In the era of zero-click platforms, native content, and walled gardens, does anyone still send meaningful traffic to the open web? Is Google responsible for 50% of all traffic referrals? 75%? Is social media sending half what search does? A quarter? Less? Are the major platforms sending less traffic overall than they did a year
The Zero-Click Email Strategy That Gets Us 40%+ Open Rates
By Ugh, I don’t want to give away my email strategy. Because it’s mine and it’s working really well for us. But since Rand recently wrote about how email is the most consistent, reliable marketing channel — and, well, he’s right — I’d be remiss in not helping you out. Our twice-monthly audience research newsletter goes
Email is the Most Consistent, Reliable Marketing Channel on the Web and I Can Prove It
By This is a very short post to say: If you’re not investing in your own email marketing list, you’re making a bad choice. Social media engagement rates have plummeted the last 15 years. Ad engagement, too. Google CTRs have fallen massively the last decade with the rise of zero-click searches. The visibility of TV and
The Chill Work Manifesto
By Shortly after Amanda Natividad joined SparkToro, she coined the term “Chill Work” to describe the unusually patient, mature, laid-back approach we take to building this business. And for the last three years, it’s become a bigger and bigger part of how I think about not only this company, but everything I do professionally. Today, I
What To Do When You’re Out of Ideas
By I’ve only been writing online as a marketer for about four years. And already, I feel like I’m out of ideas. You could say that it’s because I’m still in a postpartum fog. (Supposedly, it generally takes up to six months for hormone levels to return to pre-pregnancy levels and I’m five months postpartum.) But
The Best Damn Food & Drink Gift Guide on the Internet 2023
By Here it is, our fourth annual edition! The first three were just practice for this masterpiece of culinary and imbibable magnificence. Because this year, our food and drink gift guide isn’t just the usual excellent selection — products we’ve used, received and enjoyed, and/or gifted — it’s also chock-full of pithy commentary on important topics
Why Digital Marketing Agencies Have it Tough in 2023 | 5-Minute Whiteboard
By 3 months ago, a dear friend’s agency closed for good. 2 months ago, another close friend had a round of layoffs at their firm. And in just the last two weeks, I talked to four agency owners who reported their first revenue-declining year in the last five. It’s rough out there for a lot of
The Final Chapter of My First Startup
By I’ve told this story only once before. Never in writing. Never on video. My voice was shaky and I barely stumbled through it. But with a few years of distance I think I’m finally ready. Here goes… For 17 years I had one job. A job that defined my adult life, my self-worth, the majority
How to Future-Proof Your Marketing for an AI-Centric Search World? | 5-Minute Whiteboard
By Today, Google’s search results still look (mostly) like lists of snippets and links, e.g. But, plenty of search marketers and industry observers suspect we’re in the closing days of this format, and the future holds something closer to how AI-tools like ChatGPT and Bard answer user-inputted prompts, e.g. If that’s the case, what can/should marketers
Why the Least Measurable Marketing Channels Tend to Perform Best: 5-Minute Whiteboard
By Content marketing, social media, events, PR, and marketing through sources-of-influence have consistently produced remarkable results for the companies I’ve run, and yet, most big businesses invest 1/1,000th the effort and dollars in these tactics that they do in digital advertising. Why? Measurability and scalability. Let’s dig into this challenge (and how you can invest better)