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- The Rise of the Creator #53
Rise of the Creator
In our last edition of the RBL Flywheel newsletter, we discussed the impact of AI Overviews (AIO) and Google Core Search updates on search traffic.
Of course, this only elevates the importance of diversification, particularly influencers and creators, in your marketing mix.
A lot of marketers are concerned about AI and platform updates right now
It also underscores the importance of not underestimating any one business model or partner type in the affiliate or influencer marketing ecosystem:
Content (in its many forms)
Loyalty
Technology Partners/Innovation
Coupon/Deal
ConnectedTV
Card-Linked Offers (CLO)
Media Buyers on a CPA
Gated Offers
Email
Audio / Podcast
Influencers
Today, we highlight three significant market trends that marketers need to know that underscore the threat and opportunity of AI.
Customers don’t want ads.
The Creator Economy is here.
Consumer Tech and B2B Marketers are grappling with AI and must tap creators.
Of course, we will cover what you can do to fight back.
It’s time to rise.
A little homage to Dark Knight Rises.
It's the 3rd and final part of Christopher Nolan’s epic series.
Is it the best ‘part 3’ of any movie/series?
It is for me. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade gets the silver medal, followed by The Return of the Jedi in the #3 spot.
Ok, let’s get into it!
AIO (AI Overviews) and the last six months' Google Core Search updates are just two of the many challenges faced by performance marketers and brands.
“With great power comes great responsibility.”
As if Batman / Performance Marketers needed more to worry about, we are dealing with:
Consumers' shrinking wallets
Higher interest rates
Inflation
Astronomical costs on Google and Meta, particularly with the US Presidential election and the Paris Olympics.
Google PMAX and Meta Advantage+ Campaigns delivering efficiency yet taking more control
New low-cost competitors are entering the market, e.g. Shein and Temu
The need for a lot of performing User-Generated Content (UGC) and balancing that with brand requirements
More rigor and scrutiny on financials and budget than ever before
This stuff is not easy to navigate
Trends we are seeing that are some of the biggest for performance marketers to address now…
So much so Round Barn Labs is focusing our entire business on it!
And yes, if these trends are not understood and addressed, they become threats.
(enter Bane)
The Bane of a Marketer’s existence or a challenge? AI, Platform Changes, Rising Costs, etc.
The market forces coming for us performance marketing “caped crusaders” are formidable.
Nobody reads advertising…
Batman / Performance Marketer: “You’ve made a serious mistake.”
Bane / Market: “Not as serious as yours, I fear.”
“Mr. / Mrs Performance Marketer”
Running ads that rely on branded ads only IS a serious mistake. 😉
🔥 Action Item —> Launch an actively managed affiliate and influencer marketing program across all partner types, develop UGC ads, and secure whitelisting so your ads are not YOU telling brands how great you are, but creators and influencers and ambassadors of all shapes and sizes are telling your audience how great you are.
The Creator Economy…
Impact.com and much of the Affiliate and Influencer ecosystem have experienced this firsthand and touted it.
How one of tech’s most influential thinkers is doubling down on it.
Chamath Palihapitiya’s June 4th post was a big validator for me and the Round Barn Labs team.
It's pretty cool since I met him in SF in 2015, and his growth concept from the Facebook growth team inspired much of RBL operations in its early days.
“69% of consumers trust influencers, friends, and family over information from a brand.” - Digital Marketing Institute.
“As social media rose, it took a growing share of time spent online. And today, some influencers on social media have begun to eclipse the size of social media sites themselves, resulting in a radical shift in how demand is being generated for products and services. This leads us to the current phase: the creator economy.
While putting together this deck, I was surprised by the sheer scale of the opportunity in the creator economy. With a global GDP of $100 trillion per year, and more than 60% of this driven by household consumption, influencers are creating a seismic shift in how demand is generated for trillions of dollars of goods and services.”
Source: Chamath’s Substack
Yet another challenge has been thrown down to Batman / Performance Marketers. Let’s hear it again for those in the back:
“69% of consumers trust influencers, friends, and family over information from a brand.” - Digital Marketing Institute.
Wow.
Reliance on Branded Google & Meta Ads has cost you your strength.
🔥 Action Item —> OK, seriously, if you are an innovative high-growth company doing over $20M / year and on pace to $100M / year or more and you do not have a very detailed revenue-generating strategy to tap into affiliates, influencers, publishers, partnerships, and creators you are entirely missing the boat.
“You market like a 2014 marketer, admirable but mistaken.”
The performance marketers’ battle with Bane (AI and all these headwinds) is not going well for some.
Fareed Mosavat recently hosted Kieran Flanagan on the Unsolicited Feedback podcast with Brian Balfour.
Kieran drops some knowledge 📕 and addresses the threat and opportunity of artificial intelligence (AI), specifically for B2B marketing. To be clear, this is my summary of Fareed’s post.
Personalization at Scale 🎯Multimodal Marketing 📺🎙️📝
What does this mean? AI enables hyper-personalization by guiding users uniquely through products and creating tailored experiences.
You merely adopted AI.
Automation in Sales and Marketing - “The New PLG” 🤖
What does this mean? AI will revolutionize sales by automating tasks and enabling real-time, custom demos on homepages, blurring the lines between Marketing and Sales, much like the fusion of product and marketing in the rise of growth teams. 🚀
Google, Meta, and Chat GPT were born in it, molded by it.
Multimodal Marketing 📺🎙️📝
What does this mean? AI's versatility enables marketers to effortlessly create diverse content across text, audio, and video, enhancing engagement across various channels, with a strategic focus on mastering YouTube for a defensible future.
The Rise of Creators 🎨
What does this mean? Duh. As the ecosystem floods with subpar content, the value of unique and compelling content soars, with influencer marketing set to grow even more crucial for B2B companies in the next marketing era.
Talk about supporting our entire thesis at Round Barn Labs!
At Round Barn Labs (RBL), we specialize in helping both B2B SaaS and B2C consumer-facing tech companies achieve new heights through strategic influencer and affiliate marketing. Our approach connects you with trusted influencers who can communicate the benefits of your products to a discerning audience, driving visibility, credibility, and sustainable growth 📈 !
Focus on Craft, Not Execution 🚨
What does this mean? As AI simplifies content creation and distribution, risking market saturation with low-quality offerings, the future belongs to marketers who use AI to enhance their craft and focus on unique, impactful customer experiences—exciting a minority and terrifying the majority.
It’s time to use this to our advantage and not be “imprisoned” by these changes.
I had the pleasure of grabbing a coffee ☕️ with Fareed in San Francisco to discuss this trend and how Round Barn Labs is seeing this first with B2B SaaS and Consumer Tech clients.
The need for trusted, authentic voices is real.
Here is a link to Fareed’s blog post summarizing his discussion with Kieran.
As Kieran mentioned, this stuff is terrifying for a lot of marketers. But if you persevere, get smart, and rise, you can turn this into an opportunity.
But alas, we must persevere and evolve.
Marketing has always been about adaptation.
When you think you've got a grip on the landscape, along comes a new disruptor. Enter AI—this decade's marketing game-changer. For some, it's a scary tech menace.
The fight to beat ad fatigue and competition and be authentic for your customers is on.
So, what does it mean to be in the AI era?
This tweet from Naval sums up a lot:
There is infinite capital, there is infinite labor, there is infinite compute.
The scarcity is truth.
— Naval (@naval)
5:49 AM • Jul 7, 2024
AI has added infinite content, chip makers (NVIDIA) are adding infinite computing power, and brands have added infinite ads, see Everything Is An Ad Network.
🔥 Action Item —>
The scarcity is truth.
So, as a marketer, you need to have a system for recruiting and managing AUTHENTIC, trusted voices that are genuinely talking about your brand. If your affiliate and influencer marketing programs are managed the right way, you will have this TRUTH!
RECAP:
Customers don’t want ads.
The Creator Economy is here.
B2B and Consumer Tech Marketers are grappling with AI and must tap Creators to authentically win over customers in a more competitive environment to defeat Bane/AI Coming.
When tech, Bane, or AI comes for you and your marketing team…
Use tech to your advantage (like our friend Batman)…
And WIN with human connection and authentic voices touting your brand.
If you manage affiliates, refer-a-friend, influencers, and creators effectively, you can RISE to the challenge!
BONUS
Performance Marketing Association (PMA) Shoutout.
The PMA is looking for agencies and brands to complete their latest survey so that they can share helpful data on programs as they have in the past.
Working with Tricia Meyer on The Measurements and Insights Council has been a pleasure, and we could use your help.
Here is the link to the survey:
