Addicted to checking your email? Streaming services—yes, streaming services—might be betting on it.

The annual churn rate across streamers in the US in the 12 months ending in June averaged 47%, according to Parks Associates, and consumers report taking longer than ever to find shows to watch, meaning streamers are pressed to find ways to keep viewers from canceling their subscriptions. And there’s a relatively simple channel that some media companies are tapping into as part of their efforts to try to keep viewers plugged in week after week: The humble email inbox.

At NBCUniversal-owned streamer Peacock, users across its free and paid tiers are each sent between three and five emails per week depending on how active they are on the service, Annabella Goff, Peacock’s senior director of CRM, said. As of June, Peacock had 24 million paying subscribers, translating to several billion emails sent every year.

Blasting users with email messages may sound less sexy than the sophisticated algorithms that streamers promise will serve up perfectly timed and personalized programming recommendations. But at Peacock, at least, email seems to have a big effect on churn reduction and conversion rates. Late last year, an email campaign in which more than 40 million users received year-in-review breakdowns of their viewing activity on Peacock translated to a 20% reduction in churn rate among paid subscribers in a 30-day period, as well as a 6% higher upgrade rate for free users who moved into Peacock’s paid tier, Goff said.

More broadly, every single premium subscription streamer saw churn rates in June 2023 increase compared to the year prior—with the exception of Peacock, which saw churn rates decline 2%, according to data from Antenna.

“We know that email, in particular, is a channel that works,” Goff told Marketing Brew.

Read the full story here.—KS

A seamless customer experience is a huge selling point for brands—one that can make a marketer’s job easier.

In the name of improving customer experiences, Amazon and Panera are turning to large language models and conversational AI to improve ordering. The success they’ve seen so far is undeniable, but is this really the future? Learn how this new phenomenon could change the game.

Google is rolling out a new policy called Limited Ads Serving in an effort to reduce misleading advertisements across its platforms.

Under the policy, new advertisers will be subject to a “get-to-know-you period,” during which their ad impressions may be limited as Google familiarizes itself with the advertiser. Google will evaluate user feedback, past adherence to advertising policies, and whether the advertiser completed Google’s Advertiser Identity Verification process to determine whether and when new advertisers can expand its reach.

“Imagine someone is looking to book their next trip and searches for their favorite airline’s flights to San Francisco. Under this new approach, the vast majority of ads they see related to that search would be from…advertisers with a history of policy compliance and transparency,” Alejandro Borgia, director of product management for ads safety, explained in a post about the new policy. “Advertisers without this record of good behavior might have their impressions limited.”

Keep reading here.—JS

Each week, we spotlight Marketing Brew readers in our Coworking series. If you’d like to be featured, introduce yourself here.

Georges Tertois is co-founder and general manager of Eidgensi, a creative media agency based in London.

What’s your favorite ad campaign? The Guardian’s “The Three Little Pigs” ad. Honestly, I think this campaign was a little ahead of its time; the ad flipped a common story that we probably all know and love from our childhoods completely on its head. When it comes down to it, marketing is about how you convey a story. As marketers, we have to keep on flipping the script, changing what we create as either technology or the audience’s needs change and evolve.

One thing we can’t guess from your LinkedIn profile? I’m a geek, basically, and I love history, especially ancient societies and their mythologies. I really love Stephen Fry’s take on the ancient Greek classics. My partner got me a signed copy of his book, which I didn’t realize I needed or wanted until I had it!

What marketing trend are you most optimistic about? Least? I’m excited about AI. There’s a lot of fear around its implementation within the marketing world, but AI is not going to take people’s jobs, it’s just going to make us faster and more effective.

I think of it like this: if I have the best golf clubs in the world, and I’m playing a round against Tiger Woods, and he has rusty old clubs, he’s still going to beat me every time. Skilled and driven people are always going to win, and good tools just enhance their capabilities. So, ultimately, if you’re talented, you work hard, and you understand how to leverage AI tools, you’ll be more effective than ever.

Continue reading here.

There are a lot of bad marketing tips out there. These aren’t those.

Leave a message: Suggestions on how to use Facebook’s autoreply tool to boost brand reputation.

May I suggest: Read up on Reddit’s updates to its contextual ad targeting tools, which now include AI-suggested keywords and topics.

Go long: ICYMI, Instagram is experimenting with 3-minute and 10-minute video lengths on Reels.

Do more with data: Use data and analytics to create influencer marketing strategies that drive ROI with Tagger. Dive deep into what makes a campaign successful + find your next brand partner.*

TV is trending: Advertising through the telly is back in style, and MNTN’s got the deets. Their interactive white paper offers a deep dive + exclusive insights into performance TV advertising. Check it out.*

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• Vice president of philanthropy marketing at a leading cancer treatment and research center
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Mergers and acquisitions, company partnerships, and more.

• Francois-Henri Pinault, the French billionaire whose family controls luxury giants Kering and Christie’s, is set to acquire Hollywood talent agency CAA.
• Digital World Acquisition Corp., a SPAC, is asking shareholders to once again extend the deadline to merge with former President Trump’s platform Truth Social after a string of legal and regulatory setbacks.
• Disney and Charter Spectrum are locked in a bitter carriage dispute that left some customers without channels like ESPN and FX over Labor Day weekend.