Just Let Go – What's Working in Marketing?

Welcome back to another week of What's Working in Marketing, a weekly newsletter where we share what's working outside your own four walls across the digital marketing landscape so you can be more effective. If you enjoy reading this,?follow me on LinkedIn ?or create a?FREE Insight Library account , our team is publishing tons of free research that you won't want to miss.

This week we're breaking down:

• The Highlights:?It's time to let go of the control around your brand partnerships and let creators be themselves
• The Watercooler:?Digging into how to figure out what is actually working in marketing
• #MarketingTwitter :?Diving into three Tweets about embracing zero-click content, uncovering a counterintuitive marketing strategy and learning about Pinterest's newest app

JUST... SIT BACK & RELAX?

Doja Cat's partnership with JBL has opened up a lot of insight into the direction of influencer marketing and celebrity partnerships. To this day influencer partnerships and brand deals have been conducted with a certain level of control from the brand marketing side for the most part.?

I don't want to generalize and say all brands are like this but traditionally, there are set terms and set ways that the influencer will engage and create content for the partnering brand.?But,?things are (kind of?) changing.?

Back to Doja Cat & JBL, the star wore a custom speaker to the Grammys this year to initiate the start of the partnership. Then, being herself, Doja Cat published a TikTok saying "jibble jibble jibble" instead of the brand name J-B-L. The post has generated more than 5.8M engagements, from Doja Cat being... Doja Cat. The organic and real nature of the content created more success than a contrived and conceived TikTok script could have ever generated. Fast Company does a good job breaking down how traditionally the mispronunciation of a brand name from a partnership would be a PR nightmare, but this time around marketers are sitting back and going with the flow of?what's working.??

What is working?

People being themselves. On a deeper level than we realized the success of a campaign like this is ultimately driving the new wave of UGC creation where marketers are saying goodbye to influencers and hello to actual customers.?

Prospects want genuine connections, and real experiences. That's not to say influencers don't serve a place in the market anymore, they will continue to have their reign. It's just the shift will move from scripted to actual usage as marketers diversify.

Here are three Tweets you should check out this week:

1. Embracing zero-click content

2. Counterintuitive marketing strategy to drive sales

3. Pinterest debuts a new app, Shuffles

?? Thank You! ??

That's all for this week, I hope that you enjoyed it. If you found this valuable, I'd really appreciate it if you tagged someone who should read this in the comments.

I'll catch you next week. ???