Today in Digital Marketing - This Episode is 100% Information (I Mean, Probably)

Starting point is 00:00:00 It is Tuesday, September 3rd. Today, it's the too-good-to-be-true sales copy killing your conversions, Canva's eye-watering price increase, some nice benchmarking data coming to GA, and the one-way Instagram format that just became two-way. I'm Todd Maffin. That's ahead today in Digital Marketing. Your 100% claims might be turning customers away. New research suggests that claiming a product is 100%, like 100% pure or 100% reliable,

Starting point is 00:00:37 can backfire and decrease purchase intent by 7.5%. For example, a juice was viewed 7.5% less favorably in the study when it claimed to be 100% juice versus 99% juice. The researchers say when consumers see product information that makes these kinds of claims, it makes them suspicious of the product and its benefits. This leads to a negative reaction, makes them suspicious of the product and its benefits. This leads to a negative reaction, causing them to judge the product more harshly and be less likely to buy it. That said, 100% claims can be effective if they provide specific, relevant, and useful information. For instance, stating 100% organic juice or 100% cotton highlights important details that matter to consumers.

Starting point is 00:01:29 The research comes from a study published in the Psychology and Marketing Journal called The Effects of Pseudo-Relevant 100% Claims. We have a link to it in today's email newsletter, which you can sign up to for free by tapping the link at the top of the show notes or going to todayindigital.com slash newsletter. If you rely on Canva for your marketing, brace yourself, prices are about to soar. Starting next year, customers using Canva Teams, a subscription that supports multiple users,

Starting point is 00:02:00 can expect prices to skyrocket more than 300% thanks to the company's rollout of generative AI features. In the US, some users have reported their annual subscription rising from $120 per year for up to five users to a staggering $500. Canva is offering a 40% discount, but that's only for the first year and will bring the price down to $300, still a significant increase. The change also affects users who are locked into lower rates that Canva no longer offers. In April, the company quietly changed its offering for new team subscribers to $10 per month for each user and set a minimum of three users. Now, Canva says existing users will also be moved to this structure. Many are frustrated by the increase, with some threatening to cancel their subscriptions

Starting point is 00:02:49 and switch to alternatives. Google Analytics has dropped a new update that lets you compare your site's performance with others in your industry, letting you see how your site stacks up. GA4 has started rolling out a benchmarking feature, similar to what was available in Universal Analytics. You should be able to find it by enabling modeling contributions and business insights in admin settings under account details. This option, though, might not be available to all users right away. All right, a whack of updates on the Microsoft ad platform to talk about.

Starting point is 00:03:26 First, the company is introducing what it calls updates to audience ads. These are ads that appear across the web and in mobile ads. It's not entirely clear what they're updating, though. Their PR speak seemed to suggest that the machine learning behind the targeting has gotten smarter, so your mileage may vary. Later this month, the company will expand performance features for display and video ads, including some new bidding strategies, targeting options, and what they call enhanced conversion tracking. The Microsoft Ad Platform now lets you add business logos and customizable calls to action to native ads. Advertisers can either use automated calls to action or select from a predefined list, including options imported from Google. You can start adding these assets to your campaigns now.

Starting point is 00:04:11 They will become eligible to serve starting on September 30th. And advertisers can now use IAS verification for viewability and brand safety. And this is on native display and video ads and will work with any bid strategy. Microsoft is also making connected TV accessible to more advertisers. These updates include support for longer 45 and 75 second video ads and some AI powered asset recommendations to hopefully streamline the creation of this TV ready content. And they've also made some updates to its version of Performance Max. As of last week, campaigns imported through Google Import

Starting point is 00:04:49 will now be converted to Microsoft Performance Max campaigns on Microsoft Advertising rather than Smart Shopping or DSA campaigns. A new search term insights report is also rolling out for all campaign types in the next few weeks. And finally, search themes are now available for pilot in Performance Max.

Starting point is 00:05:08 These are words or phrases associated with the campaign that will help the ad platform optimize it during the learning period. Instagram has added an update pushing more users to slip into your brand's DMs. Some broadcast channel creators can now turn on replies in their broadcast channels. This lets subscribers share their thoughts directly with the channel owner. Previously, these channels were one-way. They were announcements used by brands for updates or creators and so on. The main broadcast channel, it'll still be a one-way stream for updates from the channel admin. Replies will appear in a separate thread. So that makes it more of a discussion area for consumers and fans than a typical group chat. Quoting social media today, quote,

Starting point is 00:05:56 the key difference here seems to be that the main broadcast channel will remain just that, a singular stream of updates from the channel admin, providing another means for brands and influencers to keep their fans updated within Instagram DMs, which is where all the interaction in the app is now happening. And as such, it makes sense for Instagram to facilitate connection in this format. And as noted, Instagram's seeing way more engagement in DMs than in the main feed these days, which is why it's been trying to build upon this as a means to maintain that social network connection as the main feed becomes more of a broadcast feed of AI-recommended clips, unquote. And finally, Google Trends launched its email subscription service in 2014.

Starting point is 00:06:46 Now it is shutting it down. The company says it is discontinuing its email alerts for Google Trends. This was how some marketers stayed up to date on trending topics in Google. The company sending an email to subscribers saying trend notifications will stop on October 29th. Google suggests using RSS feed subscriptions or signing up for its daily homepage newsletter instead. Those are options, but neither is as detailed as the email alerts were.

Starting point is 00:07:18 Well, as the great philosopher Slim Shady once said, guess who's back? Back again. Back again. Back again. It's Steph, the intrepid Steph Gunn, our associate producer who left us a year ago for some bullshit reason I wrote down here on this. What the hell was it again?

Starting point is 00:07:36 Oh yeah, what was it? Just, you know, creating life. Steph had a baby a little under a year ago and so was on mat leave, and she is back. How do you feel? I feel good. It feels good to be back.

Starting point is 00:07:50 It does feel weird to use your brain for something other than diapers, but... Fair, fair. And tell us about the baby. She is beautiful. I've seen photos. She is obviously, objectively, the most beautiful baby in the world. She's really freaking cute. Her name's Pearl.

Starting point is 00:08:05 She's one. She's like a little firecracker. She just recently started biting. So I don't know when we have to start disciplining her, but I think it's coming soon. And based on what you know about her so far, what kind of an adult is Pearl going to be like? Scary. Oh, she's really feisty, is she? She's very feisty, yeah.

Starting point is 00:08:26 She might be a bit of a scary adult based on what we're riding out right now. But I don't know if we're just entering the toddler era. She also already seems to be sarcastic. Oh, at one? It's going to be a fun ride. No kidding. Well, listen, I am so glad you're back.

Starting point is 00:08:43 Everyone, I'm sure, is also so glad you're back. They've had to suffer with the quality of my writing for a year. Now they are back to normal stuff. kidding. Well, listen, I am so glad you're back. Everyone I'm sure is also so glad you're back. They've had to suffer with the quality of my writing for a year. Now they are back to normal stuff. Steph, welcome back. I'm so glad you're back with us. I'm so happy to be back. All right. That's it for today. See you tomorrow.

Today in Digital Marketing - This Episode is 100% Information (I Mean, Probably)

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