SparkToro Blog

Office Hours: B2B Storytelling: How to Make Your Brand Their Favorite

“What’s the best Disney movie of all time?” Before you answer — you’re already proving the point. In this episode of SparkToro Office Hours from a few years back, Jay Acunzo breaks down one of the most important (and most ignored) truths in B2B storytelling: people don’t choose what’s objectively best. They choose what feels like their favorite. A lot…

Audience Research Newsletter: Mini Buyer Persona; Podcast Pitch Advice; Influence Maps

We’re publishing prior issues of the Audience Research Newsletter here! But we’re not just copying and pasting from the archives — we’re only surfacing what we believe is still salient today. For the newest, freshest advice on audience research and doing better marketing, subscribe here so you don’t miss new editions! We send this newsletter twice per month. Make a…
Marketing Office Hours Tactics

Office Hours: How to Write Influence-Driven Marketing Messaging

“Where we’re going, we don’t need… roads.” Slip on your self-lacing Nike Mags, and buckle up in the DeLorean. We’re going back to 2021 to that time I (Amanda) presented on writing influence-driven marketing messaging. A lot has changed since then. AI wasn’t yet swallowing every marketing conversation whole, “zero-click” was just starting to take off, and plenty of marketers…

Audience Research Newsletter: Why Audience Research; Grow Your Podcast; When to Charge for Public Speaking

We’re publishing prior issues of the Audience Research Newsletter here! But we’re not just copying and pasting from the archives — we’re only surfacing what we believe is still salient today. For the newest, freshest advice on audience research and doing better marketing, subscribe here so you don’t miss new editions! We send this newsletter twice per month. 1. Why…
Marketing

Why LinkedIn Might Have Two Algorithms — and Why Marketers Should Care

We marketers talk about the LinkedIn algorithm as though it’s a single behemoth. But a recent analysis from Christopher Penn suggests the platform may be running two separate systems that work together to determine what shows up in the feed. One system decides whether your post should even be considered for someone’s feed. The other decides where it ranks once…
Content Marketing Marketing Tactics

Best Practices Are Meaningless Without Audience Research

There isn’t actually anything “wrong” with best practices. Best practices are general guidelines for what to do in order to ensure a general baseline of success. The problem comes when you employ best practices without personalization or a point of view. Then you’re just leading with some statistically average decision and marketing to… nobody in particular. Certainly not bad enough…
AI/LLMs Marketing

Why Everyone Prompts AI Differently (Even When They Want the Same Thing)

Recently, I ran a tiny experiment. I asked eight mom friends — people very similar to me socioeconomically and with kids around the same age — to look up local basketball leagues for their kids. My only instructions were to search as though they really wanted a good answer. (And of course, “good” is subjective.) Every single one of them…