Anchors AweighLots of cool things happened at Spotify’s Stream On event (Bruce Springsteen and Barack Obama announced they’re teaming up for a podcast and some royals dropped by). But what stood out to us were a few major announcements for Spotify’s podcast platform, Anchor.
Spotify shared new features including paid subscriptions, video options, and interactivity tools like polls and Q&A features. But the most exciting announcement? The streaming company is partnering with WordPress to translate written content directly into podcasts. Marketers will be able to easily convert blog posts into podcast audio and vice versa.
Audio streaming is going nowhere fast, as 55% of the US population listened to at least one podcast last year. Still, we get it if you’ve been hesitant to jump in — new formats take time to master. That’s why WordPress and Anchor’s partnership is a content optimization dream come true. It’s a perfect opportunity to test the audio waters by repurposing content you already know performs well. There couldn’t be a better time to get your feet wet in podcasting, because Spotify is making waves.
TL;DR: Spotify and its podcast platform, Anchor, up the ante with the announcement of a new capability to turn blog posts into audio content.
The Company You KeepIt’s hard to deny that the sudden shift to work-from-home has had pretty major impacts on networking and developing professional relationships. To help in the absence of trade shows, conferences, and more, LinkedIn announced a slew of updates aimed at boosting community and connections through employee engagement.
The networking site updated the “My Company” tab on Pages to include some of the core features of its employee advocacy platform Elevate. Now all Page admins can curate organic content (recommended by LinkedIn) and easily suggest articles for employees to reshare through a new “Content Suggestions” tool. And with recently added analytics, all marketers can measure the impact of their employee advocacy programs.
Company pages can post all the livelong day, but in the end, LinkedIn is a space for people to connect and interact with each other. One of the best ways that brands can build a strong presence on the platform is by encouraging their employees to actively share content that contributes to the business’s thought leadership. While comments and likes online aren’t quite the same as hallway chats, this update provides a new avenue for employees to reconnect, re-engage, and build both their personal and corporate brand.
TL;DR: LinkedIn added features from its employee advocacy platform, Elevate, to all company pages to help increase employee engagement.
What Lit Us Up
A Game of ChickenFew brands manage to poke fun at their competition as well as Popeye’s Louisiana Chicken. And the restaurant’s latest target? The golden-arched McDonald’s. Micky D’s broke the news last week of a limited release menu item on www.chkndrop.com and offered page visitors access to the crispy chicken sandwich a day before the public release. Thinking 50 steps ahead, Popeye’s purchased all other variations of the website names (like chiqndrop.com and chikcendrop.com) Users that somehow mistyped McD’s already misspelled URL and landed on a Popeye-owned page, received a coupon code for a free chicken sandwich.
This isn’t the first time Popeye’s has pulled off a successful troll. The brand made a parody of the infamous banana-art, spiffed Beyoncé's fashion line, and of course, went head to head with the OG chicken sandwich-maker, Chick-fil-a.
What’s compelling about this campaign, though, isn’t that they found a way to reach potential hungry customers — it’s how they stayed true to their brand identity and connected to corporate social media trends while doing it. Popeye’s established its sassy, clever, and (honestly) petty brand voice over the years and we expect nothing less from them. And if we learned anything from this display of creative pettiness it’s this: There is serious value in keeping tabs on your competition and staying on top of digital marketing trends. Find out what they’re saying and who they’re talking to and create a clever way to get your product or service in front of potential customers — it just can’t be any variation of chkindrop.com
TL;DR: Popeye’s trolled at McDonald’s crispy chicken sandwich launch by purchasing 50 URL variations of the misspelled “chkndrop.com” to offer visitors a free Popeye’s sandwich instead.
|
-1.png?upscale=true&width=346&upscale=true&name=Tier%20One%20logo_color%20(1)-1.png)
