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Should Your Brand Jump Into Bluesky?
Everyone's talking about the Shiny New Thing™ — but there are real reasons to consider a cautious approach.
by Tod Maffin and Steph Gunn
Follow Tod: Mastodon, Threads, LinkedIn, Bluesky, & others
I’m still not exactly sure what Elon Musk thought would happen.
After he told advertisers at a conference to “go fuck yourselves,” many brands decided to leave his X platform — so many, apparently, that he’s now suing some of them for [checks notes] not advertising? (He says they conspired with each other to cause damage to the platform’s business.)
Enter, the upstarts.
This opened a window for other social media platforms and developers to try to fill the void left behind by Twitter. Even before Elon’s acquisition, Twitter never was a powerhouse of advertising effectiveness. Media buyers considered it expensive and really only good for top-funnel awareness building.
Still, though, it had large numbers and that was valuable.
Meta launched Threads.
One guy launched, then closed, Pebble.
Mastodon made a big public push.
And a small team came out with Bluesky.
Bluesky wants to be the anti-Twitter, but it has very Twitter-like roots. It was founded by Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey. It’s backed by venture capital in the crypto space.
So, what do YOU do?
Any time a new platform comes out and gets some level of traction, brand managers and marketers ask the same question:
Should we jump on board too?
Here are the cases for and against.
The Case “For”
Eyeballs Are Good: At the end of the day, marketing is about reaching eyeballs. Bluesky has eyeballs, and a growing number. Not nearly as many as Threads or X, but the trendlines are in the right direction.
First-Mover Benefits: Being among the first brands on Bluesky can position you as a pioneer, if that’s the positioning you want. It could also let you build a loyal following before the platform becomes saturated.
Less Enforcement: So far, Bluesky’s self-moderation structure is more friendly to the many brands that haven’t been welcome on the big platforms (CBD products, adult products, etc.)
Micro-Influencers: There are a growing number of micro-influencers who have strong connections with their audiences — now is the time to test paid UGC with them before their rates go up as the audience size increases.
The Case “Against”
No Large-Brand API Support: While Bluesky does have surprisingly robust APIs, none of the major large-brand third party social media platforms (Sprinklr, Sprout Social, etc.) have adopted it for publishing or engagement. Asking senior brand managers to also manage social content via their phone for one platform is a non-starter. (Some tools like Fedica and Buffer do support Bluesky.)
No Ad Options: There are no ads on Bluesky (yet) meaning organic posts and the hope of going viral are your only way to get your brand message out.
No Support: There are only 22 people on the Bluesky team. If you want any help or support, you won’t find it here yet because they’re too small. (And then, paradoxically, if they get bigger, like all other major platforms they’ll likely be “too big” to handle individual support requests.)
Looming Enshifficiation: For me, this is the big one. Bluesky was founded by Twitter’s co-founder. It’s backed by a venture capital firm obsessed with… wait for it… crypto. It’s hardly the grassroots platform it wants to be thought of. No matter how crunchy and smiley its brand is, at some point the VCs will come for their exit/return, and history has told us that’s going to mean a degraded experience for everyone.
🎯 The Bottom Line
So what should your brand do?
Unless you’re a small brand or sell in niche communities popular on Bluesky (open source software, indie game devs, social justice, crafting, etc.), this is a “wait-and-see.”
So certainly, create an account with your brand name and protect it.
But for now (as much as it kills me to say this), your brand’s time is probably better spent on Threads with its many more eyeballs, connection to the Meta marketing platform, and API support from third-party tools.
✅ Follow us on Bluesky [other social media]
✅ Follow Tod on Bluesky [other social media]
Today’s Other News
Advertising
Google's new “Customer Match” for Analytics
Google has launched a data solution for analytics. Customer Match lets marketers use first-party data collected through their websites, such as email addresses and phone numbers, to expand their remarketing audience reach across Google’s advertising platforms. more
🎯 Even though Chrome will no longer drop third-party cookies, the industry has moved on, and first-party solutions are the right play these days.
Out-of-home ads surge
Out-of-home advertising (like billboards) had its best quarter ever. Experts say this is because more people are traveling and spending time outside. “Media buyers will use programmatic channels to purchase around a quarter of all digital OOH ads in 2024. That’s more than double the amount compared to two years ago.” more
🎯 While not quite as easily measurable, outdoor CPMs are very competitive, especially during high digital-ad seasons, like Black Friday. They might be worth testing with a small budget.
Ad giant eyes TV OS
The Trade Desk, known for its programmatic platform, is working on building its own operating system for smart TVs. Their goal is to collect more viewer data directly “and serve better-targeted ads. cross-platform content discovery, personalization, subscription management, and ultimately fewer (more relevant) ads.” more
🎯 While this sounds great on paper, my sense is consumers are shying away from TVs that collect and sell their personal data. From an ad POV, though, more data is always good.
Meta improves foundational ad targeting tech
Meta says it’s improved ad recommendations using “sequence learning” to better capture the order and context of user interactions. Unlike traditional models that rely on manually designed features, this uses event-based learning to interpret user behavior more effectively. The result is a more personalized ad experience, with a 2-4% increase in conversions. more
🎯 This might be an advance in the underlying tech, but it will likely be next year before advertisers see any difference in targeting effectiveness — if we ever do.
Meta limits ad categories even more
Starting next year, Meta will change how sensitive ad categories like health and race are targeted. Advertisers will face stricter rules when using these data points, aligning with privacy concerns. more
🎯 “Sounds like if you are in one of the restricted categories, you can't optimize for purchase anymore. Meta’s shooting itself in the foot, while also killing others.” — Foxwell Founders member
Case Study
TikTok boosts bank campaign
Ally Financial used TikTok to revive its “Banksgiving” campaign. They reached young users with fun, engaging content that promoted saving money. “There’s been a 373% rise in financial content on the app over the last 12 months…. More than 80% [of users] are taking action based on advice from the #FinTok community.” more
🎯 If you still think TikTok is about dances, you’re way behind the times. Many, many people follow it for information and news. Now that videos can be longer, it’s actually a decent way to communicate a complicated topic.
Commerce
Holiday spending strong, but down
American Thanksgiving and Black Friday sales show consumer spending is steady despite inflation worries. People are shopping for deals, and online sales are rising. But spending is about $5 billion less than shoppers spent during the five-day period last year. more
🎯 Black Friday is in one week. If you don’t sell consumer products, you may want to consider pausing your online ads, as CPMs are spiking due to the increased competition.
Shoppers buy at night
New research finds an increasing number of people make big purchases late at night, especially online. This behavior is linked to convenience and impulse shopping. more
🎯 If your web site or online store is easily edited, it might be worth it to test a fun design or header promoting a sale between midnight and 1:00 a.m. — only visible during that hour.
Fast sites sell more
Once again, research finds that e-commerce shoppers leave slow websites quickly. Fast-loading pages improve sales and customer satisfaction. Many users expect a page to load in less than three seconds; more than half (55%) of respondents said they have switched to a competitor’s site when faced with delays. more
🎯 Many web admins rely on Google’s Core Web Vitals metric as a guide to speed, but that’s a terrible measurement. CWV aren’t even really a ranking factor. Just test from different devices’ incognito mode and let your “gut” tell you whether it’s fast enough.
Social Media
YouTube's new Hype Creator tool
YouTube has started a “Hype Creator” feature to promote rising influencers. This tool helps creators reach new audiences and build their channels. It’s part of YouTube’s push to stay competitive with TikTok. more
🎯 While features like this are meant mostly for one-person creators, brands can (depending on the category) test these features to see if they provide an algorithmic boost in discovery surfaces.
LinkedIn reminds us: Consistency and Conversation
LinkedIn has published dos and don’ts for posts. It’s the usual: posting consistently, avoiding overly sales-y language, and engaging with others. more
🎯 No matter how the platforms evolve — the basics of marketing remain: Be clear, be consistent, and be conversational.
Messenger chat upgrades image handling
Messenger now supports multiple image uploads and better display options. “When you upload multiple photos to the chat, they’ll appear as stacked thumbnails in-stream. When tapped, chat participants will be shown a display of all the images, and they’ll be able to expand them, as well as like and comment, all from that display.” more
🎯 Unfortunately, these fun additions roll out first in the app, and don’t make it to the API for months — if at all. This keeps these toys in the hands of smaller brands and individuals, and aren’t really usable at scale with third-party social media tools.
LinkedIn ends live audio
LinkedIn is phasing out its live audio events. The feature didn’t perform well, and the trend that Clubhouse kicked off has long died out. “You can still run audio-only live events, but you’ll need to add a static image into the video field, via a third party tool.” more
🎯 Not really a surprise here: The live-audio fad died out ages ago after Clubhouse kicked the category open. Only X really does this as part of its regular platform any more, and marketers never found a good use for it.
X shares holiday stats
X (formerly Twitter) shared stats about holiday shopping. No real surprises here — users are highly engaged with shopping-related posts during the season. The company did share that its audience now skews even more heavily towards males aged 25-34. more
🎯 “The real question comes down to how you feel about X’s overall direction, and external data on brand safety and moderation.” —Social Media Today
Emerging Platforms
Bluesky gains even more traction
Bluesky, a new social platform, is growing quickly thanks to a continued exodus from Elon Musk’s X. As of yesterday, the new platform has about 21 million members — still less than a tenth of Meta’s Threads, but this week it got a lot of buzz. more
🎯 Most major third-party social tools (Sprout Social, Hootsuite, etc.) still do not support Bluesky, so while small brands might want to try engaging via the app, it’ll be a while before the larger brands do. Regardless, if you haven’t reserved your brand’s username there yet, now’s the time to hedge that bet.
SEO
OpenAI is building its own browser?!
Hot on the heels of the U.S. government demanding Google sell off its Chrome browser, word leaked that OpenAI is exploring a new browser to compete with Google. This could change how search works by offering AI-powered results. more
🎯 Some brands blocked OpenAI (and others) from scraping their web site via robots.txt. Remember that while this block might prevent the bad parts of AI (stealing your content), it also prevents the good parts (letting them recommend your site to users).
Regulation
Australia bans teens from apps
Australia is moving forward with a ban on social media for kids under 16. Teens will need parental approval to create accounts. “Meta has argued that age detection should be conducted at the app store level, as that would then ensure that all apps held to the same, consistent standard. But that’s not as flashy as going after the perceived enemies in Facebook and TikTok, which looks better for a government that wants to be seen as standing up to big tech.” —Social Media Today more
🎯 Will this affect your ability to target teens with advertising? Not really. Targeting has been crippled for that age group on most platforms for years now, and let’s not forget that teens lie about their age all the time. Hell, don’t we all? 😉
New Format, Who Dis?
As you’ve probably noticed, we are experimenting with a new format for the newsletter, taking into account much of the feedback we’ve received over the last week (thank you!)
This new format has a single expanded “Big Story” with more context and analysis, and a clear “what it means for you.”
Then, we’re doing brief summaries of the day’s developments, a “what it means for you” note, and links to the full story.
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