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KIMP’s Picks 29th March: Weekly Highlights In Design, Marketing, AI, & More

Social media makes it so much simpler to get instant updates on everything you wish to keep up with. But sometimes, it gets a little overwhelming. But then there is the fear of missing out as well. If you are a marketer trying to stay up-to-date with the latest campaigns from around the world, or an entrepreneur looking for all the latest AI updates or just looking for creative inspiration, the KIMP’s Picks 29th March Edition is for you. 

From trending posts to insightful discussions, this post is about everything that unfolded this past week. Are you ready for a quick weekly recap? Then let’s go! 

In the Marketing Realm 

Disney is working on a more efficient ad strategy 

Disney is reportedly, working on sourcing about three-fourths of their ad revenues through programmatic advertising. Disney is evidently among the many brands influencing the advertising landscape. To achieve this, they are launching DRAX Direct, a program that integrates directly with major demand-side platforms (DSPs) like Google DV 360 and The Trade Desk.

The popular online magazine Digiday shared the below post discussing this move from Disney. What stands out in this approach is that it is meant to help advertisers enhance their audience match rates during times when third-party cookies are going away. 

Cadbury’s creative Easter campaign 

With Easter just around the corner, brands are busy launching their campaigns and Cadbury is one that has recently grabbed attention with its creativity. 

Muse by Clio, a popular place to find the latest advertising news, shared the below post discussing the innovative Easter campaign from Cadbury. To promote Cadbury Mini Eggs for their Easter campaign, Cadbury came up with miniature billboard ads first promoted through socials. 

Just last month, Netflix worked with a miniature artist to create a miniature as a part of promoting their hit show, Stranger Things. And now Cadbury seems to be taking this road too. These are campaigns that show that brands are doing their best, pushing the boundaries of marketing – to stand out, to get noticed. So, now’s a good time to start thinking outside the box with your advertising campaigns. 

Guerilla marketing inspiration 

Guerilla marketing is about ads that appear at the most unexpected spot at the most unexpected time and surprise the audience. Several big brands invest in guerilla marketing to make heads turn. Wondering how to leverage this strategy? Then here is a little inspiration shared on the Because Of Marketing page, a great space for marketing inspiration. 

The post features a recent outdoor marketing stunt that Specsavers threw. Tan outdoor installation set up in Edinburgh shows a van crashed into a bollard with a warning sign that talks about automatic bollards. The idea was to ask customers to “book an eye test” to avoid such mishaps. 

The message was on point and the hint of humor in it made the installation even more interesting therefore leading to a lot of media coverage for the brand. 

About building brand loyalty 

Marketing Week brings all the latest marketing news, trends and campaign inspiration. They recently shared an insightful post that discusses the significance of emotional loyalty for brands. About the need for brands to focus on sharing what their values are in order to effectively build brand loyalty. 

The post particularly discusses the role played by sustainability in driving customer loyalty and engagement. It talks about the significant shift in perspectives since the COVID-19 pandemic and how consumers have started prioritizing sustainable lifestyle choices in many ways. Therefore, brands investing in sustainability seem to be noticing better engagement and boosted brand loyalty. 

Some important data predicting the future of advertising in the US 

Renowned advertising news resource, Ad Age shared the below post loaded with data that advertisers would love. In a gist, there’s a steady increase in paid advertising. 

The featured article talks about the projected 5.6% increase in ad revenue in the US. It also delves into the various influencers and platforms that play a significant role in this shift. One notable information to grasp is that about 76% of the total ad spending is expected to go to digital advertising indicating how more and more brands are prioritizing digital media. 

And there are hints about a possible decline in TV advertising since the focus now is more on connected TV and hence brands are working on new strategies to keep up with these changes. So, if you are planning to revisit your advertising strategies this is a resourceful article to read. 

In the Content Marketing Realm 

The platform for user-generated content 

User-generated content has its way of connecting with customers at an emotional level. Hence several brands invest heavily in this type of content. But the question is which platform works best for this purpose. Statista answers this question in the below post. 

The graph shared shows how Reddit continues to be one of the most favored platforms for user-generated content. As can be seen in the data shared, YouTube and Facebook dominate the game however, Reddit is not far behind. This is due to the engaging nature of the platform and how easy it is for users to connect with others from around the world. So, if you are looking to create meaningful conversations with your customers, Reddit is definitely a platform you cannot ignore. 

Increasing crawl demand through quality content 

Search Engine Journal recently shared a post based on insights from Google about increasing the crawl demand. The post goes on to talk about the strategies that Googlebot uses to prioritize sites to crawl. In short, this post is about ways to get your site to look good to search engines and therefore rank well in Search. 

The post discusses tips based on the insights shared by Dave Smart, an SEO consultant, and Google Product Expert. This discussion is based on the fact that search engines only crawl through a limited number of sites every day. And for your site to be among them brands need to focus on creating high-quality content, content that is actually useful to users. So, yes, in content marketing, quality stumps quantity. 

Reasons to prioritize local SEO 

Not all brands seem to take local SEO seriously. But here is a post from Semrush that can change that perspective. This post talks about the need for brands to focus on their local SEO. Irrespective of the end goals, good local SEO can lead to various benefits. 

The post bases this discussion on the fact that there has been about 400% increase in the searches for “Open now near me” and how about 60% of users seem to get in touch with businesses directly from local search results. The post lists 9 such statistics to emphasize the importance of local SEO. Therefore, if you are contemplating on the need for investing in local SEO, this article is a good read. 

Time to prioritize video content 

Video marketing is the way forward. If you are still not convinced, then this post from Kissmetrics, a platform that provides web analytics, will prove the point. According to the post, video content is known to be 50 times as effective when it comes to driving organic search results. While text is good and while text can get your site to rank well, to enhance the performance and to stay consistent, you need video content. 

In a recent edition of KIMP’s Picks, we discussed how video is becoming one of the most influential content types on X. And it’s a well-known fact that several other platforms prioritize video. Therefore, on the whole, now is a good time to work on a robust video marketing strategy for your brand. 

In the Design Realm 

Canva acquires Affinity and moves in a new direction 

Canva has evolved drastically since its launch. It’s no longer just a platform for basic design edits and stock templates. The site has added plenty of AI features and design capabilities making it suitable for designers and non-designers alike. 

In a recent post, they announced the acquisition of Affinity, a popular professional creative software. Until now Canva’s focus has been to make design accessible to all. And now they have expanded and made room to cater to professional designers as well. And the acquisition of Affinity is a move that takes them in this direction. 

With this acquisition, they aim to provide comprehensive design solutions for all types of designers. We’re pretty thrilled to see the kinds of changes that unravel with this new move. 

Design inspiration from a unique collaboration 

A recent unlikely collaboration that’s the talk of the marketing world is the collaboration between Liquid Death and e.l.f. What is particularly intriguing is that these brands have very different brand aesthetics and personalities. 

Ad Age spoke about this new collaboration in a recent post. The post highlights one of the most interesting outcomes of this collaboration – the theme and aesthetics of the product created for this collaboration. Tilted Corpse Paint, this collection features the signature punk vibes associated with Liquid Death. 

There is even a coffin-shaped packaging created for this collection. Whereas they maintain the chic and elegant theme in the products. On the whole, the brands have managed to brilliantly bring both their unique personalities in this collaboration. This is a great example of how brands can make even the most unlikely collaboration work by seamlessly blending their personas and with strong design, of course! 

Adobe introduces Structure Reference in Firefly 

Adobe has announced a significant update to its creative AI tool, Firefly. This update introduces a new feature called “Structure Reference” within the Text to Image module. 

Structure Reference allows users to use the structure of an existing image as a reference to generate new images. Simply upload an image as a reference, and Firefly will create variations based on that structure while incorporating your text prompt. This eliminates the need for extensive text descriptions to achieve the desired outcome.

As per their announcement, this feature is currently available to both free and paid subscribers on the web application of Firefly. 

Taking cues from a timeless ad design 

The X page of It’s Nice That is an excellent source of inspiration in those times when you are stuck in a creative rut. You will find plenty of new campaign design inspiration on their page. And they recently shared a post discussing the ad design created for a brand called Cliik, a provider of home storage solutions. 

The post talks about the campaign that includes visuals inspired by an iconic LEGO ad from the 80s. Marketers can take away valuable lessons from the branding and marketing strategies of LEGO. And this campaign proves that even their marketing creatives are a great source of inspiration. 

This particular ad from LEGO became a classic because of its simple and impactful design and most importantly its emotional value. This shows how a well-designed ad can stand the test of time and boost brand image. 

In the AI Realm 

Google’s VideoPrism revolutionizes video understanding 

Google has been taking huge steps in the world of AI pioneering various new tools for users and developers alike. Another major announcement that came from them this past week introduced to the world a new tool called VideoPrism. 

In short, this is a tool that simplifies video analysis which is currently a less-explored side of AI. The tool reportedly comes in handy for several kinds of video-understanding applications. 

As per Google, they have used millions of video-text pairs to train this model and to ensure that it perceives videos as a human being would. 

To sum up, VideoPrism represents a significant leap forward in video understanding technology, paving the way for advancements in fields like scientific discovery, education, and healthcare. 

Super Grok coming to Premium+ subscribers 

X New Daily, a space to gather all the latest updates related to X shared the below post featuring some changes coming to Grok, X’s popular AI tool. According to the post, a premium version of the Grok tool called “Super Grok” will soon be made available to Premium+ users. 

On another note, there was also news that Grok will soon be available not just to Premium+ subscribers but also to Premium subscribers. 

Get ready for Grok 1.5

While Super Grok is on the cards, the other major announcement made by xAI recently is that Grok 1.5 is coming soon. Reportedly, this version is being built with better reasoning capabilities. But the biggest leap will be the expansion of the context length to 128,000 tokens.

With respect to the performance of Grok, here’s a screenshot they shared of how it performs in popular benchmarks.

The company is planning to release this version in a phased out manner with early access to testers being made available soon and public access coming later.

Stability AI introduces a new tool for programmers 

Stability AI announced their next big tool called Stable Code Instruct 3B which is touted to be a useful option for programmers. This new AI model will support natural language interaction. 

Stable Code Instruct 3B allows users to achieve various coding tasks through simple natural language instructions. These could be to tackle tasks like code generation, solving mathematical problems, and even for answering software development-related questions.

For users with Stability AI membership, this tool is available even for commercial use. 

Apple is likely to work with Baidu to bring Gen AI into their devices 

Apple has been surprisingly silent and somewhat less active in comparison with other tech brands when it comes to AI advancements. But they are consistently making an effort to bridge this gap. In a recent post, The Wall Street Journal spoke about Apple’s recent talks with Chinese tech giant Baidu in order to bring generative AI tech to their devices in China. 

Last week there were talks about Apple’s discussions with Google to bring Gemini capabilities, AI capabilities to Apple devices. And now this additional step strongly indicates that Apple is keen on making progress in this segment. 

Sora’s new examples 

OpenAI wowed the world with Sora, a powerful text-to-video tool that’s likely to be launched soon. While the preview of the tool has only been available to a select few creatives, OpenAI has regularly been sharing examples to show the capabilities of this model. 

In a recent post, they spoke about the work being conducted in Sora in collaboration with filmmakers and artists. From experimental videos to short films generated on Sora, the post highlights a lot of new examples. And they are truly mind-blowing. This has certainly added to the anticipation for the launch of this tool to the public. 

Social Media Feature Updates and Algorithm Changes

YouTube’s generative AI capabilities 

YouTube has been introducing some user-facing AI features to help creators create and manage their content more effectively. One among them is Dream Screen, a generative AI feature that lets creators remove and replace the background in their videos to create some cool effects.  They shared the below post giving a glimpse into this feature. 

The post also features an article that includes insights from a letter from the YouTube CEO about the biggest predictions for YouTube in 2024. 

Do not delete your YouTube videos 

Todd B., Product Lead for YouTube homepage and recommendations, shared the below post recently recommending that users do not delete their YouTube videos. According to his post, when you take a video down, you are also breaking the connection that was established between your channel and a set of your audience. Therefore, removing videos from your channel might not be a great idea after all! 

He also suggests making videos public in order to boost the growth of the channel. And if you really do not want your video to appear on your channel, another idea he suggests is to unlist the video rather than deleting it. 

Instagram revamps its hashtag search strategy 

Marketing Mind, a popular publishing house that talks about marketing news, shared the below post discussing the recent changes that have come to Instagram’s hashtag search strategy. Reportedly the change is to facilitate a more effective discovery experience for users. 

Earlier, users could only see the Top Posts on searching for a hashtag. But with this update, users are likely to see additional options including relevant profiles and the option to follow a topic. 

You might soon see games on LinkedIn 

If you thought games on social media was Facebook’s arena, think again! Reportedly, LinkedIn is also testing the waters. The popular tech news site Gadgets 360 shared the below post discussing some unprecedented changes coming to LinkedIn, games on the platform. 

But these are not going to be like your usual social games. There will be a few games where companies will also be ranked within the games based on the scores obtained by their employees. The idea is to make the platform more engaging and user-friendly. 

Snapchat’s new advertising feature 

Advertisers will soon have a new advertising option on Snapchat- Sponsored AR Filters. This feature allows brands to create branded overlays that users can add to their Snaps, fostering a more interactive and engaging experience.

Reportedly, these Sponsored AR filters will be easier for bands to create. Measures like these work well in harnessing user-generated content. 

That’s a Wrap 

That’s all we have for this week’s KIMP’s Picks edition. That was a whirlwind of updates, don’t you agree? Some pretty exciting advancements in the AI realm, plenty of inspirational campaigns for brands to learn from and a bunch of social media updates to look out for. Equipped with these updates we hope you embrace the coming week with great enthusiasm. Stay tuned and we’ll be back soon with another round-up. 

Posted On

29 Mar, 2024

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