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News & Trends

The Alpha is not LLM monitoring (7 minute read)

The real value in AI search lies in Agentic SEO tools that produce outcomes, not in LLM monitoring dashboards. Investors put $227 million into AI visibility tracking, but established platforms captured $550 million, and Agentic SEO companies raised only $86 million despite having far stronger operational moats. Most monitoring companies are young and face negative switching costs, while Agentic SEO tools are older, harder to replace, and power a brand's publishing engine. Many monitoring companies are predicted to face down rounds, consolidation, or failure by Q3 2026 because the category is already being commoditized by free or bundled tools.

US retail sales rose less than forecast in September as key data returns after shutdown delays (2 minute read)

US retail sales rose 0.2% in September, which missed the expected 0.4% and signaled a slowdown from the 0.6% gain in August. Consumers appear resilient but more selective as major retailers reported pressure on lower and middle-income households. Investors now estimate an 85% chance of an interest rate cut in December after the weaker retail and producer price data.

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Strategies & Tactics

Update the publishing date on old, high-quality articles (1 minute read)

Updating the publishing date on older high-quality articles can quickly increase their visibility without rewrites, audits, or link building. A 30-minute batch refresh can move 10-40% of articles from low-ranking pages to page one because Google and LLMs favor freshness. This tactic shows which content benefits from a quick update and which requires deeper work.

When is the Best Time to Send Emails in PR? (A Study of 4.5M Emails) (8 minute read)

8 to 9 AM local time is the most effective window for PR emails because 36% of opens occur during that hour. Monday delivers the strongest performance for both opens and replies across staff journalists and freelancers. Freelancers show steadier engagement during the week but still peak around 8 AM and drop on Friday. US journalists engage most between 9 and 11 AM, and UK journalists peak between 7 and 9 AM, but individual timing still depends on publication and personalization.

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Resources & Tools

Plaid adds $382k in pipeline with TLDR campaign (Sponsor)

Plaid achieved their best-performing direct buy to date, adding $382k in pipeline, earning 70 leads, and achieving 20.1x ROI. This case study breaks down their strategy, results, and example ads. Read the Plaid case study.

You're invited to rewind online (Webinar)

Pretty Little Marketer is hosting a free virtual webinar where three marketers will share strategies behind massive social growth, TV-to-B2B pivots, and campaigns for the UK's fastest-growing brands. They'll cover why B2B isn't boring, the shift from flatlays to lifestyle content, personal branding as a CV, and predictions for 2026.

Lifecycle Strategy Reverse-Engineering Prompt (3 minute read)

This templated prompt lets you reverse-engineer a company's entire lifecycle strategy. It reveals their signals, data, targeted moments, and personalization using a single, carefully crafted input in an LLM.

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Miscellaneous

How Amazon Built The World's Fastest Growing Ad Business (10 minute read)

Initially hesitant and disorganized, Amazon slowly invested in ad infrastructure, leaned on relationships with product vendors, and overcame internal conflicts between merchandising and sales. By developing proprietary systems, integrating first-party shopper data, and introducing full-funnel ad capabilities, it built a platform that now generates over $56 billion in annual ad revenue. Key moves included launching search ads, acquiring Twitch, expanding Fire TV, and monetizing Prime Video.

Video streaming services are reaching the limits of loyalty (2 minute read)

UK streaming customers are cycling subscriptions at a much higher rate, which makes loyalty harder to secure. The share of consumers who cycle has reached 21% and 42% are open to it, while 55% of subscriptions come through deals, and deal-driven users churn at a rate of 73%. Netflix's subscriber share has dropped from 76% to 72% and password sharing has risen from 6% to 8%. The research shows that many Prime Video users would cancel if it were unbundled from Prime, and those who would stay expect to pay £5 or less per month, which highlights how fragile platform loyalty has become.

Beyond the Algorithm: Why the Best Marketing Still Comes From Human Intuition (4 minute read)

Naked Juice and KeVita, both under PepsiCo, took opposite marketing approaches. Naked Juice spent heavily on measurable channels like display ads and paid social but struggled to generate cultural relevance. KeVita, with a smaller budget, relied on intuition to guide less trackable efforts aligned with lifestyle and conversation. Its campaign felt more alive and delivered better brand awareness and long-term results. Intuition, built from experience, is a strategic advantage when data alone cannot drive bold, brand-defining decisions.

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