Ollie Scheers

Patience Beats Hype. Just Ask Family Businesses. In marketing, everyone’s chasing quick wins. But the brands pulling ahead? They’re playing the long game. The IPA Effectiveness Awards tell the story: 👓 Specsavers, 🥔 McCain, and ☕ Yorkshire Tea – all family-owned, all winning with campaigns nurtured over years, not quarters. 💡 Their real advantage isn’t just budgets – it’s culture. – Frugal in the good times – Cautious before committing spend – Fiercely loyal once they find ideas that work As IPA’s Laurence Green puts it, resilience + consistency compound into returns the quarterly-obsessed can’t touch. And Rory Sutherland hammered this home in his Nudgestock keynote – showing that patience isn’t old-fashioned. It’s a competitive edge. ✅ Frugality creates focus ✅ Loyalty compounds creative value ✅ Long-term thinking outpaces short-term noise 👇 Do you think most modern brands can adopt this long-game mindset – or are today’s pressures just too short-term? 🔗 Watch Rory’s keynote: https://lnkd.in/gPtynbZk 🔗 Read IPA’s full analysis: https://lnkd.in/gnKJNukB ******* For more like this, try my free newsletter: https://lnkd.in/gBf8n27a

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When chima mmeje🏳️‍🌈 moved to the UK in 2022 and launched the Freelance Coalition for Developing Countries, she quickly noticed something surprising: 90% of people signing up for the Tech #SEO training thought it meant “SEO for tech companies”. This was a simple misunderstanding caused by a lack of awareness and she knew she needed to do something about that. She realised many people from developing countries had historically gravitated toward content work, as it’s often the easiest entry point into the industry. Chima shares how she herself first got into SEO through content, simply because it was something she could teach herself without formal training. Chima also shares how instrumental Aleyda Solís was in getting the FCC off the ground in its early days - and how she didn’t hesitate for a second to offer her help. Watch the full episode here https://lnkd.in/eyaWT7Ks

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📢 Google’s AI Mode is here in the UK - and it’s changing everything. Google has launched their most powerful AI search experience yet. Unlike traditional search, AI Mode introduces a conversational, context aware experience powered by Gemini. It’s not just surfacing links, it’s generating answers. For brands, this marks a major shift in how digital visibility is earned. To win in this new landscape, here’s what you need to focus on: ✅ Be reference-worthy - your content needs to be clear, trusted, and well-structured so Google cites you in AI responses ✅ Double down on EEAT - expertise, experience, authority, and trustworthiness are critical to appearing in generative results ✅ Optimise for entity recognition - make it easy for Google to understand who you are and what you do at a semantic level ✅ Create for context, not just keywords - content must answer broader intent, not just rank for specific terms ✅ Embrace structured data - schema, FAQs, how-tos, and product markup are foundational to being picked up by AI systems ✅ Rethink your performance mix – this is key, it's never been more important for paid and organic to work together to own more of the AI-influenced customer journey. A siloed strategy is a big no no. Hello Everysearch™ It’s never been more important to seriously rethink how your brand shows up in search. #GoogleAIMode #FutureOfSearch #SEO #ContentStrategy #DigitalMarketing #FoundEverysearch Found.

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Most agencies say they “also do LinkedIn Ads.” But every week, I audit accounts that look like a Meta specialist built them. This week I looked at one being run by a relatively big UK agency… And the audience size was 2 million. At first, I get excited thinking I’m about to help the marketing person on the call when I deliver this news. Then I realise, I’m actually delivering news that might get them fired. Because in some cases, there’s hundreds of thousands in wasted spend. LinkedIn Audience Network is another one. I audit accounts literally every week where this thing is switched on. It’s just one little checkbox. But it totally f$cks the account. Keep it off. Like 99% of the time. LinkedIn is not Meta. In many ways, it’s the opposite. Meta has super good machine learning and has a scary amount of info about us, which gives it intent signals on if we are in the market for a product. LinkedIn not so much. On LinkedIn, you need tight targeting. Spend your budget only on your ICP (not large audiences). Never trust LinkedIn's suggested bids or suggested anything for that matter. LinkedIn is built for sales-led businesses. + Long buying journeys. + High-ticket deals. + Complex funnels. To win here, you need: ✔ A real funnel strategy ✔ Middle-of-funnel nurture ✔ Ads that build trust, not just grab clicks ✔ A mix of thought leader, lead gen, and demand gen content If you’re an agency wanting to offer LinkedIn Ads to your clients, but you’re not 100% confident, we can run it for you. We’ve just opened our white label LinkedIn Ads service. We run the account under your brand. You stay the hero. We’re the engine behind the scenes. Send me a DM and I’ll show you how it works.

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This brand just blew $1,000,000 on a brand campaign (TV + Video On Demand). But the CAC… 5x higher than their performance spend. WTF are they doing? The founder of Purdy & Figg (One of UK’s fastest-growing brands) recently dropped a study that'll make every performance marketer rethink their strategy. The Setup: They spent ~$1m on a brand campaign while their CAC was sitting at $362 (way above their $67 target). Most founders would panic and pull the plug immediately. The Results After 10 Weeks: - CAC dropped to £153 (58% improvement) - 125% increase in brand search volume - 76% increase in brand search revenue Performance ads became significantly more efficient They're now projecting they'll hit their $67 CAC target within 6 months. Here's the lesson: Most founders are trapped in a "1 dollar in, 2 dollars out" mindset. It's actually holding them back from the bigger bets that drive real growth. Brand campaigns don't just build awareness - they create demand. More people searching for your brand means your performance ads get cheaper and more effective. The compound effect is: Brand marketing brings people into market → Performance ads target in-market audiences → Lower CAC → Higher ROAS → More budget for brand campaigns. It's a flywheel, not a line item. The founders winning big aren't just optimizing for this month's ROAS. They're investing in campaigns that pay dividends for years. Stop playing small. Your competitors are counting on it.

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Most businesses are stuck thinking about AI as purely a cost-cutting tool. Jim Lecinski thinks this is exactly why marketing teams, in particular, are getting sidelined whilst CEOs prioritise growth. Jim is a Clinical Professor at Northwestern's Kellogg School and former Google VP who saw the AI revolution coming years before ChatGPT launched. His strategic framework cuts through the noise: map AI applications across two dimensions - internal vs external impact, and efficiency vs transformation. Jim argues the magic happens when you move beyond the obvious productivity plays. Take IKEA's AI interior designer - it doesn't just save costs, it gives every customer access to professional design expertise that was physically and economically impossible before. That's transformational growth, not just incremental efficiency. The companies winning aren't just doing things faster and cheaper. They're doing things that were never possible. In our latest podcast episode, Greta Thomas and I had a brilliant conversation with Jim covering his framework and real examples from Coca-Cola, Starbucks, and others that are actually driving growth with AI. Worth a listen, particularly if you're thinking about doing more than just being more efficient - search 'Don't Stop Us Now AI Edition' on your favourite podcast platform or grab the link from the comments.

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