Marketing Letter - 👏 Forbes & Co. Finally Get Clapped

GM nerds,

Welcome back to the newsletter that’s pouring one out for Forbes, WSJ, and CNN…

… so you don’t have to.

Here’s what’s good this week:

→ Is Bluesky Really Relevant? 🤔
→ Forbes & Co. Finally Get Clapped 👏
→ Major Upgrades & Changes @ ChatGPT 👀
→ more, obviously 💬

But first…

​This Week's Video 🗣️🎙️​

In this week's video, I cover the significant updates regarding site reputation changes implemented by Google. These changes have already led to noticeable impacts on various websites, a testament to the weight of this update. While I haven't fully explored the detailed documents yet, I'm eager to dive into the nuances and implications associated with these adjustments. So, tune in for more!

​YouTube​​

What’s Going Down @ Google 📊

→ Changes happen fast w/ Google. Here’s the updated site reputation policy itself, which has absolutely shattered the CNNs, WSJs, and Forbes’s of the world. All were de-indexed— skill issue. And I for one love to see it. FWIW, the policy changed from:

“Site reputation abuse is when third-party pages are published with little or no first-party oversight or involvement, where the purpose is to manipulate search rankings by taking advantage of the first-party site's ranking signals.”

To:

“Site reputation abuse is the practice of publishing third-party pages on a site in an attempt to abuse search rankings by taking advantage of the host site's ranking signals.”

→ Still, the update’s aim is to further punish those among us getting the Parasite SEO bag.

→ And here’s a thorough unpacking of the whole shebang by Search Engine Land. TLDR; even though the penalty is still strictly manual, Google no longer seems to be giving preferential treatment to big publishers, and is clapping everyone equally.

AI Insight 🤖

→ If OpenAI told you that it “accidentally deleted potential evidence” in its massive copyright lawsuit vs. the NY Times, would you believe it? If so, I’m the Wallet Inspector, HMU for a free inspection.

→ GPT-4o just got a big update, with enhanced creative writing ability and improved capacity for dealing with uploaded files, among other things. Meanwhile, OpenAI is bringing the Advanced Voice Mode feature on ChatGPT to the world wide web, as the AI chatbot will now be browser-accessible to users.

→ A new upgrade by Microsoft to GraphRAG has AI search engines providing better answers while using fewer resources.

→ Oh yeah, if you’re looking for an update on how the public is feeling about transparently AI-generated marketing materials, the lashing Coca-Cola is taking for this year’s holiday campaign is a good case study.

→ A little off-topic, but Ben Affleck’s take on how AI will (and won’t) impact Hollywood is super well-spoken, smart, and probably shines some light on how emerging tech will (and won’t) impact other industries, too. Obligatory:

Social Media Round-up 📲

→ If LinkedIn is part of your grind, this list of “6.5 Creative Principles to Boost Your LinkedIn Ads Strategy” offers some data-backed, platform-specific ad tips… Including: “Be context aware,” “Don't just be different, be distinctive,” and “Get emotional” because “content resonates deepest when it triggers human emotion.”

→ A new TikTok thirty-party affiliate integration feature is letting creators add product links from networks like Amazon, Walmart, Target, etc., directly to their posts. For now, this is just being tested with certain creators, and TikTok hasn’t made any official announcements about the feature.

→ Here’s some data that might help you decide whether you really need to add Bluesky to your social media portfolio. TLDR; “usage of the Bluesky app is more than 500% higher in the US and over 350% higher in the UK” this month, but whether this is just a knee-jerk reaction to the election result or something that’ll sustain long-term? That remains to be seen.

→ TikTok’s new holiday guide offers actionable advice for “launching effective holiday campaigns, driving seasonal sales, and measuring performance.” Worth a look if TikTok is part of your playbook.

And, speaking of…

Holiday Rundown

→ Don’t shoot the messenger, but the holidays are already starting. This Holiday 2024 Data Hub by Marketing Charts puts a lot of good stuff together.

Almost every major source identified by the article is predicting that sales forecasts are lower than last year's, with NRF, Deloitte, ICSC, AlixPartners, and NetElixir all encouraging us to- comparatively- limit expectations. Meanwhile, Salesforce is expecting a 2% increase in online spending while Adobe is projecting an 8.4% increase.

Jacky Chou​
Founder of Indexsy
hello@indexsy.com
Let's Connect on Twitter👇

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