Tuesday, December 17

🌟 Today’s Highlights:

• ChatGPT Search is available to all users

• LinkedIn is testing the ability to ad boost your personal posts

• If you want to book more qualified calls, you need to check out my new lead funnel

• 📊 Stat of the Day: Threads was the most downloaded iOS app in November with 11 million downloads. (Source: AppFigures)

• 💡 Today’s Insight: How Pepsi’s campaign became one of the worst marketing disasters in history

👀 Something New Up My Sleeve

I've been working with a handful of software & service businesses on a new lead funnel involving hyper-targeted ads & nurturing email sequences. The results are starting to speak for themselves:

"We are booking 5 to 10 qualified calls a week!" - Agency owner

"This turned our sleep list full of thousands of potential buyers into a revenue machine for our SaaS business." - SaaS CMO

...if you want a ton more leads in January & have some budget, I'm looking for 3 more SaaS or Service businesses to round out the year.

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💡 Today’s Insight 💡

How Pepsi’s campaign became one of the worst marketing disasters in history

🗞 TL;DR - Yesterday, I posted this viral marketing case study on X about Pepsi’s disastrous marketing campaign where they got sued for $23 million. To the tune of 4M impressions… Today, I’m going deeper into the key takeaways exclusively for you below.

💡 Insight - In 1995, Pepsi ran its “Collect Pepsi Points” campaign which allowed consumers to redeem points printed on soda packaging for prizes like t-shirts, hats, and jackets. The campaign’s TV commercial featured a Harrier Jet for 7M points. The ad was meant to be a joke and would cost millions to buy enough Pepsi to garner enough points for the jet.

But John Leonard, a 21-year-old business student, did the math on a loophole: customers could purchase extra Pepsi Points for 10 cents each – meaning $700k would be enough to “buy” the Harrier Jet. He got a group of investors, wrote a check to Pepsi, and demanded his jet.

Long story short, Pepsi rejected Leonard’s claim then Leonard sued Pepsi for the jet’s estimated value—$23 million. The court agreed with Pepsi, but the damage was done. Here’s why this story matters:

1. Humor can backfire. What seems like an obvious joke to you might not be obvious to everyone, so avoid ambiguity in marketing!

2. Clear disclaimers are crucial. If Pepsi had included “this is a joke” in the ad, they could’ve avoided this whole lawsuit.

3. Viral controversy = Free publicity. While the lawsuit was a headache, it kept Pepsi in the headlines for years.

The key takeaway? Be bold. Be creative. But always make your intentions crystal clear. Because someone, somewhere might just take you seriously.

⚡️ Today’s Headlines ⚡️

🔎 ChatGPT Search is now available to all ChatGPT users. By default, ChatGPT will automatically determine which questions to route through ChatGPT Search, or users can tap a new “Search the web” icon in the ChatGPT interface.

📚 GHU is $79 for life, this month only. You can easily search & filter my 100+ Growth Marketing Hacks, get access to a 6-hour crash course on Growth Marketing, leverage my viral TikTok & Twitter hooks, and so much more. Take advantage of this limited-time holiday sale here →

🎙️ YouTube is testing out audio replies to video comments. Rather than just reading your replies, commenters will be able to hear them as a voice note, which YouTube believes may help boost fan engagement.

💰 LinkedIn is testing the ability to boost personal posts. The new ad option would allow users to pay to amplify their personal posts in addition to their business page updates to get more reach on the network.

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