This week we're breaking down:

• The Highlights:
  • Diving into the shifts in brand marketing spending towards creators
• Trending Research:
  • Breaking down how Current grew its web traffic by +189% by tapping into unaddressed needs

• The Watercooler:
  • Highlighting how you can start perfecting your strategy, starting with your channels
• #MarketingTwitter:
  • Diving into three threads to understand how to capitalize off trending audios on TikTok, how to find high ROI advertising opportunities and the ultimate content distribution guide

WHAT IS THE CREATOR MARKETING LANDSCAPE LOOKIN' LIKE?

CreatorIQ surveyed 150 brands and 200 influencers to publish a report about the focus and shift that creator marketing has built in the business landscape.

Here are my key takeaways: 

1. 66% of brands claim to have spent more on creator marketing in the past year than in previous years.

2. About 96% of brands and 88% of influencers reported regularly using Instagram Stories, while 46% of brands and 42% of influencers said they regularly use TikTok.

3. 48% of the brands surveyed claimed to have invested $100K into creators and 1% claim to have invested over $1M

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HOW CURRENT GREW ITS WEB TRAFFIC BY +189% BY TAPPING INTO UNADDRESSED NEEDS

FINANCIAL SERVICES

Current is a financial tech company that provides banking services geared towards the younger consumer demographic. The company aims to solve consumer pain points traditional banks fail to address.

Key Takeaways

Current.com has launched several novel services to improve financial management for everyday Americans:

• Faster Direct Deposit: Current introduced an early payroll in 2019. The landing page for this feature became the most visited service page on the website, with an average traffic share of 7%.
• ‍Teen Banking: Banking for teenagers is the brand's second-most visited service page. Teen banking services were introduced in 2017, and the dedicated landing page has been getting 4.4K average monthly visits, mainly coming from organic search. 
• Cashback: The cashback program page (which is an incentive often offered by traditional banks) ranks third on Current's website. After the launch in 2021, the page has gained 3K monthly visitors looking for familiar ways to benefit from their spending.

START PERFECTING YOUR MARKETING STRATEGY BY CHOOSING THE RIGHT CHANNELS

With people spending more time online, brands are dedicating more resources in an attempt to reach those people. 😫

This has created a perfect storm in terms of competitiveness as brands fight for digital real estate to effectively reach consumers and earn their attention.

On top of that, with so many different channels available to marketers today, choosing where to focus has become incredibly difficult for multiple reasons:

1️⃣ Competition for audience attention is high, so it’s more important than ever to meet your audience in the places they actually spend time and focus their attention.

2️⃣ No brand has unlimited resources so you need to be strategic and figure out which channels to focus on to be most efficient/effective.

3️⃣ How does your brand make an impact on an up-and-coming platform, when you’ve never had a presence there before? How can you strike while the iron is hot, but not invest in the channel just for it to disappear or evolve into something you weren’t expecting?

THREE TWITTER THREADS

A good strategy is a good strategy, no matter where you find it.

Here are three Twitter threads you should check out this week:

1. How to find trending TikTok audios and capitalize off their momentum 

2. How to find high ROI niche advertising opportunities 

3.  The ultimate content distribution thread

In case you missed any previous versions, check them out via the links below.

1. What's Working in Marketing - Simple Steps to Rank Higher on Instagram
2. What's Working in Marketing - Stop Wasting Your Time with Data
3. What's Working in Marketing - Focus on the Right Channels