4 min read

💌: What will Facebook’s new name be?

💌: What will Facebook’s new name be?

What up! I’m back in your inbox with another roundup of stories and trends from the marketing world this week. I got some good feedback on the “future of marketing” section, so we’re going to keep that going for a bit.

Last week I mentioned that I’m a finalist for a creator grant. Earlier this week I had an interview for it where I chatted with the founder of Pallet (which powers our job board) about what my vision is as a creator. This is basically what I said:

I want to build Forgematic into a marketing agency DAO, with two primary goals: 1.) Lower the barrier of entry to working in marketing and 2.) Eliminate inequality and enable people from any background to be successful in marketing.

Currently, we have a small but growing community of marketers that could act as initial members and help lay the framework of the DAO.

In the “future of marketing section” below, I will drop a link that explains what a DAO is, and why it could be the future way we all work together. Keep those fingers crossed for the grant :)

Alright, enough of me rambling, let’s get into it!

PS: I’ve been wondering what would happen if the Buy Me A Coffee link was way up here instead of at the bottom of the email 👀

Social Media & The Creator Economy

  • The big story this week: Facebook is planning to rebrand and rename itself. Zuck wants to be known for building the metaverse (we have talked about the metaverse a few times now). Facebook wants to be known for more than social media and all the turmoil it’s been swimming in over the past few years. A good take: Facebook is the new Big Tobacco.
  • Pinterest launched a new feature called Creator Rewards, which helps creators on the platform earn money. The company has set aside $20 million to support creators via the new reward system. Oh yeah, PayPal is considering buying Pinterest.
  • YouTube has been testing livestream shopping with select creators, and is now planning a week-long live shopping event. Viewers will be able to shop new products, get limited-time offers, and engage directly with creators.
  • TikTok highlighted 50 of its most influential creators with its first annual Discover List. Take a look at the full list here.
  • Instagram added a new feature called Collabs, new music features for reels, and finally added desktop posting. Collabs allow people to share a post or Reel, with a combined view count, like count, and comment thread. Get the lowdown on this feature and all the others here.
  • Apple’s privacy changes continue to send shockwaves through the social media ad world. This week’s latest victim? Snap Inc., who posted their biggest one-day stock drop this week, losing about $32 billion of market value. Oof. Next week we’ll find out about Alphabet, Facebook, and Twitter’s earnings. Buckle up for more losses. Apple’s market value has tripled since the update, btw.
  • This story about breakout TikTok star Kat Norton is great. She’s an “Excel influencer” which means she uses TikTok to teach people how to use Excel in a new way. She’s now over 650K followers and does this full time!
  • 2022 is right around the corner (whut!), so naturally people are making predictions for marketing trends in the upcoming year. Here’s a list of 26 predictions for social media in 2022.

SEO & Content

Email marketing

Advertising

  • Here’s a headline I was not expecting to type: Kroger is at the forefront of programmatic ad buying. Or rather, they’re one of the first large chain stores to offer advertisers first-party data for ads. That means they can supply data about your purchases and shopping habits to ad buyers. They have a whole data analytics arm, which claims to have data on almost half of US households. You didn’t think that loyalty number was just about discounts, right?
  • Disney is reporting that they’re pretty much out of ad space for the NHL. Only a few slots remain in the playoffs and finals (which will likely be sold to high bidders).
  • Yesterday marked the 20th anniversary of the launch of the first iPod and the iconic “1,000 songs in your pocket” ad campaign. Typing that made me feel old.
  • Great advertising starts with great customer research. This Twitter thread details the only 4 questions you need in a customer interview to prep your next big campaign.

The future of marketing

  • NFTs are booming, and if you don’t understand what they are just yet, this new podcast is for you. You can learn the basics of NFTs, why some projects are valuable, and why everyone on Twitter has an animal as profile pic. NFTs are one part of web3 that require extensive community building as a marketing strategy. Read the backstory of Bored Ape Yacht Club, an NFT project that has had hundreds of millions of dollars in trade volume since April of this year. What made the project so successful? Community building (aka marketing!)
  • Ok, so I said I want to turn Forgematic into a DAO. If you wonder what that is, then start here. Essentially, we could be an agency with a collective treasury where members vote on not only what to do with the treasury money, but also what clients we should work with. Plus, when there’s a new project, you basically get paid when you contribute to it. There’s a big uphill battle though because you need to understand crypto, wallets, tokens, etc. I love the concept, though!

And with that, you made it to the end of this week’s newsletter! Please share it with your friends, on social, in any discords you might be in — it really helps!

Thank you so much!

-- Forge