🏷️ 37% more.

Instagram wants to help your holiday prep, a secret signal to help you boost App Store rankings, and more. August 16, 2022 [Read in browser]( [logo] [sponsor]( Good morning. Here’s a short checklist to help you keep your Tuesday flowing: - Get up every 15 minutes or so. - Drink coffee, but drink lots of water too. - Share our newsletter and get exclusive content and merch (more on that below). There… We’ve covered everything except the news. E-COMMERCE Instagram wants to help you sell more during the holidays [article-image] You know how the saying goes: Whoever prepares the best wins the holiday season. Or something like that. Point is, Instagram just [published a useful guide]( to getting the most out of your product catalog and product tags that could come in handy this year. Big shoppers: According to Instagram, nearly half of active users shop on the platform every week, and businesses using product tags get 37% more sales than the ones that don’t. Tagging and bagging: Their guide walks you through important Instagram Shopping features and shows you: - How to set up and maintain your product catalog. - How product tags work. - How to use tags on different formats including Reels, Stories, and Live videos. Why we care: By using all the features at your disposal to optimize your store, you could position your brand to make more profits with less effort during the hectic holiday season. And speaking of features… TIKTOK Now you can generate backgrounds from text prompts Text-to-image seems to be one of the few trends that didn’t start on TikTok. But it didn’t take long to get on the social media app, either. What’s going on: [TikTok just launched a text-to-image effect]( called “AI greenscreen” which lets you create a background based on a text prompt. Right now AI greenscreen generates images that are thematically close to inputs, but much more abstract than the images generated by, say, DALL·E. Why we care: TikTok’s effect gives creators and brands the ability to conjure unique video backgrounds quickly and easily. Be among the first to use it, and it could help your content pop in the app’s busy feed. SPONSORED BY BLACK CROW AI New one-click ML Model helps you identify and target the hottest buyers in your audience – try it free [article-image]( Did you know eagles can spot a rabbit from two miles (3.2 km) away? They can target and slingshot down on their prey before the rabbit can say “yikes.” Imagine targeting prospects most likely to purchase with the same accuracy… You wouldn’t waste money showing ads to uninterested prospects… … And your message would only reach the most aware audiences: The people with credit cards in their hands. 150 DTC merchants are doing that right now with [Black Crow AI's one-click Machine Learning model]( that uses your first party data to create a unique set of audiences out of your site visitors to use across your marketing campaigns. It’s helping them boost ROAS by 25%... and sometimes by as much as 120%. Yes, advertising platforms may have lost targeting power… but you can gain it back with Black Crow AI. Target hot buyers with eagle-like accuracy with a [30-day free trial](. ASO The secret signal that can boost your app’s App Store rankings [article-image] When you launch an app on the App Store, it’s tempting to “set it and forget it.” But the truth is, you need to tweak and optimize the metadata to make sure your app stays among the top search results for the relevant keywords… Kind of like SEO, but for apps. Now, when it comes to App Store optimization (ASO), most marketers are tracking three signals: - Keywords. - Ratings. - Overall downloads. Nailing these can definitely help you appear above the competition on the results page. … But Appfigures found [another hidden signal]( that can accelerate your app’s climb to the top, regardless of the other three parameters: Trending downloads. In other words, an increase in downloads within a short period of time. See, when a particular app is currently ranking second on a highly competitive keyword, it has the least number of downloads and rankings. Maybe it didn’t have the most relevant parameters, but it did have a 75% growth in the number of downloads in the last few days. Why does this happen? Simple: App Store’s algorithm likes positive trends. If it realizes that an app is “blowing up,” that’s a signal that the app should rank higher in search results because it’s relevant and people like it. So if you want to catapult your app to the top of App Store’s search rankings, you want to design a combination of: Proper keyword placement + organic and honest rankings + trending downloads. That’s why a big launch can give you a headstart, especially if you’ve done all the other optimization well. So make sure you promote the heck out of your app, and watch it climb. SPONSORED BY T&C SUMMIT 2022 Join Stacked Marketer’s founder for a live webinar and learn how to build a newsletter just like ours [article-image]( It’s been a minute since we shared some behind-the-scenes of our newsletter, hasn’t it? Well, on August 18 at 5:30 PM CEST (11:30 AM Eastern Time), in partnership with Traffic & Conversion Summit 2022, [you can join Emanuel Cinca](—founder of Stacked Marketer—to discover: - How and why he launched a newsletter in the marketing industry. - The “secret” for curating, creating, and writing content like we do. - What keeps engagement rates high for a newsletter and other email activities. Plus, Manu’s taking your questions at the end of the session! [Grab your free seat here.]( THE CREW’S INSIGHTS Why you should follow marketing principles, not case studies [article-image] You read a case study. You go, “Woah, we need to do this.” You try doing the thing, just the way they did it in the case study. And… It doesn’t work. What’s going on? This scenario is more common than you may think. [Rand Fishkin says]( it’s because most people don’t understand the distinction between effective tactics and marketing principles. And he’s right. Let’s break it down. Effective tactics are the tips and techniques you see in case studies—content marketing tricks, specific advice for ad performance, viral ad campaign ideas. Marketing principles are the foundational things which lead to good marketing. For example, “repetition influences perception” is a marketing principle. The important bit: Marketing principles are the tools you use to come up with effective tactics. If you only read about tactics and try to copy them—which is what will happen if you copy case studies—you’re not getting to the root of the issue. So the next time you read a case study, take a minute to do the following: - Identify the tactics being used. - Identify the marketing principles those tactics rely on. - Let the principles, not the tactics, guide your own campaigns. Instead of copying tactics, rely on marketing principles, and use the tactics as inspiration. Your marketing will perform better that way. ROUNDING UP THE STACK [APPLE:]( Surprise, surprise. After slapping advertisers with iOS14 and App Tracking Transparency (ATT), Apple may start showing ads on more of its own products. Which makes us wonder… Will Apple be as strict with privacy regulations on their platforms? [META:]( Bye bye, Special Ad Audiences. Meta is shutting down its lookalike audience alternative for housing ad sets and will pause any remaining ad sets containing them on October 12. That gives you two months to adjust to the change. [BUSINESS:]( Personalization matters. According to new Elastic research, 84% prefer a personalized user experience, while 88% say that they’re more likely to continue shopping if a website provides such service. Good to know. [GOOGLE:]( Merchant Center update. Free listing accounts with the “Insufficient contact information” and “Missing return and refund policy” status won’t be disapproved automatically anymore. Instead, Google will limit their visibility until you fix the issue. BRAIN TEASER What's the difference between a well dressed man on a bicycle and a poorly dressed man on a unicycle? You can find the [answer here](. [poolside-logo] POOLSIDE CHAT Python hunting contest [article-image] What do you get when you gather a bunch of Florida men together? A [snake hunt](, of course. Over the last eight days, more than 800 men plowed through the Florida Everglades, looking for the invasive Burmese pythons that prey on native wildlife. Their reward for restoring the balance to the ecosystem? Up to $2,500 in cash prizes. Not bad. Still, it sounds risky. We haven’t decided if this contest sounds like the beginning of a “Florida man” headline or the setup for a horror flick… SHARING IS CARING “I want only email marketing, not all marketing on planet earth.”—a reader who unsubscribed Hey, our newsletter isn’t for everyone. But it’s definitely for smart marketers who manage multiple growth channels. ... And we have a feeling you know a few of them. Would you take a few seconds to share our newsletter with someone who values getting the latest marketing news and insights in 7-minute segments? [article-image]( [CLICK TO SHARE]( Or copy your referral link: [ [SUBSCRIBE]( | [SM PRO]( | [ADVERTISE]( You are receiving this email because you want to know what is going on in digital marketing. If you aren't thrilled about our emails, reply and let us know why. Or you can unsubscribe from all daily updates by clicking [here.]( Our postal address: Spectrum IT Solutions GmbH, Canettistrasse 1/Top 0107, 1100 Wien, Austria