Hello Marketers!! It’s finally Friday, and we’re closing the week with a mix of brands getting bold, shifting strategies, and rewriting playbooks.

Today: the fake-apology trend taking over Instagram, Manscaped’s move from performance to long-term brand building, and how news advertising is quietly outperforming. Plus: TikTok’s creator advantage, SEO’s reinvention, Poppi’s marketing masterclass, and more. Let’s dive in…

Instead of chasing rankings, brands now have to earn citations, the new visibility currency, by building entity-level authority, publishing verifiable expert content, and structuring knowledge in ways AI can trust. This shift forces SEO to evolve from keyword focus to brand-level credibility, meaning we must rethink content workflows, measurement, and strategy to ensure their brand becomes the top answer, not just a blue link. Why it matters (POV): In an answer-first world, AI is both the gatekeeper and the competitor, and the successful brands will be the ones that feed these models with the clearest expertise and strongest authority signals.

It proves to be powerful for rapid ideation, especially for seasonal variations, mood changes, and material edits, making it a strong asset for PMax and Display creatives. Tests show it excels in lighting, textures, and object placement, but still struggles with brand elements, demographic accuracy, and consistency, meaning it can't replace professional design for high-stakes or heavily branded campaigns. Why it matters (POV): As AI tools flood the ad ecosystem, the real advantage won’t come from generating more assets, but from knowing when AI helps you scale and when human judgment protects brand integrity.

Creator-led ads massively outperform traditional brand creatives, delivering 70% higher CTR and 159% higher engagement at the same CPM because creators understand TikTok culture, move fast, and bring built-in trust that brand channels can’t replicate. With TikTok One now streamlining creator discovery, briefs, production, and reporting for us marketers, brands can scale both big campaign moments and always-on storytelling without burning internal bandwidth. Why it matters (POV): The platform’s most effective brand marketing is no longer “ads” angle, it’s creator-powered content that feels native and community-aligned, and TikTok One makes it easier for brands to collaborate with creators.

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Brands pretend to apologize for their products being too good, a trend that drives fast engagement because users instinctively stop when they think they’re seeing a real apology. While early adopters saw big spikes in likes and virality, comms experts warn the tactic is quickly becoming overplayed and could backfire by dulling the impact of real apologies in future crises. Why it matters (POV): This trend is a perfect example of short-term social wins vs. long-term brand risk. It could erode customer trust when brands actually need to communicate something serious.

60% of marketers say news placements beat their campaign benchmarks. With granular suitability controls now available, brands can avoid specific topics without blocking entire news sites. It conveniently opens access to some of the most engaged, high-intent audiences online. Why it matters (POV): while social feeds and search traffic become less predictable, news environments offer stable reach, strong performance, and audiences that actually pay attention, making it an underused but high-ROI channel.

Manscaped hit the natural ceiling of performance marketing after years of pumping 70% of its budget into the lower funnel, so the brand flipped its strategy. Now putting nearly 70% into upper-funnel campaigns to drive cultural relevance. Their viral “Send Face Pics Instead” campaign is the blueprint: a humor-led, insight-backed repositioning play that reached 60M organic views. Why it matters (POV): The next stage of growth for D2C brands doesn’t come from more conversion ads, but from brand storytelling powerful enough to shift perception, open new categories, and compound over months, not days.

Their marketing strategy is built on founder-led storytelling, TikTok-native content, cultural fluency, and a brand identity engineered for modern consumers. Instead of traditional campaigns, Poppi used Allison Ellsworth’s unfiltered TikTok presence to drive real-time demand, viral moments that lifted sales 200% overnight, Gen Z-focused campus activations, and creator-led Super Bowl spots that outperformed legacy soda giants. Why it matters (POV): brands aren’t built through distribution alone, they’re built through story, community, and culture first (even for consumer goods). Poppi’s playbook is a masterclass in how authenticity plus smart category insight can redefine an entire market.

Ocado shifts from pure performance to a “consideration → profitable growth” strategy, betting on brand building, value-based acquisition, and smarter on-site personalization to scale beyond its current 14% share of the online grocery. The biggest unlock is the Marks & Spencer partnership. Most new customers come because of M&S, yet many still don’t realize Ocado is the exclusive online home of M&S food. The CMO’s playbook combines faster delivery, deeper loyalty integration, and search-driven repeat purchases with a channel mix led by Google Shopping, Meta, and a 5–10% experimental budget. Why it matters (POV): Ocado is proving that long-term growth doesn’t come from chasing the cheapest CPA, but from boosting consideration (aligned with the Manscaped growth strategy above), improving convenience, and using personalization where it actually impacts revenue. 

— Sam C.