The Marketing Rundown

The Marketing Rundown

di Jerome Manuel

The First Real ChatGPT Ads Numbers — and AI That Runs Your Campaigns

ChatGPT Ads finally has outside benchmarks: 0.73% CTR in the US, above 1% in four other markets, plus an analysis of 15,000 advertisers showing who's actually buying. Braze and Meta both shipped AI aimed at campaign operations rather than content. And two cheap tests worth queuing — money-back guarantees versus free trials, and product names specific enough to lift purchase intent up to 9.5%. --- This podcast is AI generated. It may contain mistakes. Check important info.

Founder Content, Broken Attribution, and Reddit's Knife Problem

Click-based attribution is breaking down as AI search answers questions without sending the click — and the numbers being passed around about how badly are mostly cited secondhand. We dig into what Kevin Indig's "Collapse of Attribution" actually shows, what the agency research behind founder-led content conveniently doesn't disclose, and an identity-framing email tactic that's cheap enough to test this week. Plus Shopify opening checkout to AI agents, YouTube's conversational editing preview, and a Reddit analysis of 51,129 comments that found a small group of accounts carrying an outsized share of buying recommendations. --- This podcast is AI generated. It may contain mistakes. Check important info.

The Four-Week Warning

Holiday bidding has a deadline, and it's closer than it looks: Microsoft says campaigns under 30 conversions in 30 days need consolidating now, and new bid strategies need four weeks to settle. Plus Google locking Target ROAS during promotions, unhashed IPs in Customer Match, why a ChatGPT "organic lift" is more likely a GA4 tagging problem, and what free-trial length actually costs you. --- This podcast is AI generated. It may contain mistakes. Check important info.

Why your rankings this week don't mean anything yet

Google kicked off its fourth spam update of 2026 with a rollout window of up to two weeks — the longest of the year — so any ranking movement you see right now is a snapshot of something still in motion. Also this episode: Chartbeat's data showing Google Search referrals to publishers down 40.2% year over year, what OpenAI's Ads Manager actually costs before you bid, why 60% of AI-assisted purchases still close on Amazon even at price parity, YouTube's affiliate expansion, Google's new Demand Gen formats, and why less than 10% of what AI says about your brand comes from you. --- This podcast is AI generated. It may contain mistakes. Check important info.

When the Metric Becomes the Target

MIT and Stanford research suggests AI agents optimize for whatever number you hand them — not the business outcome behind it. Plus: Amazon Marketing Cloud opens five years of purchase data, Search Console flattens AI Overviews into a single position, California's new $5,000-per-post creator fines, and why only 11% of small merchants are ready for AI shopping agents. --- This podcast is AI generated. It may contain mistakes. Check important info.

Smart Bidding, Reddit Budget, and Ads Inside ChatGPT

Comscore says sponsored ads appeared in 47% of ChatGPT conversations about video games in June, up from 3% in March — measured on U.S. desktop, share of conversations, not users. Also: whether Reddit deserves performance budget, four Google Ads settings worth auditing, Microsoft's Copilot audience beta and its missing exclusions, and what Google now says about how long Smart Bidding takes to calibrate. --- This podcast is AI generated. It may contain mistakes. Check important info.

Turn Off AI Overviews, Get More Clicks

Independent researchers put Google's AI Mode to the test and found it cuts clicks to websites, shrinks overall search sessions, and pushes people toward Bing and DuckDuckGo — without users reporting a better experience. We walk through what the Penn and Northeastern study actually measured and where its method fell short. Also this episode: Meta drops the Instagram requirement for Threads advertisers, Pinterest publishes the four things its new Performance+ score checks, ChatGPT Ads hits a $1 billion run rate in under 200 days, Semrush shares a workflow for turning AI citations into brand mentions, RevenueCat's data says low usage beats price as the top churn driver, and a Google Ads coach argues Customer Lifecycle Goals are overkill for almost everyone. Plus X's new reach-penalty transparency and a survey on why marketers trust human reports more than AI ones. --- This podcast is AI generated. It may contain mistakes. Check important info.

Ad Attribution and Customer Acquisition Levers

Google Ads is down to two attribution models — last-click and data-driven — and choosing between them turns on how long your sales cycle runs. Plus the five levers that move CAC on Meta and Google, and why one founder's offer pulled 3 paid signups from 7,500+ free subscribers but 34 from roughly 350 existing customers. Also: California's new AI-performer disclosure law, Google pulling free product listings across the EEA, Meta capping Facebook Page link posts, and what consumers actually do when AI cites a creator. --- This podcast is AI generated. It may contain mistakes. Check important info.

AI Search and Instagram Collab ROI

Brands under 10,000 followers are seeing 5x more interactions from accepted Instagram collabs than from their own standard posts, per Emplifi. A Herringbone study of 600 local businesses finds Google AI Overviews state incorrect details 27% of the time and ChatGPT 20% — but publishing clearly roughly halves the error rate on both. Plus: why Amazon's testing limits favor fewer, bigger swings; a preprint finding Reddit's AI search filters out first-person experience; Merchant Center AI insights go live in five countries; and Meta hands WhatsApp Business setup to AI agents. --- This podcast is AI generated. It may contain mistakes. Check important info.

OpenAI Wants Advertisers. Webflow Wants 80%. HubSpot Wants Your Budget.

Three platforms shipped big numbers this week, and every one of them was measured by the company selling the product. HubSpot's Unbound26 announcement came with an 81% lift, a 2.2x, and a 3.6x — with no published methodology behind any of them. Webflow says publishing is up to 80% faster, reported by Webflow. OpenAI opened up ChatGPT's advertiser side with Shopify and HubSpot integrations, but it's select advertisers, US-only, and nobody outside the pilot has seen a performance figure. We go through what was actually announced, what each number is measuring, and the three things worth doing this week — plus quick hits on the unsealed Google ad tech order, cart transfer in Google's commerce protocol, Cloudflare's new AI training setting, and Apple's ATT changes in five EU countries. --- This podcast is AI generated. It may contain mistakes. Check important info.

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