The Marketing Slice by Hurree

Marketing changed drastically in 2023. From ChatGPT and generative AI to X and Threads, marketers had to keep up with a lot over the past year. The question now is: what marketing trends will take over in 2024?

While we can't be sure, in this episode, we've used industry insights and expert predictions to look at the key trends we think will shape the marketing landscape in 2024. These include:

• AI
• Augmented reality
• Influencer marketing
• First-party data
• Sustainability
• And more

If you'd like to read along or want access to the text, just visit our blog.

And don't forget, you can access ebooks, downloads, templates and more on our website.

ChatGPT is heralded by some as a marketing miracle. While we might not go that far (yet), it can be an invaluable tool in a comprehensive marketing strategy when used properly. But what exactly does that mean?

In this episode, we will dive into the strategies and tips that will help you unleash the full potential of ChatGPT, including: 

• Setting goals
• How to train ChatGPT
• Using prompts
• A/B testing
• The ethics of using ChatGPT
• And more. 

Tune in to hear how to unlock the potential of ChatGPT and other language models, while avoiding the pitfalls that make these tools trickier to use than most marketers expect.

If you'd like to read along or want access to the text, just visit our blog.

And don't forget, you can access ebooks, downloads, templates and more on our website.

In the ever-evolving landscape of marketing, creating a niche is the key to success. Join us in this episode as we delve deep into the world of inbound marketing, a game-changing approach that can set you apart from the competition. From its origins with HubSpot's groundbreaking concept to its core principles and tactics, you'll learn how to attract, engage, and delight your audience. Discover the innovative flywheel model and why inbound marketing is all about creating value and nurturing long-lasting customer relationships.

In this episode, you'll learn about:

• The birth of inbound marketing: Explore how HubSpot's groundbreaking concept of inbound marketing reshaped the industry.
• Understanding inbound marketing: Uncover the core principles of this customer-centric approach, including content marketing, SEO, social media, and email marketing.
• Inbound vs. outbound marketing: Discover the fundamental differences between pushy outbound tactics and the trust-building nature of inbound marketing.
• The flywheel methodology: Dive into HubSpot's innovative flywheel model, a customer-centric alternative to the traditional funnel, and understand why it's a game-changer.
• Core tactics of inbound marketing: Explore key strategies, including content marketing (from blogs to videos), SEO, and email marketing, while staying compliant with GDPR.
• Benefits of inbound marketing: Learn why inbound marketing is not just cost-effective but also effective in building brand awareness, aligning sales and marketing departments, and utilizing first-party data.
• Inbound marketing's impressive impact: Discover the remarkable results of inbound marketing in both B2B and B2C scenarios.
• Conclusion: Understand why investing in inbound marketing is a smart choice, especially in an era of rising data transparency and privacy concern

Tune in for actionable insights and strategies that will empower you to elevate your marketing game, create value, and build lasting relationships with your audience.

If you'd like to read along or want access to the text, just visit our blog.

And don't forget, you can access ebooks, downloads, templates and more on our website.

Tracking the user journey is essential for marketers to gain insights into how users interact with their websites or apps. Google Analytics 4 (GA4) is designed to be more flexible and scalable than previous versions. With its advanced features and capabilities, it’s revolutionising how marketers analyse user behaviour, unlock valuable insights, and optimise their strategies.

In this podcast, we'll explore how marketers can use the new advanced features of GA4 to  better understand their customers and their journeys.  This includes:

1. Enhanced funnel analysis
2. User flow analysis
3. Event based tracking
4. Cross-device and cross-platform tracking
5. Improved personalisation opportunities
6. Machine learning capabilities
7. Advanced audience insights
8. Attribution modelling
9. Privacy-centric approach
10. Custom reporting and analysis

If you'd like to read along or want access to the text, just visit our blog.

And don't forget, you can access ebooks, downloads, templates and more on our website.

While AI is becoming a part of our daily lives, it's crucial to consider the ethical challenges it presents. 

In this episode, we delve into the ethical implications of AI and specifically, the rise of generative AI.  We explore how generative AI can be biased, unfair, and unsafe, and emphasize the importance of transparency and accountability in its use.

We'll cover a range of topics, including:

• Traditional vs generative AI
• The ethical issues of generative AI
• How to practice responsible AI
• And more.

If you'd like to read along or want access to the text, just visit our blog.

And don't forget, you can access ebooks, downloads, templates and more on our website.

AI is transforming how businesses operate - from automation and decision-making to customer service and resource allocation. 

In this podcast, we'll explore real-life examples of companies harnessing the power of AI in diverse business processes, with valuable insights on how you can leverage AI to drive innovation within your own organisation, including:

• Sephora
• Amazon
• Google
• Lyft
• Spotify
• Starbucks
• And more...

If you'd like to read along or want access to the text, just visit our blog.

And don't forget, you can access ebooks, downloads, templates and more on our website.

What does a marketer actually do? With so many different types of marketing and job roles out there, it's not always an easy question to answer. But what if I told you that marketers can change the world? That's right - there are marketing campaigns throughout modern history that have had a profound and lasting impact on the world we live in today.

In this podcast, we dive into some of our favourite history-changing marketing campaigns that prove just how much of an impact marketing can have on our world. From diamonds to sports apparel to women's razors, we explore the fascinating stories behind these campaigns and how they shaped our values, beliefs, and even our way of life.

Some of the topics covered include:

• De Beers history changing diamond campaign
• The Nike partnership that transformed sports marketing
• Gilette's impact on beauty standards
• And more!

If you'd like to read along or want access to the text, just visit our blog.

And don't forget, you can access ebooks, downloads, templates and more on our website.

Any good marketing strategy takes into account not just your own objectives and goals, but what is happening within the marketing industry as well. 

Marketing trends, especially recently, have come through fast, with some lasting the test of time and others fading just as quickly as they appeared.  That can make it difficult to forecast what's coming and incorporate that into any plans.

This episode should help with that. We look at a brief summary of what happened in marketing in 2022 and look to what (we think) will be 2023's biggest trends, including:

• Zero-party data
• Interactive content
• Shorter video
• Agile marketing
• The rise of zero-click content
• More reliance on data
• More emphasis on social responsibility
• The death of Twitter?

If you'd like to read along or want access to the text, just visit our blog.

And don't forget, you can access ebooks, downloads, templates and more on our website.

Resources mentioned in the show:

• 9 Brands That Will Inspire Your TikTok Strategy
• Zero-Click Content: The Counterintuitive Way to Succeed in a Platform-Native World

Meetings are an everyday part of working, but in recent years, they seem to have taken over our daily schedules. Whether you’re a CEO, COO, or just someone looking to make a difference in how your company operates, many of us are seeking out ways to be more productive, especially in meetings. 

We've put together a few examples of how real companies are changing they way they run meetings to make them more effective and productive, including:

• Shopify
• Amazon
• Google
• Tripping.com
• Modal Forms
• And more!

If you'd like to read along or want access to the text, just visit our blog.

And don't forget, you can access ebooks, downloads, templates and more on our website.

Since it launched in 1985, Microsoft Excel has been a powerhouse in the world of data analysis and business processes across the globe. You would expect the software to be a polished, reliable and foolproof tool, leaving no room for error, however that is not always the case. While it is an effective tool, it brings with it its own set of risks, with some companies having learnt the hard way.

Listen to this episode to find out how some of the largest companies in the world including Kodak, Barclays, Public Health England and even MI5 have made simple errors in their spreadsheets that have cost them millions.

If you would like to read this instead, just visit our blog here.

And don't forget, you can access ebooks, downloads, templates and more on our website.

Brand awareness. It's an important marketing OKR - 77% of B2B marketers say brand awareness is crucial for growth - but historically, it has been tricky to measure and even trickier to justify ROI. Why?

Brand awareness is not a metric that exists in a simple format. To measure and report on it, you need to look at a number of different metrics and KPIs for context. But what exactly are those metrics? That's the question we try to answer in our latest podcast. 

Listen to the episode to find out:

• What is brand awareness
• What metrics you should be measuring
• The tools you need to track them
• And more!

If you'd like to read along, you can check out our blog here. 

And don't forget, you can access ebooks, downloads, templates and more on our website.

TikTok has become a social media juggernaut. It is far and away the  fastest growing social media platform, growing by 87% in 2020 alone, and is expected to reach 1.8 billion users by the end of 2022.

However, as a relatively recent addition to the social media landscape, there are a lot of conflicting theories for how to use TikTok effectively for business. We find the best way to get started with a new platform is to see examples of brands that are doing it right. So we've put together a list of brands that are killing it on TikTok to show you how you can use it to grow awareness, engage users, and generally amp up your marketing strategy.

Listen to find out what brands we love and why. And if you'd like to read along, you can check out our blog here.

And don't forget, you can access ebooks, downloads, templates and more on our website.

The gestalt principles look at human perception and are based on the human tendency to intuit patterns when processing information, including visual information.

One of the core tenets of the principle, which translated from German means ‘unified whole’, is that people tend to group similar elements, recognise patterns, and simplify complex images.

So, what does this have to do with dashboard design?

In short, everything, given that the gestalt principles define how humans perceive the world. Design, in this case, is just another complex set of visual information that people have to make sense of. 

When it comes to dashboards specifically, the gestalt principles or gestaltism can help in a myriad of ways. To find out exactly how though, we’ll go through some of the principles in this podcast and outline how you can apply them when building your dashboards.

If you would prefer to read about it, just check out the blog here.

And don't forget, you can access ebooks, downloads, templates and more on our website, hurree.co. 

Dashboards provide a clear, visual representation of your data by highlighting overall progress towards key goals. In this episode, we will dive deeper into some of the benefits of dashboards and discover how to determine which KPIs and metrics you should include on your dashboard for optimum success.

For many marketers, the tricky part of building an effective dashboard is knowing which metrics and KPIs are the most important and relevant ones, especially when there is so much data to choose from. We go through our top tips you should consider when choosing the KPIs for your dashboard.  

If you would prefer to read about it, just check out the blog here.

And don't forget, you can access ebooks, downloads, templates and more on our website, hurree.co. 

Did you know an engaged workforce can increase profits by up to 21%?

It's not all about the profit though. Over recent years, employee engagement has become a key factor for many job seekers and employees, which means it has become increasingly crucial to employers as well. 

In this episode, we'll go through:

• What is employee engagement?
• Why is employee engagement important?
• Data-backed strategies to engage your employees better
• And more!

If you'd like to read about employee engagement, you can check out the blog.

And don't forget, you can access ebooks, downloads, templates and more on our website, hurree.co. 

In this episode, we explore the benefits of an email dashboard and the best metrics to include to fully assess email marketing performance. 

Email marketing dashboards are a great way to display, measure and track the most valuable data for your email marketing and will give you the key data to gauge how close you are to achieving your email marketing goals. 

Before creating your dashboard, you should consider the goals of your email campaign. Is it to generate revenue, distribute new content, drive traffic to your website or nurture your existing subscribers? Once you have determined your goals and objectives, you can start deciding which metrics will be most relevant to include to show overall success and progress towards your goals.

Some of the best metrics include: 

1. Click through rate 
2. Conversion rate 
3. Bounce rate 
4. Unsubscribe rate 
5. List growth rate 
6. Spam complaints

Prefer to read about it? Then check out the blog here.

And don't forget, you can access ebooks, downloads, templates and more on our website, hurree.co. 

In this episode, we show you how you can more effectively manage your projects using data dashboards.

Project management can be quite complex, taking a lot of time and resources, especially when trying to track goals and progress across different platforms. While a lot of project managers rely on spreadsheets and GANTT charts, one of the best tools to keep track of essential elements is a project management dashboard.

In this podcast, you'll learn:

• What a dashboard is
• The benefits of a dashboard
• How to use a dashboard to manage your projects
• And more!

Prefer to read about it? Then check out the blog.

And don't forget, you can access ebooks, downloads, templates and more on our website, hurree.co. 

In this episode, we explain the KPIs you should be tracking to get the most out of your social media marketing strategy,

Social media is now recognised as an entire business function, rather than just a marketing tool, so naturally managing and reporting on it is an incredibly time-consuming task.

It’s probably very obvious, but when done effectively, the hard work is rewarded. In fact, 78% of consumers are willing to buy from a company after having a positive experience with them on social media, so it certainly pays off to do it well.

With that being said, how do you know how well your social channels are actually performing? There is a lot of data available, but we're spotlighting the 11 KPIs that we believe are most useful in tracking the effectiveness of your social media channels.

We also have informative guides, videos, blogs, and infographics available at www.hurree.co.

In this episode, we explain the definition of a vanity metric and give you top tips on how to identify them, along with examples of common ones to avoid. 

Many of the analytics tools available to marketers will have dashboards with various graphs, metrics and reports, but just because it’s on the dashboard doesn’t necessarily mean it will be the data you need.  While it’s still useful to know how many people read your blog, liked your Facebook post or opened your email, do these metrics actually tell you enough about your campaign’s performance, or are they simply vanity metrics?

Vanity metrics are the KPIs or metrics that look good at a glance, but they don't provide much of an impact on any of your future marketing decisions, or shape your strategy. It’s important to be able to identify vanity metrics so that you don’t waste time tracking values that are meaningless.  

When deciding what metrics to measure, ask yourself the following questions: 

• Will the metric lead to a decision or a course of action?
• Can the results of this metric be easily reproduced in future? 
• Is the metric accurate and does it tell the full story?

Listen to this episode of the Marketing Slice to dive deeper into vanity metrics and learn which ones are best to avoid and why. 

In this episode, we will go over the biggest KPI mistakes we’ve seen and how you can avoid them.

KPIs are crucial to your overall business success. They help keep you on track, make decisions, and achieve your overall business goals. So, it can be really disheartening when you take the time to create and track your KPIs but aren’t seeing the results. Even worse is when you aren’t sure what’s going wrong.

It's easy to get bogged down in vanity metrics or leave your KPIs unattended. To make the most of your KPIs, it's important to ensure you're following KPI best practice, including:

1. Not making KPIs that are specific or measurable
2. Measuring too much
3. No ownership of KPIs
4. Working in a silo
5. Tracking KPIs manually
6. Comparing yourselves to others
7. Not reviewing your KPIs regularly
8. Not acting on KPI results

Listen to this episode of The Marketing Slice to find out how you can avoid these mistakes and make your KPI programme a smashing success.

If you would prefer to read about these KPI mistakes,  you can check out our blog post here.