Ian Mackey

It’s ok to feel like this at the moment. It’s not age, the industry demands you are across the newest and most effective way to connect with people effectively. Marketing, comms, creative and media is in a bit of an identity crisis. And when that happens, you put on different things to see what works. INSERT - AI is the future, influencers should capture 8% of total ad spend, sponsorship isn’t right (Toyota stopping Olympics post Paris), use EX as your next campaign, and advantage+ everything. Australia’s ad spend is recovering slower compared to the US and Europe. It’s a good thing. This is the time to question everything we are doing. Ask these sorts of questions. “Will this actually work” “Could this money be better spent in the business” “If I don’t spend this money, what will happen”

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Who would’ve thought that in June of 2024, brands are still putting up their rainbow-themed logo as their profile picture for Pride month and calling it a day? Not me 🤷🏽‍♀️ In our 2024 Influencer Pricing Report we quoted New Digital Age who found that nearly 57% of UK consumers disengage from media and advertisements they perceive as unrepresented, specifically 62% of LGBTQIA+ individuals reporting they tune out. But this isn’t about brands getting consumers to care about them, this is about showing true allyship. Consumers in 2024 expect brands to show genuine social responsibility, otherwise, they a) don’t trust them and b) don’t buy from them. So how can brands be better and support the LGBTQIA+ community during Pride and beyond? ⬇️ 1. Support LGBTQIA+ causes - Donate to and partner with organisations that actively support the community! This is so much more meaningful and impactful than rainbow profile pictures. 2. Partner with LGBTQIA+ creators - Collaborate with LGBTQIA+ influencers and content creators, during Pride and throughout the rest of the year too (👀) 3. Always have inclusive representation - Include LGBTQIA+ stories, experiences and people in your content and campaigns, again, not just during Pride month, but all 👏🏽 year 👏🏽 around 👏🏽 Are there any brands in particular that you feel are showing true allyship during this year’s Pride month? Please share them in the comments - I would love to see some good examples of support! Photo Credit: our talent @reystyless on Instagram

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Today's women in their 40s and 50s are trailblazers - redefining societal norms, embracing diverse lifestyles, and commanding nearly half of the UK's wealth. Yet, they are often left feeling overlooked by the media, with many brands missing the untapped opportunity of this "super consumer" cohort. But what if there was a way for brands to understand, uplift, and empower these women while increasing their bottom line? Our latest consumer report in partnership with Southpaw explores the attitudes and behaviours of the 4.6 million women aged 45-54 in the UK through the lenses of identity, intent, and influence, providing actionable strategies brands can implement to captivate and connect with this transformational audience. 💡 Find out more via Campaign here: https://lnkd.in/erndv6b8 Download the paper here: https://lnkd.in/ewn8EstJ #MidlifeRevolution #Whitepaper #StaySmart

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The dos and don'ts of writing an influencer brief. Some important insights here. It's also important to add some casual observations here as well: Influencing has few if any barriers to entry, and so many successful influencers have few if any academic credentials. Some may even be 'illiterate' and/or 'innumerate', but will have other skill sets that more than compensate for this. And so, it's okay to use storyboards to get your brief across. Secondly, there are influencers out there who work damned hard to produce viral content. Many don't want to then be burdened by cumbersome briefs that have little or nothing to do with what they're doing. Ideally there could and should be a second tier of marketers/managers who take care of the business side for them in much the same way that many successful musicians have managers who steer their career for them. #influencers #marketing #digitalmarketing #retail #tiktok #instagram #facebook #youtube #pinterest #x #twitter #management #agent

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Last week, I was invited to TikTok HQ for Beauty Week 2024 to drop the heat on full-funnel creative and paid strategies to scale brands 📈 The most common issue I see when brands are trying to scale on TikTok, is that they do not have a robust system in place to identify and scale winning creative concepts. 🚨 This is why most brands will fall at the first hurdle 🚨 Without this, brands lack an effective feedback loop between paid and creative and fail to capitalise on the unique something that TikTok offers. ✨ Insert the infinite optimisation loop ✨ If you’re looking to confidently scale on TikTok in 2024, this four-step creative process will allow you to start that journey. 1️⃣ Test the macro concepts (unboxing vs a day in the life etc) 2️⃣ Optimise the winners, and start to crack what’s working by assessing TSR, Hold Rate and CVR 3️⃣ Introduce variations - you want to make as many variations of the winning creative as possible to confirm the elements for a winning TT ad 4️⃣ Iterate the winners Rinse and repeat to broaden out the range of concepts you are testing, or to introduce new SKUs. The Beauty industry is extremely competitive on TikTok. If you are not taking an ‘always-on’ approach to your creative optimisation and consistently being led by the creative data... you’ll be left behind. Big thank you to TikTok for Business for hosting me 👏

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𝗦𝗽𝗮𝗶𝗻𝗳𝘂𝗹 /speɪnf(ʊ)l/ 𝑎𝑑𝑗𝑒𝑐𝑡𝑖𝑣𝑒 𝖯𝖺𝗂𝗇 𝗂𝗇𝖿𝗅𝗂𝖼𝗍𝖾𝖽 𝖻𝗒 𝖲𝗉𝖺𝗇𝗂𝗌𝗁 𝗌𝗉𝗈𝗋𝗍𝗂𝗇𝗀 𝗉𝗋𝗈𝗐𝖾𝗌𝗌. 🦁 It wasn’t to be for England. 💳 However, we’ve seen some fantastic Out of Home campaigns across the Euros, from brands reactively looking to align with the team’s success to official partners such as Chase delivering bold brand messaging across Clear Channel UK’s Storm inventory. 🎽 The Summer of Sport continues, with the 2024 Summer Olympics starting on 26th July, and from our Question of Sport research we know that consumers will associate brands that align with Paris 2024 with Excellence, Respect, Tradition, Discipline and Focus (Clear Channel Sports Tracker Survey Jan 2024). 💡 These are all appealing brand associations, particularly for Finance advertisers, but consumers can only make these associations if they’re aware of your brand’s link to the sporting event – whether it’s an official one or not! 🥇 As the medium delivering the highest daily reach (95% according to Touchpoints 2023), now’s a great time to ensure you’ll be sprinting ahead of the competition by building brand associations through OOH. 👏 Great work EssenceMediacom UK #Euro2024 #England #Spainful #OOH #DOOH #PlatformForBrands

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Have you seen our latest report? In Burning Platforms, CMOs from BT, Halfords, HSBC, M&S, Samsung and Tesco share perspectives on research from AAR and The Drum exploring the ‘burning platforms’ of the modern marketing ecosystem. As the role of the CMO becomes more challenging and complex, this is essential reading. Discover more below. #MarketingOperatingModel #MarketingOperations #MarketingReport https://lnkd.in/eKrYY4bH

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 Gear up your brand for Pride Month! ⠀ Read Our guide will help you create impactful campaigns. ⠀ Use merchandise to help raise awareness on LGBTQ+ issues ⠀ Get your FREE logo makeover in rainbow hues ⠀ #PrideReady #SpreadLove #pride2024 #identitymerchandise

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More great coverage for the World AI Creator Awards from the IDEA FARM team…🔥🔥🔥 Just to recap, we’ve launched the world's first AI Creator Awards - and client fanvue is the inaugural partner. The first instalment is called Miss AI - where beauty, the tech and skill that goes into building AI creators, and their social clout and marketability can earn contestants the coveted crown. 👑 👑 👑 Our judges include the UKs only beauty pageant historian Sally-Ann Fawcett, two of the world's biggest AI creators Aitana Lopez and Emily Pellegrini - and marketing guru Andrew Bloch. Miss AI is the first award in a programme of awards under the banner World AI Creator Awards (WAICAs). The AI Creator Economy is expected to reach $1B this year and the ambition is to run different awards throughout the year recognising achievements from tech to diversity in the AI Creator Economy. #MissAI #PR #Awards #CreatorEconomy #AICreatorEconomy #WAICAs

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The state of today’s demand generation content is influenced by the disparity between content marketing and B2B demand generation plans. While demand generation technology and practices have continuously evolved over time, much of B2B content creation is still following the same quantity over quality approach. This issue is compounded by organisational structures that promote a lack of alignment between content teams and demand gen teams. As a consequence, these teams rarely collaborate on strategy to ensure that the right content is targeting the right campaign theme, personal, vertical market, or stage of the purchase process. This guide explores three key areas, to empower your teams to tackle these challenges and generate demand generation-ready content that engages your buyers. https://lnkd.in/e83YaHti

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Amazon remains in a league of its own! 🤑 Retail Media continues to grow across Europe, what does this mean for you: - Whilst other retailers are increasing at a faster rate and stealing share of the spend, Amazon is still miles ahead 🚀 - Regulatory changes have increased the difficulty of targeted digital marketing, boosting the appeal of retail media for CPG companies to engage with consumers at the point of purchase 📈 - Transparency and standardisation of impact metrics, such as return on ad spending, are essential for success ✔ #retailmedia #amazonmarketing #

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According to WARC Media, social media is the largest media channel worldwide by advertising investment, with Meta alone representing a 63% share of global social spend. Having overtaken #paidsearch last year, #socialmedia is forecast to total $247.3bn (£198.1bn) in 2024, up 14.3% year-on-year. Meta alone is on track to surpass linear TV in global ad revenue by 2025. In the UK, social media ad spend grew 15.6% year-on-year in 2023 and is forecast to reach £8.8bn in 2025, per the latest AA/WARC expenditure report. Much of this growth is attributed to rising spend on social video formats, up 20% on last year, according to IAB UK. View more in this report by MarketingWeek: https://lnkd.in/emxSPm8c #marketing

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When you do not have big budgets and need to make every penny count, putting simple mechanics into your activity to support brand and account activity is essential. This is a classic offline example of working with our customers Ocado Retail to support their business whilst driving our brand awareness and measuring advertising results for future activity. Win win. One good thing that came out of covid lockdown for marketers is the mainstream use of the humble QR code with consumers. #customermarketing #QRcodes #throughthelinemarketing

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SMG's Talking Shop Webinar took place yesterday and had a panel of experts from Boots UK, L'Oréal, and Bayer. It was a fantastic webinar on the continued growth and emergence of Retail Media Networks. Some key themes - 1st party data is key. A retailer's data is the backbone of their Retail Media Network - Use the 1st party data carefully. More regulation is around the corner - There will continue to be a growth in Retail media networks globally. Launch impactful creative that speaks to your users - Retail Media is no longer seen as bottom of the funnel. Use the channel for brand awareness too - Digital is not just on-site, but also means in-store digital and audio - Measurement remains a focus. The closed look attribution of RMNs is one of their major advantages - Short term objectives are often related to ROAS. But don't discount long term objectives such as number of new customers gained with a campaign - If you are a bricks and mortar retailer then run ROPO analysis (research online, purchase offline - and vice versa) as the majority of purchase still happen in-store - Lookalike targeting is key - both on site and off-site Look forward to the next webinar

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Summer's has finally decided to come to the UK , but for savvy lifestyle brands, it's also a strategic pre-season for a killer Q4. Why summer? ️ • Build a Fan Club: Build audiences when ad costs and competition is low but engagement is high •Test & Learn: Try out new ideas (summer sales, anyone?) before the big rush. •Deepen Customer Love: Summer vibes + engaging content = happy future customers! Don't miss this golden window with my Summer Audience Builder! Send me a DM and let's chat about summer strategies to crush Q4

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OK, I have some amazing news to share. I am absolutely thrilled to join Winnin as its first US Country Manager, with the mission of empowering brands to gain an edge in culture to the world’s biggest stage. If you already know Winnin, you definitely already understand my excitement. If you don’t, be ready to have your world rocked. Winnin is a software company that maps the connections between everything people are interested in. It quantifies and analyzes people’s cultural consumption data to predict future behavior, driving growth. Winnin fuses three things I love deeply: culture, creativity, and technology—three disciplines I have always been both a student and a practitioner of throughout my whole career. In summary, it gives me the opportunity to effect change at an unparalleled scale. Since the early days when my friend Gian Martinez founded Winnin, I have been a supporter and a fan. I have also been their client, which gave me the opportunity to experience the amazing impact they make in every engagement. So it’s no surprise that their enterprise client roster already lists some of the world’s most valuable brands - AB InBev, The Coca-Cola Company, Google, Meta, Netflix, and Unilever, among them. You read that right - many of the brands that are a reference in data insights count on Winnin as a data insight partner. As I shift 100% of my focus to Winnin, my newly founded PRESENT strategy consultancy won’t be taking on new clients for the time being. But Present will always be… present, with its philosophy guiding me daily. That’s it for now. It was about time that this diamond of a tech company broke ground in the States, and I feel incredibly lucky to play an important role in that. Thanks, Gian, Carlos, and Erich, for the warm welcome. Let’s win this.

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🐾 Black Friday Chaos? Not at www.petshop.co.uk 🐾 Here are more customer stories that went to different levels at Wayflyer we rise by lifting others. Thanks to our partners at Wayflyer, we’ve mastered the art of cash flow wizardry! 🧙‍♂️💰 This Black Friday, we're ready to fetch every opportunity without a hitch. #Challenge: Cash flow crunch during peak sales 🐶😬 #Solution: Wayflyer’s cash flow magic 🪄 #Result: Pawsome deals and smooth sailing! 🐾🚀 https://lnkd.in/eBfC9QAW Here’s to a tail-waggingly successful Black Friday! #BlackFriday #Petshop #Wayflyer #CashFlowMagic #BusinessGrowth #Partnership

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