, and natural disasters. Get customized coverage today starting at $19 per month at zensurance.com. Be protected. Be Zen. More movement on the connected TV front. The smart TV brand Vizio has secured more than $100 million in spending commitments, most of this money coming from six major agency holding companies. Quoting Vizio, this accelerating advertiser demand is aligned with broader market shifts as consumers increasingly move from linear TV to streaming, and advertisers seek the unique opportunities that Vizio, whose smart TVs are in

Starting point is 00:05:57 millions of homes across America, supplies. Vizio only recently announced frequency capping so you can control how often a device is exposed to an ad on one of their TVs. On the content side, they have a collection of more than 260 free-to-watch, ad-supported TV channels. So, lots of inventory there. If you're an SEO type person, you may have noticed that Google Search Console has been missing data for August 23rd and 24th. This happens from time to time, and in most of the cases, Google's actually got that data backed up somewhere else, and they can use that backup to backfill the missing numbers. Not this time.

Starting point is 00:06:37 Google's John Mueller says, quote, It looks like this really is data loss and won't be backfilled, unquote. He also mentioned that they've sometimes thought about using the power of machine learning to backfill with made-up data. Oh, I'm sorry, I read that wrong. Here it is. With interpolated data, something Facebook calls modeled data, something that marketing professionals call horseshit. But so far, they haven't and don't plan to in this case.

Starting point is 00:07:03 So remember, just because your numbers dropped off a cliff those dates doesn't mean you lost clicks or impressions. It's only the reporting data that's gone here. A couple of interesting findings from a study TikTok commissioned of 7,000 of its users around the world. Most of the study results were, you know, about what you'd expect from a self-funded study. Everyone loves TikTok. Everyone's inspired by it. Blah, blah, blah. But a couple of interesting items stood out to me. First, those polled said they're spending more time on TikTok at the expense of watching TV, listening to podcasts, watching streaming videos or reading.

Starting point is 00:07:39 Specifically, 35% said they spend less time watching TV or video content since they started using TikTok. 46% say they engage with the app's content without any other distractions. Apparently, that number was 37% on competing platforms. And 25% reported they research or buy a product after seeing it on TikTok. And finally, for those of you who use Google's Workplace Suite, the company announced yesterday they will be adding a panel to Calendar called Time Insights. This will let you see... I don't even know if you want to see this or not, but it will let you see how much your working week is spent in meetings.

Starting point is 00:08:20 It will be rolling out gradually over the next month to most of their plans. The starter and basic plans will be spared this misery. The company says this information will only be visible to you. Your manager or employer will not have access to the Insights Report. I'm very excited. I have a new monitor coming. I've been using this really old 27-inch Apple monitor for more than a decade now. It still has a MagSafe connection, if that tells you anything about its age. But it's held up really well.

Starting point is 00:08:51 No burned out pixels. It is starting to get a little dim, though. And I feel like I need a little bit more kind of desktop space. So tomorrow, I am getting a 49-inch super wide monitor. Yes, more than four feet wide. I can plug the HDMI from my cable box in my studio into it, so the left third or quarter or something will be CNN or CBC or something all day long. I do this now.

Starting point is 00:09:14 I have a little 18-inch monitor up on a cheap lamp frame so I can kind of monitor what's going on in the news. Very excited about that. Talk to you tomorrow. Let it go. Talk to you tomorrow.

Today in Digital Marketing - 'Buy Now Pay Later' Gets a Huge Vote of Confidence

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