Author Archives: i4lead

Ethan Mollick, professor of management at Wharton Business School, has a simple benchmark for tracking the progress of AI’s image generation capabilities: “Otter on a plane using wifi.”

Mollick uses that prompt to create images of … an otter using Wi-Fi on an airplane. Here are his results from a generative AI image tool around November 2022.

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And here is his result in August 2024.

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AI image and video creation have come a long way in a short time. With access to the right tools and resources, you can manufacture a video in hours (or even minutes) that would’ve otherwise taken days with a creative team. AI can help almost anybody create polished visual content that feels real — even if it isn’t.

Of course, AI is only a tool. And like any tool, it reflects the intent of the person wielding it.

For every aerial otter enthusiast, there’s someone else creating deepfakes of presidential candidates. And it’s not only visuals: Models can generate persuasive articles in bulk, clone human voices, and create entire fake social media accounts. Misinformation at scale used to take serious operations, time, and expenses. Now, anyone with a decent internet connection can manufacture the truth.

In a world where AI can quickly generate polished content at scale, social media becomes the perfect delivery system. And AI’s impact on social media can’t be ignored.

Misinformation is no longer just about low-effort memes lost in the dark corners of the web. Slick, personalized, emotionally charged AI content is misinformation’s future. To understand the implications, let’s dive deeper into social media misinformation and AI’s role on both sides of the misinformation fence.

Social Media Misinformation Today

What is misinformation?

Before I begin, I should note how I’ll discuss the term “misinformation.” Technically speaking, this issue has a few different flavors:

• Misinformation is false information shared without the intent to deceive. It’s usually spread accidentally because people believe it’s true. When your uncle shares a fake news story on Facebook, that’s misinformation.
• Disinformation is false information shared deliberately to mislead, manipulate, or harm a person or persons. Its purpose is often to create political, social, or financial gain. Think bad state actors or troll farms meant to deceive intentionally.
• Malinformation is when someone shares true information intending to cause harm, often by taking it out of context. It’s a real story used maliciously. For example, someone leaking private emails to smear a public figure is malinformation.

For our purposes, I’ll focus on misinformation as much as possible and will note differences otherwise.

Social Media Misinformation: A Brief History

The fact that we need distinctions hints at the scope and scale of social media misinformation today. False or inaccurate printed content has existed since the Gutenberg printing press.

The advent of newspapers also brought “fake news” and hoaxes — one of my favorites being The Great Moon Hoax of 1835, a series of fake articles in the New York Sun covering the “discovery” of life on the Moon.

Misinformation has followed every medium — newsprint, radio, television. But the internet? Two-way communication on the World Wide Web has helped misinformation like “fake news” proliferate.

Once users could create content online — not just consume it — the door opened to an almost limitless supply of misinformation. And as social media platforms became dominant, that supply didn’t just grow; it became incentivized.

News on Social Media

Today, 86% of Americans get their news from digital devices; information sits in their palms, awaiting engagement. Ironically, the more accessible information becomes, the less we seem to trust it — especially our news.

Social media has only exacerbated these challenges. Firstly, social media platforms have become primary news sources. The 2024 Digital News Report from Reuters & Oxford found:

• News use has fragmented, with six networks reaching significant global populations.
• YouTube is still the most popular, followed by WhatsApp, TikTok, and X/Twitter.
• Short news videos are increasingly popular, with 66% of respondents watching them each week — and 72% of consumption happens on-platform.
• More people worry about what is real or fake online: 59% of global respondents are worried, including 72% of Americans.
• TikTok and X/Twitter are cited for the highest levels of distrust, with misinformation and conspiracy theories proliferating more often on these platforms.

The more we rely on social media platforms for news, the more their algorithms prioritize engagement over accuracy in the challenge to keep us scrolling. Platform creators are then encouraged to provide relevant content to capture attention, engagement — and dollars.

And if the goal is engagement, not accuracy, why limit yourself to real news? When “outrage is the key to virality,” as social psychologist Jonathan Haidt says, and virality leads to rewards, you do whatever it takes to go viral.

And it works, as the data shows. MIT research shows fake news can spread up to ten times faster than true news on platforms like X/Twitter. A story need not be true to be interesting, and in an attention economy, interesting wins.

Mind you, misinformation is often unintentional. And the reward systems these platforms offer to users encourage sharing interesting content regardless of veracity. Your uncle may not know if an article is true, but if sharing it gets him twice as much engagement on Facebook, there’s a good chance he pushes that button.

But now, it’s not just humans spreading falsehoods. Generative AI’s ascendence is fueling the fire — revving up a powerful misinformation engine and making it harder than ever to tell what’s real or not.

AI Can Create Misinformation, Too

Generative AI tools, with broad access and easily manipulated prompts, expand creative powers to nearly anybody with a fast enough internet connection.

So far, the ability to manufacture fake images and videos is AI’s greatest contribution to misinformation proliferation. Common offenders include “deepfakes,” AI-generated multimedia used to impersonate someone or represent a fictitious event. These can be funny; others, damaging.

For example:

• The “swagged-out Pope,” with images of Pope Francis in a puffy jacket.
• Russian state-sponsored fake news sites mimicking The Washington Post and Fox News to disseminate AI-generated misinformation.
• Drake’s “Taylor Made Freestyle,” which used deepfakes of Tupac Shakur and Snoop Dogg. Drake removed the song from his social media after the Shakur estate sent a cease-and-desist letter.
• A campaign robocall to New Hampshire residents using a deepfake of President Biden. The consultant behind the robocall was assessed a $6 million fine by the FCC and was indicted on criminal charges.

Organizations can also use AI copywriters to mass produce thousands of fake articles. AI bots can share those articles and simulate engagement at scale. This includes auto-liking posts, generating fake comments, and amplifying the content to trick algorithms into prioritizing it.

One often-cited prediction suggests that by 2026, up to 90% of online content could be “synthetically generated” — meaning created or heavily shaped by AI. I feel that the number is inflated, but the trend line is real: content creation is becoming faster, cheaper, and less human-driven.

That said, I’ve also found that some fears over AI misinformation’s effect on real life could be overblown. Ahead of the 2024 U.S. presidential election, four out of five Americans had some level of concern with AI spreading misinformation before Election Day.

Yet, amid efforts from foreign actors or deepfakes like the New Hampshire robocall, AI’s impact ended up muted. While technological advances could lead to more effects in future elections, this result shows the limitations of AI-driven misinformation in the current technological climate.

And from a brand safety perspective, marketers aren’t panicking either — at least not when using established social media platforms. Our own research found that marketers felt most comfortable with Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram as safe environments for their brands. While AI-generated misinformation makes noise in political and academic circles, many marketing teams remain somewhat confident.

So if AI-driven misinformation isn’t swaying elections or bothering marketers (yet), where does that leave us? These AI tools are evolving, as are the tactics. Which begs the question: Can AI fight the fire it helped light?

But … AI Can Also Be the Solution

For years, search engines like Google have tried to fend off the spread of misinformation. Many news sources also put misinformation management front and center. For example, Google News has a “Fact Check” section highlighting erroneous information. And, while automation and bots are helping, it faces an uphill battle in the Age of AI.

What AI unlocks is scale. While generative AI can create misinformation, it can detect, flag, and remove that content just as effectively. AI-generated content is becoming more realistic and harder for humans to spot, which means scalable AI countermeasures become essential. That’s true for protecting public trust and brand reputation.

Marketers are caught between an AI arms race. They’re trying to use AI in their business branding to help them do their jobs faster and better. But AI-powered misinformation can negatively affect brand credibility, platform visibility, and consumer loyalty. In short, marketers need help.

Here are some organizations on the front lines of that fight, using AI to rein in misinformation.

Cyabra

Cyabra focuses on detecting fake accounts, deepfakes, and coordinated disinformation campaigns. Cyabra’s AI analyzes details like content authenticity and network patterns and behaviors across platforms to flag false narratives early.

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Fake profiles can pop up and push misleading online narratives with breathtaking speed. If your brand is monitoring online risk and sentiment, a tool like Cyabra can keep pace with the spread of misinformation.

Logically

Logically pairs AI with human fact-checkers to monitor, analyze, and debunk misinformation. Its Logically Intelligent (LI) platform helps governments, nonprofits, and media outlets track misinformation’s origins and spread across social media.

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For marketers and communicators, Logically can offer an early warning detection system for false narratives around their brand, industry, or audience.

Reality Defender

Reality Defender uses machine learning to scan digital media for signs of manipulation, like synthetic voice or video content or AI-generated faces. I haven’t found many tools offering proactive detection — you can catch deepfakes before they go viral.

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This kind of early detection can help brands protect their campaigns, spokespeople, or public-facing content from synthetic manipulation.

Debunk.org

Debunk.org blends AI-driven web monitoring with human analysis to detect disinformation across over 2,500 online domains in over 25 languages. It tracks trending narratives and misleading headlines, then publishes reports countering emerging falsehoods.

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Global brands will find Debunk.org especially helpful, given its tool’s multilingual nature. You can navigate international markets and regional misinformation spikes more intelligently.

Consumers are also getting AI-powered support. For example, TikTok now automatically labels AI-generated content thanks to a partnership with The Coalition for Content Provenance and Authenticity (C2PA) and its metadata tools.

And with Google investing heavily in its Generative Search Experience, the company includes an “About this result” panel in Search to help users assess the credibility of its responses.

As AI advances, so too will the tactics used to deceive, and the tools designed to stop it. What’s around the AI river bend? Let’s look at where misinformation could head in the Age of AI — and what experts are already seeing.

What We Can Expect: Misinformation in the Age of AI

Emotional Manipulation and “Fake Influencers”

According to Paul DeMott, CTO of Helium SEO, the most dangerous misinformation tactics may be the ones that don’t feel like misinformation.

“As AI gets better, some subtle ways misinformation spreads are slipping under the radar. It’s not always about fake news articles; AI can create believable fake profiles on social media that slowly push biased info,” he said. “Researchers might not be paying enough attention to how these fake accounts work to influence people over time.”

DeMott sees the issue extending beyond fake people into the message’s emotional design.

“One thing that could make it harder to spot misinformation is how AI can target specific emotions. AI can create messages that prey on people’s fears or desires, making them less likely to question what they are seeing,” he said.

He believes the next wave of misinformation solutions must match AI’s budding emotional awareness with detection systems ready for subtext.

“To counter this, we might need to look at AI solutions that can detect these subtle emotional cues in misinformation. We can use AI to analyze patterns in how misinformation spreads and identify accounts that are likely to be involved,” said DeMott.

“It’s a constant cat-and-mouse game, but by staying ahead of these evolving tactics, we have a shot at keeping the information landscape a bit cleaner.”

Hyper-Personalization and Psychological Biases

Kristie Tse, a licensed psychotherapist and founder of Uncover Mental Health Counseling, sees the danger not only in the tech but also in the psychology behind why misinformation works.

“One emerging misinformation tactic that’s being underestimated is leveraging highly personalized, AI-generated content to manipulate beliefs or opinions,” she said.

“With AI becoming increasingly sophisticated, these tailored messages can feel authentic and resonate deeply with individuals, making them more effective at spreading falsehoods.”

Tse explains how misinformation hijacks humans’ emotional wiring, leading to challenges like the speed of spread.

“The speed at which misinformation spreads is often faster than our ability to fact-check and correct it, partly because it taps into strong emotional responses — like fear or outrage — that bypass critical thinking,” she said. “Psychological factors, such as confirmation bias, play a significant role. People are more likely to believe and share misinformation that aligns with their existing beliefs, making it harder to counteract.”

But AI could help us if we build the right tools.

“On the solution side, we might be overlooking the potential for AI to create tools that proactively detect and counter misinformation in real-time before it goes viral,” said Tse.

“For example, AI could flag manipulated content, suggest reliable sources, or even simulate a debate to highlight contradictory evidence. However, these solutions need to be user-friendly and widely accessible to truly make an impact.”

AI Ecosystems That Reinforce Biases

James Francis, CEO of Artificial Integrity, warns we’re focusing too much on content moderation and not enough on context manipulation.

“We‘re not just dealing with fake articles or deepfakes anymore. We’re dealing with entire ecosystems of influence built on machine-generated content that feels real, speaks directly to our emotions, and reinforces what we already believe,” he said.

Francis notes that people usually fall for lies because the content feels emotionally right.

“What worries me most isn‘t the technology — it’s the psychology behind it. People don‘t fall for lies because they’re gullible. They fall for them because the content feels familiar, comfortable, and emotionally satisfying,” he said. “AI can now mimic that familiarity with incredible precision.”

With such an ecosystem in play, he believes the real challenge isn’t removing falsehoods but empowering people to stop and think.

“If we want to push back, we need more than just filters and fact-checkers. We need to build systems that encourage digital self-awareness,” he said. “Tools that don‘t just say ‘this is false,’ but that nudge users to pause, to question, to think. I believe AI can help there, too — if we design it with intention. The truth doesn’t need to shout. It just needs a fair shot at being heard.”

Synthetic Echo Chambers

Rob Gold, VP of marketing communications at Intermedia, raises the alarm on one of AI’s more insidious abilities: creating networks of fake credibility.

“It’s not just a fake or misinformed article, but the potential for AI to manufacture the illusion of academic or expert consensus by building large networks of interconnected fake sources,” he said.

Gold shares that AI could mimic credibility by creating articles, studies, posts — even Reddit threads — fooling users and search engines.

“It wouldn’t be hard at all to build a strong, fake echo chamber supporting a false story. It tricks us because we tend to trust information that seems backed up by many sources, and AI makes scaling that creation simple,” he said.

“Imagine trying to disprove a fake claim about, say, security flaws in cloud communications when there are half a dozen fake ‘studies’ that all agree and cite one another.”

To fight this, he says we need smarter tools able to detect citation loops and sudden explosions of information.

“These tools should flag strange patterns, like lots of new sources appearing quickly, sources that heavily cite each other but have no history, or sources that don’t link back to any established, trusted information,” Gold said.

“Ironically, seeing too many of these tightly linked, brand-new sources pointing only to each other might become the warning sign itself.”

Confusion Attacks Against the Fact-Checkers

Will Yang, head of growth and marketing at Instrumentl, sees an even deeper problem simmering: AI content design not only to trick humans but also to confuse other AIs.

“Neural Network Confusion Attacks are a sneaky new tactic emerging as AI technology advances. These attacks involve creating AI-generated content designed to confuse AI fact-checkers, tricking them into misidentifying genuine news as false,” he said.

These attacks fool AI systems, of course. But they also erode public trust in all moderation efforts.

“Researchers might underestimate the psychological impact this has, as users begin to question the reliability of trusted sources,” he said. “This erosion of trust can have real-world consequences, influencing public opinion and behavior.”

Yang suggests the solution is for AI systems to get smarter at both detection and identifying manipulative intent.

“Training these systems not only on typical data patterns but also on detecting subtle manipulation within AI-generated text can help,” he said.

“This means enhancing AI models to recognize inconsistencies often overlooked by conventional systems and focusing on anomaly detection. Expanding datasets used for AI training to include diverse scenarios could also reduce the success of these confusion attacks.”

Social Media Misinformation Is Getting Smarter. So Must We.

Ethan Mollick posted another otter video in January 2025. Watch it, and you might mistake it for cinema.

Otters on planes are fun and games. But this same technology can whip up fake videos or audio of celebrities and politicians. It can tailor emotionally precise content that slips easily into a family member’s Facebook feed. And it can create an ocean of fake articles or fictional studies to manufacture expertise overnight, leaving users none the wiser.

I work with AI in marketing regularly, but writing this piece reminded me how fast this space is moving. The truth may not need to shout, but amid louder AI-generated noise, it needs help to be heard.

Whether you’re scrolling social media feeds as a marketer or an everyday user:

• Stay aware.
• Ask questions.
• Understand how AI systems work.

Thankfully, AI isn’t only amplifying misinformation; it’s also helping us detect and manage it. We can’t outsource the truth to machines. But we can make them part of our solution.

I first tested AI tools in 2019 to automate repetitive parts of my workflow. It seemed like the perfect solution: Let the code execute the manual stuff I was too bored to do.

However, I quickly discovered hidden costs to everything I did. My automation script needed a server to live on. The server needed maintenance and monitoring. And if the backend APIs changed, my script would no longer work.

AI today has similar overhead costs, but at a far greater scale. For instance, Sam Altman recently tweeted that saying “yes” and “please” to ChatGPT cost tens of millions of dollars in computing resources.

This got me thinking: How much does AI cost businesses, and when does it make sense to integrate AI?

In this article, I’ll walk you through different kinds of AI models and how much AI solutions cost based on the model type. Whether you’re a startup founder, an SMB, or an enterprise business, you’ll learn how to budget for AI in your company.

Table of Contents

• How much does AI cost?
• How is pricing determined for AI?
• How much should you spend on AI in your business?

How much does AI cost?

AI costs vary widely depending on the type of solution, business model, data quality, model variant, usage patterns, and more.

Let’s break down the cost of AI based on four commonly used AI model types.

The Cost of Large Language Models (LLMs)

LLMs are trained on massive amounts of data (think billions of tokens) to understand and generate human-like language. I use LLMs extensively in my workflow — whether it is to prompt ChatGPT to draft an email, analyze photos through Gemini, or get content ideas from Claude.

Businesses can use LLMs across multiple departments to do things like:

• Answer user complaints through chatbots.
• Screen resumes, create SOPs, or help decide business pricing models.
• AI-assisted code development or debugging.

LLMs are powerful — but that’s also what makes them expensive. User queries get computed across resource-hungry GPUs that cost millions of dollars to train and maintain.

Here’s a rough breakup of the costs to integrate an LLM in your business.

Model as a Service

LLMs like ChatGPT and Claude fall into this category. You essentially “rent” their computing power via a natural language interface (chatbots) or API calls. Chatbots charge a monthly flat fee, while API pricing is more complex.

LLMs break down your prompt (what you send) and the output (the generated answer) into tokens. Each token is a unit of text — a complete word, part of a word, a space, or even punctuation marks like “/”.

For API calls, you get billed based on the total token usage. Here are the costs for OpenAPI, as of May 2025:

• Individual tier: $20-$200/month for restricted access to their chatbot interface.
• GPT o3 (per 1M tokens): $10.00 input; $40.00 output.
• GPT 4.1 (per 1M tokens): $2.00 input; $8.00 output
• GPT 4.1 nano (per 1M tokens): $0.100 input; $0.400 output.

Not sure how many tokens you’ll use? You can run your prompt through OpenAI’s handy tokenizer tool and get an estimate. Also, remember, any documents or past conversation history you include as context count toward your token usage!

Open-Source LLMs

Open-source models like Llama or Mistral are a cost-effective alternative to commercial LLMs like OpenAI. Accessing open-source model weights is free, so you don’t have to pay any API costs.

The main cost for open-source LLMs comes from compute + hardware requirements. Businesses can expect to pay around $200-$500/month for smaller models, but it can also range upwards of $5k-$10k/month for large-scale enterprise usage.

Of course, open-source models require a fair bit of technical expertise to implement, deploy, and update across your systems. However, fine-tuning an open-source model can cut down your overall costs significantly.

Training Your Own LLM

If your business deals with very complex or sensitive data, you can opt to develop your own AI infrastructure. LLMs require computing resources (high-end GPUs), memory (databases), and specialized engineering talent.

Training your own LLM can easily cost you between $100k – $1m for initial development. And then comes maintenance, fine-tuning, prompt engineering, fall-back logic, and model monitoring.

The Cost of Predictive Analytics Platforms

Want to know which products might become holiday bestsellers? Or if a new feature will get enough market demand? Instead of relying on your gut for answers, consider using predictive analytics platforms.

These platforms identify patterns in massive datasets like customer behaviour, historical market data, etc., to help make data-driven decisions. For instance, they can estimate potential customer churn by analyzing usage frequency and support ticket history.

Predictive analytics platforms tend to be more affordable than other AI models since they don’t need heavy computing power. Costs depend more on data quality and the number of users.

SaaS-Based Platforms

Pricing is based on users, monthly prediction volume, or on-demand usage.

Solutions like Tableau or PowerBI premium cost $15-$100/user/month. Enterprise SaaS solutions like Alteryx start at $4,950 per year for a single user. More comprehensive plans, including the Alteryx AI Platform, can range from $10,000 to $50,000 or more per year, especially for larger teams.

Custom Solutions

Basic predictive systems cost between $20k-$30k, while advanced ones start around $40k+. You can reduce development costs by using open-source libraries like scikit-learn or Tensorflow. However, expect to pay a 20-30% premium for maintaining the model and associated infrastructure.

The Cost of Recommendation Engines

Recommendation engines are an excellent way to customize user experience. They analyze user data and activity to suggest products, services, and content your customers might like next. For instance, at the end of this article, you’ll find a “related articles” list — that’s a recommendation engine in action.

These recommenders are a win-win: Customers find what they want, and companies get to boost user retention on their platform.

But what’s the actual cost for companies to understand my preferences (and yours!) so accurately? The answer depends on the kind of recommendation engine they use.

• Platform-integrated: Typically free. Many ecommerce, marketing, or CMS platforms include basic recommendation capabilities free of charge or at a minimal cost. Examples include Shopify’s product recommendation API and Hubspot’s smart content recommendations.
• Off-the-shelf: $2000 – $12,000. These are typically SaaS-based solutions, with a pay-as-you-go model. For instance, Amazon Personalize computes its pricing based on data sent to the model, training, and real-time or batch recommendations.
• Custom: $10,000 – $200,000. A custom recommendation engine might be the right fit if your business model depends on curating good content or products. These can be expensive, but you can use open-source libraries like LightFM and FAISS to build quick prototypes. Examples include Netflix, Amazon, and Spotify.

The Cost of Process Automation Solutions

As I mentioned earlier, my AI journey began with process automation tools. I built a dashboard for managing access to internal company tools.

Instead of manually reviewing and approving each user request, my script would verify eligibility, grant permissions, and notify users automatically. It would also flag unusual access requests or suggest likely permissions based on data from similar teammates.

While working on this project, I discovered that process automation can handle any repetitive task. These tools can open new browser tabs, click buttons, send customized emails, log activities, and more. When you add AI to the mix, these systems can even handle decision-making and analysis based on previous data.

Intelligent process automation solutions like these have two components:

• Automation tool. You can choose a SaaS no-code solution like Make.com or a robust enterprise solution like UiPath. Make.com has a subscription-based pricing ($9-$29 per month for 10,000 ops) while UiPath operates on a per-bot pricing ($1000 – $10,000 annually per bot).
• AI models for specialized tasks: Automation tools can call on AI components to process specialized tasks such as document parsing, intent classification, etc. This is similar to having a custom LLM, priced per unit processed (i.e, per document or API call).

How is pricing determined for AI?

AI cost isn’t just about the model you choose. It’s about how often it runs, how much data it needs, and how well it scales.

Let’s look into specific factors that affect costs across AI models.

1. Data Costs

AI runs on data. The quality of your data determines how accurate your model will be. If you’re not careful with the data you supply, AI can spit out nonsense into customer communications or include its own biases.

I’ve seen internal company data get messy. Valuable data gets stored across multiple CRMs, cloud solutions, and internal tools. The result? Inconsistent, redundant, and often unreliable data.

So, while raw data is cheap to acquire, getting clean, labeled data can become expensive. Data processing involves multiple steps: collection, cleaning, labeling, and structuring into AI-friendly formats. Each step is typically charged based on data volume or hours spent. For instance, CVAT, a data cleaning platform, estimates the cost of annotating 100k images at $300k.

If your internal data isn’t sufficient, you can supplement it with external datasets from providers like Bloomberg or data marketplaces like Kaggle.

Once your data is ready, the next step is to store it. Depending on data volume, cloud data storage instances can cost anywhere between $1k-$10k a month. Your cloud storage should be able to scale with you as you collect and process new data.

Data governance is another factor to consider. I recommend budgeting around 10-20% of your costs to go towards data security and compliance with laws like GDPR.

2. Infrastructure Costs

Infrastructure costs come into play if you opt for custom AI solutions or use open-source models. SaaS platforms include these expenses in their monthly pricing, but building your own infrastructure needs a substantial budget.

For instance, high-performance Nvidia GPUs like H100 can cost between $15k and $40k per unit. Most production environments will require multiple GPUs to optimize for performance. A modest AI cluster could easily cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. You must also consider energy and power costs to manage this cluster, which can bump up the total cost by 30-40%.

Cloud solutions like Google Cloud AI or AWS are cost-effective, with a pay-as-you-go pricing model. Costs typically range from $2 to $80/hour, depending on the specifications of the GPU instance. A single H100 80GB GPU within the a3-highgpu-1g instance costs approximately $11.06 per hour, while an instance with 8 H100 80GB GPUs, the a3-highgpu-8g, is priced at around $88.49 per hour.

3. Training and Development Costs

Most businesses underestimate the development costs for successfully running an AI model. You’ll need to build custom integrations to make the model work with your existing systems, train the model, and then fine-tune the responses for your use case.

“The real cost isn’t the token [API calls to an LLM]. It’s everything you wrap around the model to make it usable — retries, caching, orchestration, fallbacks, evals. Anyone quoting ‘fractions of a cent’ per token is leaving out half the bill,” explains Joe Cainey, the CEO of Sunbeam.

Acquiring the right developer talent has also become competitive. Salaries for AI developers can range from $200k-$1m+. Project-based freelancers charge somewhere between $50 and $100/hour, depending on their experience and geographical location.

4. Maintenance Costs

AI tools must be updated every 3-6 months to account for newer models, data contexts, and changing business needs. Maintenance activities can include, but are not limited to:

• Performance monitoring.
• Retraining based on user interactions.
• Adjusting prompts or data for better output.
• Security and compliance updates.

Unless your business environment is highly controlled, I’d say you should expect a 15-20% maintenance overhead to keep your AI systems running accurately.

How much should you spend on AI in your business?

There is no straight answer to this question. Setting the right AI budget for your business is not about following industry averages, but about tailoring it to your needs.

Let’s break down the key factors you should consider before deciding on an AI solution.

Business Size and Budget

Budget predictions can vary depending on the scale of your business.

An IBM study indicates that larger companies plan to allocate roughly ~3% of their revenue to AI, about $33.2 million annually for a $1 billion company. In contrast, small and medium business owners I’ve interviewed budget around 5-20% of their total revenue to AI.

Small and Medium Businesses (SMB)

If you’re an SMB, consider starting with AI-integrated SaaS platforms that can target multiple departments. For example, Hubspot’s Breeze bundles AI automation for marketing analytics, customer support, and sales into one tool. This integrated approach to AI delivers better ROI than maintaining your own infrastructure, especially for teams with limited technical resources.

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Of course, this decision also depends on the nature of your business. If your business deals with sensitive data or has AI-dependent operations, you’ll likely need a custom model. Depending on your budget and business priorities, you can choose an open-source solution or build a proprietary one.

Roman Georgio, the CEO of Coral Protocol and ex-Camel AI founding member, shared his thoughts on this: “I would pay a bit more to use Claude if I were building a SaaS tool like Cursor since my product depends on the best possible LLM output.

“But if I’m just performing text summarization for an AI-powered CRM, I’d optimize costs and use [an open-source solution like] Mistral or Qwen.”

Enterprises

Enterprise budgets can range in billions. Oracle spent $3B in Q125 for the cloud infrastructure that supports AI training. At this scale, enterprises typically adopt a hybrid strategy — using custom infrastructure with third-party or in-house APIs for sensitive data and SaaS platforms like Breeze for specific departments.

Many enterprises use their collective bargaining power to negotiate agreements with AI vendors. These agreements typically have a minimum lock-in period where you get volume-based discounts and early access to new platform features. For instance, a senior AI leader shared with me that they spend $100k/month on GitHub Copilot licenses for ~7000+ team members.

Integration Complexity

Here’s something you probably didn’t expect me to say: Getting your systems ready for AI might cost as much as (or sometimes more than) the AI solution itself.

Implementing AI requires you to address any inefficiencies in your systems.

Bad data? You’ll first need to standardize it to reduce costs and the risk of hallucinations. Disconnected systems? You’ll need to build custom integrations with your AI tool.

Standardizing your systems is not just an AI expense, though. It improves your overall operations with efficient reporting, easier training cycles, and smoother integrations in the future.

So, budget for integration costs, but also look at the overall business value.

Risk Tolerance

Another thing to consider is your business’s risk tolerance. Souvik Roy, senior AI development manager at Standard Chartered, highlights this as a significant concern since they deal with financial data.

“Before automating any processes, the first thing we consider is whether potential damage is reversible. We don’t want to run into compliance issues or potential fines because we tried to automate something,” he told me.

For instance, if a model generates “You have to…” instead of “You must…”, the difference is usually negligible. However, this can lead to critical misunderstandings in industries like law or finance.

Companies with low risk tolerance should allocate additional budget to safety guardrails, testing, and human oversight.

When (and When Not) to Invest in AI Solutions

While researching AI costs, I saw a clear pattern: AI is slowly moving from small department-specific experiments to enabling organization-wide shifts.

Companies aren’t asking if they should adopt AI, but rather how to integrate it.

Whether it is a managed solution like Hubspot Breeze or a custom implementation with API calls, there are AI solutions for each business level. Hubspot’s State of AI Marketing Report reveals 75% of companies implementing AI have gotten a positive ROI.

When I spoke to Cainey, I liked his three-step decision tree for integrating AI solutions:

1. Does it scale linearly with headcount?

2. Is it predictable enough for a model to handle?

3. Is it safe to be wrong 5% of the time?

If yes to all three, it’s on the roadmap. If not, it’s either human-led or skipped entirely.

My advice? Resist the temptation to automate or include AI in every business process. Start small, measure usage, and then scale your AI investment as you validate the ROI.

I cofounded Morning Brew in 2015. Since then, the content landscape has transformed into an even more competitive arena. The cost of paid acquisition has skyrocketed. Content differentiation has become harder than ever, especially when AI can write generic posts in seconds.

The result is a sea of sameness — 101-level blog posts, cringy trade show booths, outreach emails offering free AirPods if you listen to a pitch, and aggressive marketing drip campaigns.

So, how can you stand out in a world of limited attention and high demand? Marketing teams need to build trust and provide their audience content with real value. You can make that happen with an ICP-focused content demand engine.

I’ll explain the exact process we run at my new business, storyarb, to build audience, establish trust, and drive demand for high-growth B2B businesses.

How to Craft a Content Demand Engine

Step 1: Define your market of one.

Start by asking yourself, who is your market of one? This is similar to your ideal customer profile (ICP), but even more specific. Envision a real, individual person who needs the product or service that your company offers. Then ask:

• What are their needs?
• What challenges do they face?
• How can you provide them with something truly valuable?

As the chairman of storyarb, my market of one is Bruno Estrella, head of marketing at software company Clay. When I write our content, I think about what topics would be interesting to Bruno and what he needs to know to advance in his role.

Step 2: Find the smartest people in your industry.

Once you’ve worked to understand your market of one, it’s time to start thinking about who that person might want to learn from. Ask yourself, who are the smartest people in your industry? Who are the subject matter experts, or SMEs, whose advice would be most valuable to potential customers?

If you’re not sure where to get started, I’ve found that there are four common types of SMEs:

• Current employees.
• Current customers.
• Prospects.
• Industry thought leaders.

Of these types of SMEs, current employees and customers are generally the easiest to work with, while prospects and in-demand industry thought leaders may be trickier to access. That said, all four can provide helpful insights that can serve as the backbone of your content offerings.

Once I have a list of SMEs, I begin outreach and schedule recurring interviews. I ask these experts what’s at the top of their minds and any helpful how-tos that other marketers should know. I gather quotes and paraphrase their top tips, which leads to the next step.

Step 3: Create your content.

I’ve already heard from experts in my field, gathering helpful advice that my audience can’t get anywhere else. Now, it’s time to maximize. I turn each SME conversation into a long-form piece of content. Ideally, this will be a playbook that readers can emulate to drive success in their business.

To drive demand for my playbook, I tease the content in our weekly newsletter. I can even follow up with the same SME for newsletter-exclusive insights. Then, I move to social. Posts can be shared by your company’s official social media channels and the relevant executives’ personal channels.

The content creation stage of your demand engine takes the most time and requires the most creativity. You’re in search of substantial insights that you can turn into several pieces of content.

Everything short form — from newsletter mentions to social posts — should tease these learnings and point to the long-form content on your website. When readers get to your site, they will have gotten so much value from the content that they’ll check out the product-related pages of your site and convert into pipeline.

Importantly, I’ve found that you don’t need a lot of infrastructure to get started. At the most basic level, you just need a blog, a way to capture email signups, a newsletter, and social media accounts.

What Great Content Actually Looks Like

Once you’ve set up this basic infrastructure — as well as some analytic tools to help you map your content development efforts to actual leads — you can get started. In this section, I’ll share the three types of content that power any content demand engine.

The Long-Form Playbook

The long-form playbook is your anchor. Drawing heavily on insights and quotes from the SME you’ve interviewed, I recommend structuring this piece of content as follows:

• Section one: A brief description of a specific goal or challenge that the SME faced.
• Section two: An overview of how they’ve overcome a challenge or accomplished a goal.
• Section three: The process. This is where you can share the SME’s step-by-step path to success, including detailed information about how they execute their game plan.
• Section four: The result. What was the outcome after they finished the process you just described?
• Section five: Key learnings. This is the meat of your playbook. It’s where you share the non-obvious, timeless learnings that the SME took away from their experience. It’s also helpful to highlight the takeaways that readers can apply to their own goals and challenges.

Different industries may benefit from different kinds of content, or from greater focus on certain sections. That said, I’ve found that sticking to this general structure helps me make content that will be interesting and relevant to my market of one.

The Editorial Newsletter

The next part of the content demand engine is an editorial newsletter. Importantly, this is not a marketing drip campaign. This newsletter is designed to add value for your ICP — not just to pitch a product. I recommend sending your newsletter weekly or biweekly and including the following content in each edition.

Introduction

I always like to say that this section of the newsletter is like a mental warm-up. I usually start with a statistic, a fun fact, or a news headline that’s relevant to my ICP, followed by one or two sentences of commentary. The introduction creates a slippery slope that gets the reader to keep going, so you want to start strong.

What’s on Deck

After the introduction, I like to include a quick table of contents previewing the stories to come. This doesn’t have to be super detailed — just include enough of a preview that the reader knows what to expect.

The First Story

Your first story is the anchor of your newsletter. Here, you’ll want to create a newsletter-native version of your long-form playbook. For example, if your long-form playbook is a 1,200-word article, you might turn it into a 300-word summary designed for your newsletter.

Then, at the end of the story, you can link to the full playbook in case readers want to go deeper. Now, you’re using your newsletter as a mechanism to drive traffic back to your site, while still offering a smooth, cohesive experience for readers who only have time for the newsletter version.

Curation of Insightful Posts

After the first story, I include a curated list of four or five insightful posts from the previous week that I think could be of value to the ICP. This can be as simple as a bulleted list.

Marketing for Internal Content

So far, everything in the newsletter has been exclusively focused on adding value. Now, you get to promote something that’s happening internally within your company. This should still be something that you think would be of value to your audience, but it can be a little more promotional than the rest of the newsletter.

Conclusion

Finally, at the very bottom of the newsletter, you can include a call-to-action — something like “book a meeting” or “schedule a demo.”

Again, just as with your long-form playbook, your newsletter should be adapted to fit the unique needs of your ICP. For example, in some industries, readers may be interested in more links to additional posts. In others, you may only want to include one or two posts in your curation list.

To learn more about what works best for your brand, experiment with different options and iterate based on the results.

Social Media

Finally, you can use your newsletter and playbook to create eight to ten pieces of social media content. If you’re not sure where to start, here’s a breakdown that I’ve found works well:

• Four company posts taken directly from the playbook.
• One company post promoting the newsletter.
• Three posts from executives focusing on different parts of the content.

In addition, you can also explore opportunities for cross-promotion with the subject matter expert featured in your content. For instance, your SME might be willing to post a link to your playbook from their LinkedIn or let you tag them in your company posts.

In many cases, collaborations like these can be a real win-win, offering both you and your SMEs access to a broader audience.

Best Practices for Building Your Content Demand Engine

So, we’ve gotten through the basics. But how can you take your content demand engine to the next level? Here are some of my favorite best practices to keep in mind when developing your own demand engine.

Focus on value, not on selling.

If you believe in the product or service your company offers, you’ll want to sell it to people. But when it comes to creating content that builds trust, you have to think value first.

When you craft content, you need to ask what problem you’re trying to solve. Is your playbook offering insightful, novel recommendations? Or is it just a thinly-veiled sales pitch? Proactively analyzing each and every piece of content in this way helps me craft resources that are truly valuable to my audience.

Make sure sales and marketing work in tandem.

All too often, marketers will get a great idea for a new content play … but they forget to loop in sales. That leads to inconsistencies across the customer journey, as prospects end up hearing different messages from different people across the organization.

To address this, I’ve found that it’s helpful to focus marketing efforts on sales enablement. Rather than operating in a vacuum, your content demand engine should be designed with sales needs in mind. In addition, sales and marketing teams should work together to analyze the performance of different content initiatives. Both teams can then adapt and iterate accordingly.

Get creative.

Finally, don’t be afraid to get creative. While it may be tempting to just stick to a single approach or standard operating procedure, truly great ideas only emerge when you’re willing to take risks and try new things.

For example, once you’ve gotten the hang of creating content for long-form playbooks, newsletters, and social media posts, consider branching out into other formats. One option is to take the subject matter expert interviews that you’ve been doing in private and turn them into webinars.

Exploring these creative strategies can be a great way to create new content from conversations you’re already having and attract new audiences to your brand.

Great Content Surfaces Net New Knowledge

Creating a successful content demand engine isn’t just about creating individual resources, like a playbook or newsletter. It’s about surfacing net new knowledge. Great content marketers act as curators, unearthing and sharing deep, relevant insights with the people who need them the most.

When Instagram released Threads in July of 2023 as a competing platform to X (previously Twitter), I’ll admit that I was unconvinced it would make a splash. But here we stand in 2025: Threads has surpassed TikTok and Instagram in the social apps category in Apple’s App Store. Not everyone’s using it, but those who do say it’s a digital marketing powerhouse.

Post-launch, Threads quickly gained traction as one of the fastest-growing social platforms in 2023. While the initial buzz may have faded, Threads still remains an untapped goldmine for marketers looking to elevate their social media strategy.

Threads content is a real contender for your attention in 2025. It’s blown skeptics (like me) out of the water. Let’s look at how to get started on the platform, examples of successful posts, and tips from marketers on how to develop your Threads strategy.

Table of Contents

• Overview of Instagram Threads
• How to Set Up a Threads Account
• How to Use Threads
• 5 Threads Tips From Marketers (+ Examples)
• Brands to Follow on Threads

Overview of Instagram Threads

Threads allows brands to connect, curate, and quickly share content. It gained popularity rapidly — due in part to its focus on providing a simplistic, casual approach to social media.

With its intuitive user interface and seamless integration with Instagram, Threads became a popular platform for brands across industries.

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Threads Statistics

Let’s take a look at Threads by the numbers.

• Explosive growth. Threads exploded with 100 million users within its first week. This feat made it the fastest-growing social media platform ever. By the end of 2024, Threads had 100 million active users per day.
• Monthly active users. By the end of 2024, Threads had 275 million monthly users.
• Compared to X. In 2024, X had 335.7 million monthly active users.
• Revenue. The estimated revenue in 2025 is $8 billion. In 2026, its estimated revenue is $113 billion.

Here’s what marketers said about Threads in our 2025 Marketing Trends survey:

• Marketing ROI. 3.5% of marketers reported that Threads had the biggest ROI in 2024.
• Activity. 8.3% of marketers reported that they leverage Threads in their marketing strategy.
• Investment. 20.3% of marketers reported that they plan to increase their investment in Threads in 2025.
• Jumping in. 7.9% of marketers reported that they would leverage Threads for the first time in 2025.

And if you’re curious, here’s how Threads stacks up against Meta’s other channels — all according to over 1,000 marketing pros. 

Are you one of those marketers diving into Threads for the first time this year? The water’s warm — here’s how to get started.

How to Set Up a Threads Account

Setting up a Threads account is a pretty straightforward process for seasoned social media users. Here are the steps to follow.

1. Download and install the app.

Start by downloading the Threads app from the App Store (for iOS) or Google Play Store (for Android). Once downloaded, install the app on your mobile device.

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2. Connect your Instagram account.

Launch the Threads app and sign in using your existing Instagram account credentials.

Since Threads was created by Instagram, the integration is seamless. And if you have multiple Instagram accounts, you can create a separate Threads account for each one.

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3. Customize your account.

Once you’re signed in, take a moment to personalize your Threads account.

I recommend adding a profile picture, populating your bio, and selecting a username that aligns with your brand or personal identity. You can also choose to link other social media accounts to enhance cross-platform engagement.

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4. Begin sharing and engaging.

With your Threads account set up, it’s time for my favorite part: Start sharing compelling content and engaging with your followers.

You can create your own thread or actively participate in conversations to foster stronger connections and drive meaningful interactions.

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How to Use Threads

One of the reasons I love Threads is that when it comes to posting, marketers truly have full liberty in defining what engaging and compelling content — that resonates with their audience — looks and sounds like.

Pro tip: Have content that isn’t quite right for Instagram or Facebook? Consider Threads as your new (unfiltered) best friend. Funny content, pop culture references, and other casual content fits well.

I think Threads has proven itself to be a platform that is safe for marketers to leverage casual content and tone as a marketing touchpoint strategy.

What to Post on Threads

Whether it’s sharing a brand-related meme, referencing a trending pop culture moment, or showing love for an upcoming brand partnership, you can use Threads to build authenticity and foster a sense of transparency with your audience.

Like this example from beauty brand, Glossier:

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Threads can help you promote newly-launched products, product lines, or services like never before. By sharing exciting new products or product updates with your followers, you can:

• Create a sense of anticipation.
• Immediately assess customer interest in products.
• Interact with customers and obtain feedback in seconds.

Just like Target did in the example below:

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I enjoy it when marketers initiate Q&A sessions, solicit feedback, or simply start meaningful discussions to create a sense of community and encourage audience participation.

This not only helps in building personal connections, but it also provides valuable insights that can guide future marketing strategies.

Here’s an example from Starbucks I love:

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5 Threads Tips From Marketers (+ Examples)

I have some ideas and examples of great Threads marketing from founders, marketers, and social media managers for you. I hope these insights steer your Threads marketing strategy.

1. Post content that invites discussion.

Posting content that invites discussion has been fruitful for Jen Ruiz’s Threads strategy. Jen Ruiz is an author and founder of Jen on a Jet Plane, and she’s created viral Threads posts in the travel niche. She compares the Threads algorithm to the TikTok algorithm in 2020 — global reach and the ability to get millions of views without followers.

“Certain topics for me in the travel niche (like tipping, safety, and air travel advice), always tend to go viral because they invite a lot of discussion.”

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As a user, I love reading these posts and their comments. The discussion from users makes you feel like you’re sitting at a round table instead of listening to someone talk into a megaphone. Here are some ideas for Threads posts that invite discussion:

• Common misconception in your industry.
• Unpopular opinions.
• Hot takes.

2. Join other people’s conversations.

Threads isn’t a monologue; it’s a dialogue. Beyond just creating engaging content, you should be engaging with others as well.

“Brands that win on Threads don’t just post, they participate,” shared Sasha Berson, co-founder of Grow Law Firm, a marketing company for law firms.

“Think of it more like a group chat than a content platform. Jump into relevant convos, ask questions, and reply like a human, not a PR team,” shared Berson. “Engagement drives reach on Threads right now way more than polish does.”

3. Keep it conversational.

Threads marketing is quick and minimalistic in nature. Sure, highly curated content formats are still present, but they kind of stick out like someone who’s overdressed at an event.

“It pays to ditch the blah corporate script and unleash a lil’ sass and personality,” shared Justin Belmont, CEO of marketing agency Prose. “Audiences aren’t exactly scrolling for corpspeak and platitudes; they’re hungry for off-the-cuff, witty one-liners and insights that actually feel human.”

Here’s an example from clothing designer Cassey Ho asking people to complain about their clothes. I love how this post feels like a conversation between friends at happy hour instead of marketing materials.

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4. Don’t ignore visual content.

While Threads is indeed a text-based medium, viewers still engage with visual content. After all, X isn’t purely text, either: It’s text, images, videos, audio events, polls, and more. Some easy, uncurated image ideas are:

• Behind the scenes.
• Process photos.
• Throwbacks.

The rest of your social media presence is probably highly curated. An authentic, untailored look at your brand will resonate on the Threads platform.

Here’s an example from Minky Couture:

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“Some of our best-performing posts are framed in a casual, low-production authentic way,” shared Breanna Hendry, social media marketing director for Minky Couture. “I believe Threads is all about showing your brand’s personality without overthinking it.”

5. Try trending content/conversations.

Don’t worry about chasing down trending audio. Instead, think about trending conversations that are happening right now in your community. Post a meme, an opinion, or even just acknowledge that you’re following the drama.

Not only does this spark conversation, but touching on trending content also shows viewers that your entire social media strategy isn’t pre-scheduled a year in advance. Every marketer schedules content in advance (myself included), but I really appreciate knowing that someone is still showing up in real-time to participate on a platform.

No one does this as well as Duolingo. The social media team doesn’t miss a trending meme or popular TV moment. Here’s an example that touches on the release of the new season of White Lotus. I haven’t seen White Lotus, but based on this post, I’m pretty sure it would give me nightmares.

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Brands to Follow on Threads

We’ve gone over the fundamentals of Threads marketing — now let’s look at brands that are doing these things well.

Plus, check out a few ways you can take inspiration from what they do best and apply it to your social media marketing strategy.

1. Poppi (@drinkpoppi)

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By leveraging Threads, Poppi makes deliciously tasty flavors that you know of (or maybe don’t) and turns them into beverage classics.

What do they do best on Threads? Poppi knows how to win the hearts of its viewers. Poppi keeps its Threads community alive through consistent engagement.

2. Spotify (@spotify)

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Through Threads, I love how Spotify treats followers like family. It makes announcements about new releases from artists and exclusive glimpses into the music world.

What do they do best on Threads? Follower fanfare. Spotify wants to know what’s on the minds of its followers and won’t hesitate to ask. The combination of Spotify’s inquisitive requests and its followers’ eagerness to answer creates a new kind of recipe for true social media success.

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3. Target (@target)

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On Threads, Target puts a new spin on what it means to share promotional content for its products.

What do they do best on Threads? Interactive, trendy content. Target can guess what’s on your shopping list without even asking, simply because they keep their eyes on well-performing products.

I like how Target uses Threads as a way to gauge interest in popular items in-store and online, then creates activity around the enthusiasm for those items.

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4. HubSpot (@hubspot)

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Of course, you can’t miss following HubSpot.

What do we do best on Threads? Using Threads, we “talk business” like never before by molding humor into valuable insights, tips, and strategies related to everything (yes, everything) to do with marketing.

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Threads for the Win?

I have realized I was missing out by brushing Threads off as “just another version of Twitter.” While I didn’t jump on the bandwagon initially, I’ve now integrated the platform into the overall social media strategy for my clients. I’m publishing daily and seeing steady growth; if I had a time machine, I’d be active there from the start.

Thankfully, Threads is still ripe for picking. Marketers can create a sense of exclusivity, intimacy, and authenticity through their off-the-fingertips posts. I look forward to seeing your content on my feed.

Editor’s note: This post was originally published in October 2023 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

One of the biggest reasons I’m a late(r) convert to AI is that AI-generated content usually has some tells. And while I’m a little closer to it than most, when I spot social media content that’s a direct copy-paste from GPT, it feels canned and inauthentic, and I lose trust in the person or brand.

While I firmly believe that authenticity is important everywhere you market your business, it’s especially important when it comes to making connections and growing relationships on social media.

In fact, while I’m 100% on board with using AI to brainstorm or flesh out ideas, I will never advocate blindly publishing AI-generated social, blog, or email content. With that in mind, I want to share my approach to using AI in social media strategies in a way that allows you to be more effective in how you spend your time while still sounding like you.

Table of Contents

• How AI Can Level Up Your Social Media

• How to Maintain Authenticity When Using AI
• When You Should Avoid AI
• Being Transparent About How You Use AI

How AI Can Level Up Your Social Media

AI isn’t going anywhere. ChatGPT alone is responsible for millions of conversations every day. And the vast majority of marketers responding to our 2025 Marketing Trends Survey say that AI is making a significant impact on their work, to the tune of nearly 80%.

With that in mind, you’re probably already using AI and doing so feeling pretty good about job security. Just 18% of marketers expressed concern that AI would take over most marketers’ job duties.

The rest feel confident that it will either take away menial aspects of marketing or act as a partner, making marketing more efficient. The key phrase here? “More efficient.” Notice, I didn’t say “as a total replacement.”

That’s because generative AI has some specific telltale signs. Some of them?

• Parallel construction sentence structure — “not only…but also.”
• Abundance of emojis — 🎉 💥 ♥️ ✅
• Generic hooks — “In today’s fast-paced world…”

There are more, and I’m not using this as an example of why not to use generative AI. People do use those tells, too — and that’s precisely why ChatGPT does. Instead, I want to point out that if all of your social content looks like AI or is obviously AI-generated, it can feel inauthentic and may erode your audience’s trust.

M. Shannon Hernandez, founder and CEO of Joyful Business Revolution, agrees. “I have seen nothing that AI has leveled up on social media. The world of social media is swimming with AI, and now is the time to embrace your very humanness and actually stand out in a sea of mediocrity.”

While generative AI is the most popular use for social media, some great options include:

• Brainstorming. I love plugging basic ideas into ChatGPT and asking it to flesh them out further or point out questions people may have.

• Maintaining a consistent voice. Teach your favorite AI tool how you write. Then, it can help you make sense of random musings.
• Polishing your content. Whenever I have something that’s close to the sentiment but doesn’t quite flow right, I often go to GPT to help me make it sound better.
• Getting more mileage out of long-form content. Most people I know publish a blog and drop a few posts on social media. Instead, you can use AI to help you pull out some important ideas and make your content go further without repeating yourself.
• Showing up more consistently. Hit-and-run (also known as post-and-ghost) social media isn’t a strategy. AI can help you come up with more ideas at scale and give you writing prompts for social posts so you can write and schedule a ton of content at once.
• Creating images. Whether you’re using DALL-E to come up with images or using Canva to mass-create quote images to go with captions you’ve written, I think this is one of the best ways to work smarter, not harder.

Over 32% of marketers say product demonstrations or tutorials perform best on social media, with user-generated (22.5%) and behind-the-scenes (22%) content right on its heels.

So, what’s falling behind in terms of social media performance? Educational content ranks lowest. And just 18% of marketers say influencer marketing is their top-performing content.

But here’s what really caught my eye — 84% of marketers expect AI-generated influencers or avatars to start replacing real humans this year.

That’s a red flag, because AI can’t replace real connection. And if you’re using AI in your content strategy, how you use it matters. Here are a few tips for maintaining authenticity in your social media strategy.

1. Use descriptive AI prompts.

You’ve probably heard the phrase “garbage in, garbage out.” The same applies to AI. It isn’t a mind reader — at least not yet. That means it can only go off of the information you feed it about what you’re creating, which makes it important to spend time developing your prompts.

“As you’re building the prompt, make sure that you put enough effort into the description. I like to tell it who I am, who the client is, the voice to use, and an overview of what you’re looking for. Where possible, it’s helpful to give an example. Once you’ve done that, you’ve given AI enough to go on and give you a draft for the first version you can edit,” says Alyssa Burkus, a ghostwriter who offers thought leadership consulting.

Pro tip: Don’t be afraid to kick it back with feedback until it gets you closer to what you want.

2. Ask for multiple versions.

In my experience, AI rarely nails my sentiment the first time. So I like to ask for 3-4 versions of whatever I’m using it to create, especially when it comes to emails and social media copy. I find that the slight variations help me get really close to what I want. Plus, it gives me some phrasing I can pick and choose from.

3. Create rules or custom GPTs for different types of copy.

I am low-key obsessed with creating different custom GPTs. I’ve got a few types set up — true custom GPTs and what I call “GPT memories.”

If you find you’re going to create a lot of a specific type of content, which comes with complex instructions, it’s probably worth your while to train a custom GPT.

Just choose “My GPTs” in the dropdown menu and follow the instructions to train your own. The possibilities are endless, so I’m not going to go into more detail here. I’ve got these for emails, social posts, and even landing pages to streamline the drafting process.

The other thing I like to use is ChatGPT’s memories. For example, I’ve taught mine a handful of LinkedIn prompts, hooks, and rules I like to use. Then, all I have to do is ask ChatGPT if it remembers my LinkedIn rules and what they are. Once it responds, I can ask it to take whatever we’ve been discussing and use those rules to give me some social post ideas.

4. Share your experiences.

Your stories and your perspective are what make you come alive. There’s nothing more authentic than sharing what’s actually happening in your business right now. Use AI to shape your stories or repurpose your content — but ground it in something real. Even coupling an AI-generated social media caption with a candid photo can make it feel more personal.

5. Take it one prompt at a time.

One of my favorite takeaways from a recent AI + SEO webinar with Neil Patel was not to do it all in one go. Instead of asking AI to write a full social caption, carousel, and CTA in one prompt, break it up.

Ask it to do A. Then ask it to take A and do B. Then add C. You’ll get better results — and more control.

Anecdotally, I’ve found this true as well, so it was quite validating to hear it. By dripping out information piece by piece, AI can build a foundation for what I’m using it to do and be far more effective than cramming it all into one prompt.

6. Feed AI a transcript of you talking.

Want to make sure your social media content feels authentic? Tell your AI chatbot exactly what you want to say or be known for.

Use a tool like Loom, Otter.ai, or even the voice feature in Google Docs to talk out your two cents on whatever topic is at hand, and then feed that transcript into the generative AI tool with a prompt to use your thoughts and ideas to map out some social posts.

I’ve found it helpful to ask for ideas first and then flesh those out into posts with a dedicated structure.

7. Use AI for social listening.

AI isn’t just about generating new content. It’s also helpful to keep your finger on the pulse of what’s going on in your space.

Nikita Morell, copywriter and messaging strategist for architects, shares, “One of my favorite ways to use AI for social media is using tools like Gumloop to ‘listen in’ on discussions and help me identify topics to share on social media. From there, it can either come up with post drafts for me to edit or just send me a list of ideas.”

8. Add a human touch and oversight to every post.

“AI can’t sound human. That’s why it gets tone so wrong. Tone is fundamentally the communication of emotion. And emotion is (for now) a purely human concept,” says Gill Hill, editor, brand voice specialist, and founder of Interrobang!?

While this relates in part to the telltale signs of AI mentioned above, it goes further. If you think of AI as the average of all things said on the Internet, it makes sense that AI-generated content extracts personality and everything that makes content interesting.

Hill agrees. “As brands realize that AI is just a hollow shell of emojis that attempt to replicate tone, they are reaching out for human help. Companies who have never thought about brand voice before (or heaven forbid, discounted it as unnecessary) now look at AI copy and know that the tone is wrong.”

The solution, then, is to go ahead and use AI to your heart’s content. Just don’t post it blindly.

When You Should Avoid AI

My friend Monique Swansen has a rule: “Just because you can, doesn’t mean you should.” While she usually uses it in an accounting context because that’s her zone of genius, I’ve found it applies in so many other places… including AI.

Even if AI can do something, it doesn’t always mean you should use it that way. Here are a few situations where it’s best to leave AI on the sidelines.

The Comments Section or DMs

It’s tempting to click on LinkedIn’s AI prompts when it generates a comment — I get it. However, in my experience, AI comments seem to do one of two things:

• Summarize the post.
• Choose one aspect of the post to elevate.

What do the two have in common? Neither adds anything of value. And they both feel inauthentic. The best comments — the ones people actually notice — add to the discussion and share personal experiences. Just like you’d see in any real-life situation.

Same goes for DMs. Some people I know have started putting a period in their LinkedIn profile names to make it easier to spot the bots.

Original Thought Leadership

Thought leadership, at its core, is your thoughts and perspectives, informed by your lived experiences. By definition, AI doesn’t have that — it’s artificial. It can pull from patterns, mimic tone, and organize ideas. But it doesn’t know what you know.

Sure, use AI to flesh out an outline or smooth out a few talking points — after you’ve plugged in your two cents.

Copy and Paste Situations

Don’t plug a post into GPT, copy it word-for-word, and hit publish. It usually feels generic and removes all the energy from your voice.

Fiona O’Carroll, director of digital marketing at Xenon Arc, shares, “I use ChatGPT to come up with a draft before plugging it into another tool — Hemingway — to help make it sound less like AI.”

From there, she can analyze the text, find areas where it should be stronger or simpler, and then make sure it has her personal touch.

I also like using tools like Originality.AI to find specific passages that may need another pass to sound less like AI and more like you. That said, I think it’s important to take these outputs with a grain of salt. Because sometimes AI sounds human and vice versa, especially with drier, more technical language.

When You’re Telling Personal Stories

Hernandez says, “AI is a machine that has all the knowledge in the world and none of the wisdom that makes a human, well, human. AI doesn’t have the capacity to feel. It doesn’t have the capacity to create or hold or evoke emotions, and it certainly doesn’t have the capacity to have empathy.”

Sure, you can use AI to polish these up or structure them in a way that makes more sense. But, it doesn’t pay to remove all of what made the story yours from the post. Your voice — with all its quirks, edges, and energy — is what cuts through.

When You Have to Be Spot-on in Your Messaging

There are some areas where AI just isn’t worth the risk. Don’t rely on it for:

• Crisis communications.
• Brand messaging that’s been client-approved or legally sensitive.
• Anything requiring cultural nuance.
• Legal, financial, or health claims.

Use human judgment here. Always.

Being Transparent About How You Use AI

If you’re using AI in your content creation process — say so. Do you need to do it for every social post you do? Not really. But if you’re creating content for other people, it’s a must.

Sure, it’s about ethics and doing the right thing. It’s also about trust.

If you’re a personal brand, the bar isn’t quite as high, but if questioned, always respond honestly.

On the other hand, if you’re an agency or creating content on behalf of clients, it’s probably a good idea to include in your contract if and when you use AI, the kind of human oversight and editing that’s involved, and what tools are in play.

Note: This isn’t legal advice, so absolutely consult an attorney about best practices here.

Whatever you do, don’t fake it. At this point, most clients expect and/or encourage the use of AI, so the real issue lies in telling the truth about it.

You Are the Secret Sauce

If you’ve ever attended one of my workshops, you’ve probably heard me say, “Your secret sauce isn’t your methodology or mechanics. It’s YOU.”

The truth is, whatever the step-by-step process is, you can probably learn about it on YouTube or by asking AI. But as much as you or I can break down how to do something, we can’t teach people how to think or how our neurons are wired.

So what I really mean here is that your secret sauce is all of your lived experience that informs your approach. And that’s the part that AI tools can’t do.

As I mentioned earlier, ChatGPT, Claude, Jasper — whatever AI tool you love most — doesn’t know what makes you tick. It doesn’t know your voice, your story, or the way you see the world. That’s what makes your content worth reading.

So, by all means, use the heck out of AI. Brainstorm with it. Build with it. Speed things up with it.

Just don’t forget that you’re the ingredient that makes it matter.

Do you ever look at CEOs and wonder, “What makes them so successful?” I‘ll tell you their secret: It’s not what they know, it’s who they know. Every great leader has a board of directors — smart people who challenge their thinking.

But, what if you don’t have a board of directors? Well, with AI, you can build your own, entirely for free.

Your AI board of directors can help you transform your decision-making processes and get unstuck in minutes. The time you save can help you level up your work and focus on what you love in your personal life. Below, I’ll share the 10-minute process I used to build a personal board of directors.

How to Build Your Board of Directors

Before you start prompting, choose your favorite AI chatbot. For this example, I’ll be working with ChatGPT o3-mini-high. However, if you have a free account, ChatGPT 4o will get the job done. Now, let’s begin.

1. Choose your board of directors.

The beauty of an AI board of directors is that you can pick anyone you want. That might be:

• Your role models in business.
• Consultants with full client rosters.
• Experts with direct experience on the problem you’re trying to solve.
• Or a combination of the three.

For my example, I want my board to include amazing entrepreneurs and leaders with diverse experiences. These different perspectives give me a better chance at finding solutions for challenging problems.

Remember, there are no limitations when dreaming up your board. Ask yourself: Who would I go to for advice if I could choose anyone, living or dead? Who has already done what I’m trying to do?

Those people are your ideal board of directors.

2. Have AI write and refine the prompt for you.

My favorite way to write an AI prompt is actually to have AI write the prompt for me. Once I have my list of people, I ask ChatGPT to help me write a prompt that can unlock insights from my ideal board. Here’s what I wrote.

Initially, ChatGPT gave me a list of each entrepreneur’s key attributes and why they are iconic. While that’s a good start, I want more information. So, I switch on OpenAI’s deep research feature, which allows the LLM to better understand each board member’s qualifications.

I ask for summaries that focus on the unique experiences and qualities that make each person on my list great. In other words, I want to know what makes each of these founders uniquely them? ChatGPT then generates a deep dive on each person, complete with citations.

From there, I ask ChatGPT to combine this information with my initial request. The result is a thorough prompt that can power my AI board.

3. Give the group a scenario.

Now, I’m ready to consult my board of directors. I take the prompt I’ve enriched with detailed summaries of my board members and add it to a new ChatGPT window. Then, I plug in the specific question I want to ask those people. For my example, I’ll focus on growing my podcast Marketing Against the Grain.

With all of this information, ChatGPT gives me advice from each board member in their own voice. I love this approach because it helps me move more quickly. By treating my AI board like collaborators, I can refine my strategy faster with new perspectives that challenge my thinking.

Of course, just like talking to people in real life, you will always have more context on your problem than anyone else. This exercise is great for tackling your biggest problem of the day, but not every piece of advice it tells you is going to be perfect or immediately actionable. That means you’ll need to evaluate each response and decide what advice is worth taking.

Making the Most of Your AI Board

Your digital board of directors can help you think in new and different ways. Once you’ve created and refined your prompt, you can use it again and again. Just plug in a new problem, swap out a board member here and there if you think someone else would have a more valuable perspective, and you’re good to go!

You can also use your prompt to create a custom GPT that allows you to simply plug in your question. No need to copy and paste the entire prompt every time.

Most importantly, build a habit of consulting your personal board of directors every time you have a problem. This will get you accustomed to embracing feedback from people with unique experiences and train your mind to think differently. That alone will make you more successful than 95% of the people out there.

To learn more about leveraging AI to fast-track your problem-solving skills, check out the full episode of Marketing Against the Grain below:

Growth is the mandate for brands each year. One way to grow? Create offerings that appeal to a wider group of people. That’s where inclusive marketing comes in.

Inclusive marketing is all about acknowledging the many ways people are different. Brands that do inclusive marketing well authentically infuse the identities they’ve chosen to serve throughout all parts of their marketing mix to ensure those consumers feel like they belong and that the brand is for “people like them.”

With eight years of experience as a consultant, I know that each brand’s approach to inclusive marketing looks different, tailored to its audiences and its products. So, I wanted to share how role model companies have created strategies that win. Let’s dive in.

Inclusive Marketing Strategies from Top Brands

1. Zumba focuses on building a diverse team.

When brands struggle with inclusive marketing, I recommend that they look at the demographics of their teams. If everyone comes from the same background, you may be missing valuable insights. A diverse team will be more representative of the consumers you want to serve, helping you better understand their needs.

One of my favorite examples is Zumba. This popular dance fitness program trains instructors in 160 countries and has more than 15 million people who take their classes worldwide. With a global audience, Zumba needs instructors who can teach in different languages and understand different lifestyles.

“Now, what’s important to know is that those instructors come from all walks of life. So, you have people taking their certification for a variety of reasons,” says Carolina Moraes, chief marketing officer of Zumba.

According to Moraes, the diversity of the brand’s instructors helps attract a wide range of customers.

She further explains, “So, as you can imagine, that brings in a blend of a very diverse community of instructors where you have lawyers, teachers, firefighters, hairdressers, chefs, all kinds … taking these trainings together. And, they bring in their students who very often are from the same universe. So when they start teaching, their class very often looks like them.”

While having a diverse team can help you expand your perspectives, your hiring practices alone don’t guarantee success. You can only benefit from your employees’ unique insights if they feel safe enough to share their experiences.

That’s why brands need to build an inclusive culture and focus on psychological safety. When employees feel like they belong, they can bring their lived experiences and what makes them unique to the work they do.

Zumba builds this environment by working with education specialists who train new Zumba instructors and get them steeped in the brand’s inclusive culture.

“Now, they are the most diverse group you will probably see. They are a direct reflection of the brand. And when they hold those sessions, not only is this diversity spoken about in the actual training, but it’s also brought into the product and how the product is delivered,” Moraes says.

Pro tip: Building and empowering a diverse team within an inclusive culture will help you attract a bigger and more diverse customer base.

2. Wistia features diverse talent in its communication.

Like Zumba, video marketing platform Wista focuses on amplifying diverse voices. The company features diverse talent in its promotional videos — both in the form of internal team members and external influencer partners.

Taylor Corrado is the senior director of brand marketing at Wistia. She explained the benefit of showcasing a diverse set of experts in the brand’s content.

“If you’re building a team that’s inclusive and diverse, you’re going to be able to infuse it more into your marketing… When you realize how much you can use your team to be in content and to be the voice of the brand, but also visually represent groups, it’s really impactful,” Corrado says.

The data backs this up. I ran a survey of 1,000 customers about inclusive marketing. Of respondents, 46% wanted the brands they engaged with and bought from to have internal staff and leadership representative of their customer base. I also found that 41% of consumers wanted brands to work with representative influencers and spokespeople.

Pro tip: Put your team front and center (without using tokenism), as a reflection of your brand’s commitment to inclusion. Consumers want to see that you walk the talk. They see the team you hire and feature as a reflection of your values.

3. Michael Graves Design builds accessibility into its product.

The most successful companies bake inclusion directly into their products. That’s why I love Michael Graves Design.

CEO Ben Wintner told me that the brand’s ethos around accessible homes centers on “the decisions you make within a home that are going to allow the widest group possible to live the way they want to live, and most importantly with independence and dignity.”

To achieve this mission, the brand works to build products for the people who have the most specific needs, including those who are disabled. Wintner says the brand builds its products with novel functional enhancements. Design teams are equally focused on “blending safety, style, and accessibility.”

Most companies I’ve seen design products for the masses. They later go back and figure out how to adapt offerings for underrepresented and underserved communities.

Michael Graves Design breaks that mold. By focusing on building a product that works for consumers with the most specialized needs, while considering the wider needs of its larger customer base, the brand delivers a product that actually works for the widest group possible.

I’ve seen this work outside of the design space. Take a restaurant I regularly visited while living in Buenos Aires. The menu was designed for people who followed a gluten-free and Paleo diet. However, the food was delicious and focused on popular dishes that people in Buenos Aires love to eat.

The result? The majority of people who ate at the restaurant were not gluten-free or Paleo; they just came for a delicious meal. The restaurant was also frequented by people who had those restricted diets, because there weren’t a lot of available restaurants for them. And, the restaurant could serve a wide range of diners. It’s a win-win-win.

Pro tip: Design for the consumers with the most specialized needs, so you have a product that works for the widest group possible.

Tune into my full conversation with Ben Wintner on this episode of the Inclusion & Marketing podcast.

4. Lysol prioritizes identity-based research to improve effectiveness.

Customer intimacy is at the heart of any effective inclusive marketing strategy. The team at Lysol prioritizes engaging in research to ensure they understand their consumers at a deep level, all while crafting communication that strikes the right tone.

Gary Osifchin is the chief marketing officer and general manager at Reckitt U.S. Hygiene. He told me that the brand had effectively engaged African-American and Hispanic consumers by authentically representing them in the brand’s marketing. The key here, according to Osifchin, is basing all promotional campaigns on consumer insight.

Osifchin shared they captured insights from “a lot of rich quals, a lot of in-home, a lot of upskilling, and ensuring that we actually are speaking to diverse consumers to gain insight.”

Osifchin explained that when the team evaluates their efforts, they know how consumers will receive their communications.

“Are we actually delivering a better fragrance experience with our Lysol brand new day products amongst the target consumers of African Americans and Hispanics? The answer is yes, we are, because we developed it based on insight, and then we tested it to ensure that we’re delivering against it,” Osifchin says.

Pro tip: Move beyond superficial content that doesn’t resonate with consumers from underrepresented and underserved communities. Invest in getting the insights you need and testing them to ensure that what you create resonates.

5. HubSpot acquires more customers through multilingual content marketing.

People in more than 135 countries use HubSpot. Not all those customers speak English. Even if they do, they may prefer to engage with educational content in a different language. So, as a means to reach more of its ideal consumers, HubSpot leans into multilingual marketing.

The brand creates localized original content and funnels different languages, such as Spanish and French.

Selim Damani is part of the French growth marketing team at HubSpot. Damani told me that the brand takes a very strategic approach to gaining consumers in different markets. The strategy goes beyond just translating existing content.

“We have to accept that the original market or the U.S. market is different from international markets. But they [other markets] are also all different and unique, and we cannot have just the one strategy we roll out for every other country,” Damani says.

According to Damani, American companies in France need to adapt their marketing campaigns so they resonate with French audiences. Without steeping campaigns in the local culture, potential customers will assume that the product won’t meet their unique needs.

“If all the examples that I’m shown are about an American delivery company, American fast foods, American train systems, booking systems that don’t exist, I’m like, ‘Okay, it works. But it won’t work for me,’” Damani explains.

The solution here, Damani continues, is to speak to the customers and show that “your market is not an afterthought of my strategy, but that you are the center of the regional strategy.”

Pro tip: Your inclusive marketing efforts will be more effective if you don’t try to force a one-size-fits-all strategy to work. Know your diverse customer identities, and find ideal ways to serve them.

Get Ready to Grow With Inclusive Marketing

Each company that I featured above took a different approach to inclusive marketing. However, each brand reaped the same reward: They could genuinely serve a wider range of customers by meeting their unique needs.

More brands are realizing that inclusive marketing is both the right thing to do and incredibly effective. By understanding diverse perspectives in your audience, you can create inclusive campaigns, design more accessible offerings, and expand your reach.

As a marketer, I’ve seen it happen time and time again: I land on a product page that’s cluttered, confusing, or just badly designed and I leave immediately. No second chances.

Why? Because I know there’s probably another tool or product out there that does the same thing, but offers a much better experience.

Your landing page design matters. A lot. It’s not just about looking good, it’s about shaping how people perceive your brand and whether they choose to take action. A weak website can hurt your credibility and your conversion rates.

Table of Contents

• What is a landing page?
• Why do you need a landing page?
• How to Create a Landing Page
• How to Design Your Landing Page
• Landing Page Best Practices
• Expert Tips on How to Build a Great Landing Page
• Landing Page Copywriting Tips
• A/B Testing Your Landing Page
• Landing Page Metrics to Track
• How to Make Your Landing Pages More Effective
• What to Do Post-Conversion: Lead Nurturing

Landing pages contain lead forms that ask visitors for their contact information in exchange for something of value, otherwise known as an offer.

The video below will help drive that definition home.

How to Create a Landing Page

Before I dive into the details, I want to emphasize that creating a landing page doesn’t have to be complicated. Here are some actionable, step-by-step instructions to help you create one.

1. Define your goal and audience.

Whenever I start working on any landing page, I always make sure to define the “why,” “who,” and “what.” I suggest asking yourself the following:

• Why am I making this landing page?

• Who do I want to visit my landing page?

• What steps do my landing page visitors have to take to help me achieve my goal?

Your answers will guide the process of writing your copy, creating a lead magnet, and adding the necessary elements to your page.

For example, say the reason you’re making your landing page is to generate leads for your upcoming book launch (your “why”). This means that you’ll be targeting people who love to read books in your genre (your “who”).

And to get them on your email list, you’ll have them fill out a form once they land on your page (your “what”).

Here are some CTAs I suggest using on your landing page to collect leads:

• Subscribe to a newsletter.
• Download a free ebook/guide.
• Sign up for a free trial.
• Register for a webinar.
• Download a coupon.

Pro tip: To get the most results from your landing page, stick to one goal (or one CTA). In my experience, if you place two CTAs next to one another, they’ll compete for the visitor’s attention. Sticking to one CTA not only makes it much easier to create an effective landing page, but also reduces the amount of work your visitors have to do when they arrive on your page.

2. Choose a platform.

After setting your goal and defining your audience, the next step is to select the platform you’ll use to create your landing page.

My personal favorites are WordPress and Wix, but you can use any other popular content management system or dedicated landing page builders like Unbounce or Leadpages.

Unbounce and Leadpages, however, can be really expensive, and while WordPress and Wix are free, you’ll likely have to pay for functional landing page templates — which isn’t feasible if you’re new to creating landing pages.

You can work around this problem by using HubSpot’s Free Landing Page Builder.

This tool has the following features:

• A WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) editor that makes it easy to build stunning, yet professional, landing pages. This feature is what helped me confidently build my first-ever website without any previous coding experience.
• An extensive landing page template library so you don’t have to create a landing page from scratch.
• Built-in personalization so you can tailor your page’s content to fit your target audience.
• AI copywriting tools that help you generate compelling copy in just a few seconds.
• Robust analytics so you know who’s visiting your landing page and what they do when they get there – these types of insights can be a true goldmine for your business.
• Integration with Salesforce and HubSpot’s CRM tools so you can manage the leads your page generates.

With this tool, you can build beautiful, effective, and mobile-responsive landing pages for free. You can also test and optimize these pages yourself, without asking a web developer for help.

3. Customize your landing page design.

If you choose to use a landing page template, you should customize the design to match your brand. This includes the colors, fonts, layout, and visuals.

Here are some tips to help you with customization:

• Choose a captivating hero image (the large image that’s typically in the area above the fold, right underneath the website header) that shows visitors what your offer is about.
• Use images (product images and stock photos) and illustrations to show the benefits and values that your visitors will gain by working with your company. Let these visuals tell a story.
• If applicable, include real photographs of people using your product/service (e.g., reading your book, using your face lotion, etc.) to help your landing page visitors connect with you on a personal level. A quick tip? If you have relations with influencers, then reach out to them and ask whether you could feature their stories on your site.
• Use a color palette that’s a mixture of bright colors and muted tones to create balance and make your overall design more memorable.
• Optimize your images for web loading speed. If not, they might bog down your landing page and make it load very slowly.

4. Write a compelling copy.

After customizing your landing page website, it’s time to include some actual content.

The first step before writing the copy itself is to write down exactly what message you want to convey on your website. What services or products do you want to promote? What are your company’s market advantages? Also, what brand personality do you want to communicate?

Once you have all this, think about how you want to structure the landing page copy. The typical structure involves a headline, a tagline, the actual copy, visuals (images and videos), and a CTA.

An engaging headline and image can be crucial, but experience has shown me that it can fall flat without well-crafted copy. Your copy must be clear and concise and guide your visitors to the action you want them to complete.

Compelling copy also speaks directly to the visitor using “you” and “your” to engage them. We’ll go more in-depth on copy tips below.

Pro tip: Speed up the writing process by using generative AI to create a rough draft of your landing page copy and refine it to match your brand voice and tone.

With Campaign Assistant, HubSpot users can plug in their main points, features, and CTA and generate a first draft in seconds.

So, you could provide all the key information you’d like the page to feature, and ask Campaign Assistant to generate relevant copy.

Here’s an example:

5. Add a persuasive call-to-action (CTA).

After telling your visitors all about your product/service and how they can benefit from it, you’ll need to show them the action you want them to take.

This is your call-to-action (CTA), which I believe is the single-most crucial element on your landing page — it’s one of many elements that encourage conversion.

It’s usually in the form of a click-through button, which should stand out on the page, meaning you should use a color that contrasts with other elements on the page.

The call-to-action (CTA) should clearly explain what you want visitors to do; that is, use an action verb that spells it out for them, like “submit,” “download,” or “get it now.” I’ll mention more on CTA best practices below.

6. Create a form (if needed).

Sometimes, a CTA button alone will not suffice. I’d say this applies particularly when you’re targeting different kinds of people with the same landing page.

This is especially important if you’re creating a lead magnet, i.e., a digital asset that adds value for your target customers. This could be a freebie, like a library of useful Excel templates (if you’re in B2B) or a free weekly diet plan (if you’re a B2C business in the fitness field).

In this case, you’ll need to create a form to collect information on the people who access your lead magnet. It could look something like this:

Source

Before creating one, however, determine what information you need from visitors. If you only need their full name and email address, ask for those only.

Don’t ask for their phone number, home address, company name, and job title unless you absolutely need this information to tailor offers to them correctly.

If you’re not sure how to approach this, remember: shorter is better.

In July 2023, we surveyed 101 marketers and advertisers in the U.S. to learn about trends in landing pages. Of respondents, 30.7% said the ideal number of questions on a landing page form to get the best conversions is four.

Beyond that, 10.9% of marketers report only the name and email are essential for a landing page form.

Pro tip: Connect your form to your email marketing and CRM tool to manage and nurture your leads.

7. Test and preview.

Now, you’re ready to launch your landing page!

But before you do that, though, do a final check. Check your copy and ensure that there are no grammatical or spelling errors that will make a bad impression on your audience.

Also, take time to check your design and make sure everything is properly placed and formatted. Double-check that all links, forms, and buttons work as expected.

I learned this the hard way. Once, while creating a landing page for an ebook in Unbounce, I forgot to test if the CTA button worked. The page got plenty of visits, but it didn’t convert and I couldn’t figure out why. Eventually, I watched a few session recordings, and only then did I notice the problem: clicking the CTA did nothing. It was broken.

Once I fixed it, the conversion rate improved immediately.

Lesson learned: Never publish your landing page without testing and previewing it first.

Another thing: Make sure that the contact information of visitors who click your CTA button is safely situated in your email marketing and/or CRM tool.

When you’ve confirmed everything is as it should be, click Publish.

8. Monitor and optimize.

You thought we were done, right? Not quite.

After publishing your landing page, you shouldn’t just forget it; instead, monitor and test it to figure out ways to continue improving upon your landing page elements. The best way to do this is through A/B testing.

Some important elements you should run experiments on include:

• The headline. Try different headlines to see which one resonates best with your audience.
• Visuals. Change the hero image and other illustrations you use on your landing page.
• Form. If you have a form on your landing page, change the number of form fields and the form placement to see which one(s) convert better.
• CTA. Design a different CTA button and tweak the accompanying copy and bit to see which one visitors click on more.

When you conduct these tests and implement your results, you’ll be able to get the best out of your landing page, no matter what your goal is.

Pro tip: Also analyze performance metrics and user feedback, and make necessary adjustments to improve the effectiveness of your landing page over time.

How to Design Your Landing Page

Often, design means creativity, colors, and pretty pictures. We take design a step further for a landing page to mean functional, direction-oriented, and practical.

So, to craft a well-designed landing page, you’ll have to tap into both your right and left brain.

But don’t get me wrong — you still need fantastic imagery and attractive colors to convert your visitors. We’ll touch on how to incorporate all of this below.

Landing Page Structure

The good news is you don’t need to get too creative here. I’ve found that most landing pages follow a very similar structure because it’s been proven to work.

You can infuse your creativity through branded elements and images, but stick to a landing page format people are used to seeing.

A good landing page has five elements:

1. Headline that grabs the visitors’ attention.
2. Imagery that is relevant to your audience.
3. Lead form that sits above the fold to capture visitors’ information.
4. CTA that is action-oriented and compelling.
5. Copy and description that informs and entices your visitor to complete your form.

Source

Can your landing page include more than this? Absolutely. (Think of social share buttons visitors can use to spread the word about your offer.) This is simply the bare minimum.

You need to know your audience, where they are coming from, and where they are in their buyer’s journey to understand how much you need to include. The rule of thumb is to have as much information as you need to get people to convert.

Landing Page Layout

Trust me when I say most people don’t read every word of your cleverly crafted copy. Instead, they skim through and pull out the most important tidbits. Your job is to make those tidbits stand out so your visitor doesn’t miss anything important.

That means a few things:

• Keep the most important information above the fold so your visitor doesn’t need to scroll to get to it.
• Perform a blink test on your page, meaning a visitor should be able to gather the main message in less time than it takes them to blink, i.e., less than five seconds.
• Use white (or unfavorable) space to keep your visitors engaged and focused and to help them comprehend your message.
• Write with bullets and short paragraphs to make your copy easy to digest.

Try to work the critical copy into an F-pattern, which is the direction that most people scan a page online. Work with the flow of visual patterns to drive people to the key points that will get them to convert.

Landing Page Colors

The design of your landing page — including the colors you use — should reflect that of your website.

You’re aiming to form a long-term relationship with the people who visit your landing page, which means they need to become familiar with your branding colors and unique style.

The more they recognize your brand, the more they trust you (and the more they trust you, the easier it is to get them to do what you want them to do).

Personally, I’ve found that when landing pages stick closely to the main brand palette, users feel more confident taking action; it’s like they know they’re in the right place. It might seem like a small detail, but it plays a big role in building credibility.

The areas where you should consider using alternate colors are on the elements of your page that need to stand out — ahem, your CTA button.

Contrast is the name of the game here. Say your branded colors are primarily green; you’ll want to choose a color that can draw users’ attention, say purple.

Landing Page Images

The image on your landing page is one the first things people see, and since people process visuals far quicker than text, it sets the tone for their entire experience.

But how can you choose between millions of stock photos and that company photo shoot that’s taking up all the space on your computer?

Let’s narrow down the selection with a few essential questions.

Who is my target audience?

What does your persona look like? How old are they? How do they dress? What are they interested in?

The answers to these questions are important in determining what image you will place front and center on your landing page.

If it will appeal to your audience, it needs to represent them somehow.

Where on my landing page do I want them to look?

This might seem odd, but it’s based on the idea that people follow directional cues, like where someone is looking or pointing. If you want visitors to fill out a form, consider an image that drives their attention toward that form.

Will this image reinforce my message?

Every element on your landing page serves an essential purpose.

Since your image is one of the first things people see, it should help clarify what visitors can expect from your page. Make sure that your image adds value.

Here are other important things to consider when creating excellent landing page images.

Call-to-Action (CTA)

We’ve discussed your CTA a few times, but since it’s the most crucial part of your landing page, it’s worth mentioning again.

When it comes to the design of your CTA, there are a few tricks that will make it so alluring that visitors feel compelled to click.

To clarify, your CTA includes the button and the copy you use to draw attention to it; these tips cover both.

• Give your CTA a vibrant and contrasting color.
• Focus your CTA copy on the benefit to your visitor.
• Get to the point — try using no more than five words.
• Tell your visitors what you want them to do using action verbs (e.g., Get, Download, Click, etc.).
• Make your button large enough to stand out on the page.
• Give it some negative space — don’t crowd the area around your CTA.
• Follow the flow of the page and place your CTA where your readers’ eyes will go, such as to the right of or below the copy.
• Test your button shape, test your copy. As a matter of fact, test everything (we’ll cover how to do this below).

Beyond that, consider personalizing your CTA. HubSpot research found that personalized CTAs convert 202% better than default versions.

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Mobile Landing Page

More than half of website traffic comes from mobile devices; therefore, the user experience should be the same regardless of the device visitors use.

By making your landing page responsive, you give them every opportunity to view and convert, whether on a desktop, phone, tablet, or otherwise.

I can’t count how many times I’ve clicked on a promising ad only to land on a page that’s a nightmare to navigate on mobile. When that happens, I’m gone in seconds — and I’m sure I’m not the only one. A seamless mobile experience isn’t optional anymore; it’s expected.

Next, I’ll share some basic landing page best practices.

1. Craft a benefit-focused headline.

Over the years, I’ve learned that for every 10 people visiting a landing page, at least seven will bounce off the page. To keep that number low, visitors must understand what’s in it for them within seconds of arriving.

My headline is the first thing they’ll read, and it should clearly and concisely communicate the value of my landing page and offer. The same goes for your own landing page, so craft a clear, direct, and engaging headline.

2. Choose an image that illustrates the offer.

I always include images in my landing pages. The purpose of an image is to convey a feeling — it should illustrate how visitors will feel once they receive the offer.

Specific images may work better than others, so you should always split-test your options (which we’ll cover below).

3. Include the lead form above the fold.

Your lead form needs to be readily accessible should your prospect want to convert immediately — you don’t want them searching and scanning your landing page to find your offer.

“Above the fold” means visitors don’t have to scroll to get to the form — it’s in view when someone hits the page.

This could be a form or an anchor link to the form. Even better: Design your layout to scroll with the user as they move down the page.

4. Give away a relevant offer.

Think of your landing page as part of your lead’s journey to your ultimate offer — your product or service. Your offer is the thing you give in exchange for your lead’s personal information.

Not only should it be compelling enough for your visitor to provide their contact info, but it should also be relevant to your business. Say you sell horseshoes.

Your offer might be something like “10 Simple Ways to Size Your Horse’s Hooves” because, ultimately, you will ask that lead to buy your horseshoes.

You wouldn’t hook them with an offer about organic farming because that puts them on a different path.

We’ll talk more about how compelling offers are below.

5. Only ask for what you need.

You want to gather as much information as possible about your lead, but how much you ask for depends on several factors:

• How well-acquainted they are with you.
• Where they are in their buyer’s journey.
• How much they trust you.

Ask for as little info as you need in your lead form to create a low barrier to entry. A name and an email are more than sufficient to nurture a new lead.

6. Remove all navigation.

Your landing page has one objective and one objective only: to convert visitors into leads. Any competing links — including internal links to other pages on your website — will distract from that goal.

Remove other links on your page to draw your visitors’ attention to your call to action.

7. Make your page responsive.

Like every other page on your website, your landing pages must be responsive to accommodate every viewing experience. The last thing you need is for your form to fall out of view on mobile devices.

Give your visitors every possible opportunity to convert, no matter how they view your page.

You can use tools to help accomplish this. For example, HubSpot’s drag-and-drop landing page editor, available in Marketing Hub Starter, makes creating mobile-optimized landing pages and forms effortlessly easy.

8. Optimize for search.

Sure, you’ll be driving visitors to your landing page through email blasts, social posts, and other marketing methods, but your page should also be optimized with target keywords for your paid campaigns and organic search.

When someone searches for your key phrase, they should find your landing page. Similarly, when you target a keyword with paid ads, those words should exist on your landing page.

9. Remember to use a thank you page.

A thank you page is where you send leads once they’ve completed your form. Now, you could just show a thank you message on the same page or ditch the thank you altogether, but there are many reasons why that’s not the best option.

A thank you page serves three essential purposes:

• It delivers the offer that you promised (usually in the form of an instant download).
• It allows you to interest your new lead in additional relevant content.
• It serves as a chance to thank them for their interest, which goes a long way in promoting them to a customer.

Expert Tips on How to Build a Great Landing Page

Sometimes, the best way to get inspired is by looking at examples of successful landing page design projects.

Here are the stories and tips from six experts who were involved in either designing landing pages from scratch or optimizing them for better user engagement.

Remove any autoplay media above the fold.

Karlo Čičko, a tech expert and software developer at GameBoost, told me that he has built, tested, and rebuilt landing pages specifically for gamers – a subgroup who are notoriously fast to bounce if something looks slow, boring, or out of touch.

At GameBoost, a lot of his work happens behind the scenes on backend systems, but every now and then he gets pulled into the UX and design side when the performance has to match visual engagement.

“Especially with new feature launches or seasonal promos, we need to make sure our pages convert in seconds – not minutes. One design decision that changed things for us was stripping out any auto-play media above the fold,” said Čičko.

It might sound counterintuitive in the gaming world, where flashy trailers are standard. But what they found was that static imagery with smart microcopy actually gave visitors more control and let them browse without overwhelm.

“We saw clearer engagement paths once we removed that visual overload,” he added.

Consider a visual snapshot layout.

Case studies can be a powerful way to turn leads into prospects – if they’re persuasive (meaning they include relevant information) and are well-presented on your website. To make their case studies more engaging and easier to digest, Thrive Local has introduced a visual snapshot layout.

“In place of heavy write-ups, we designed modular blocks that provide a quick, digestible overview of the results, industry, and services involved. All of those blocks feature a primary headline in bold text (the main achievement), a short line below it with measurable impact, and a visual giving a cue instant recognition,” says founder, Matt Bowman.

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This design reflects how most users actually browse — skimming quickly for relevance and evidence.

Since launching this format, engagement time on the page increased by 38%, and click-through rates to detailed full case studies improved by almost 45%. It means users are less intimidated by heavy copy and are more likely to explore stories relevant to their industry or goal.

“Our main takeaway here is that visual hierarchy and bite-size proof points win. When people are looking for credibility and capability, less really is more – provided the information is clear, concise, and easy to digest at a glance,” explained Bowman.

Make design decisions that promote fast load speed.

Discussing landing page design best practices would be incomplete without factoring in page performance. Luke Chapman, senior SEO strategist at BigChange, says that he observes on-site performance metrics and behavior to inform his company’s web design decisions.

He told me that one of the most impactful design changes his company made was optimizing image load speed across key landing pages.

“Initially, the pages had high-quality visuals, but they were large and slowed things down, especially on mobile. We switched to next-gen formats like WebP, compressed files without losing quality, and used lazy loading so images only load when they come into view,” Chapman told us.

He said that this seemingly small change made a huge difference not only for SEO but also user experience. The page load time dropped by nearly two seconds. “Bounce rates also went down, time on page increased, and we saw a big lift in organic conversions.”

Get creative with on-site animation.

Human brains are wired to track moving objects — so, no wonder that designers use this built-in, evolutionary trait of ours to bring attention to the “right” elements on the page.

Raihan Masroor, founder and CEO of Your Doctors Online, told us he saw this in real life when he was involved in the company’s website redesign. As the company wanted to engage more users, the design team applied a “trick” — viz., they replaced the “Start Chat” button with a fake typing animation within the input field.

“It looked like someone was already replying – “Hi there, need medical help today?” – and auto-opened after two seconds of user pause,” Masroor said.

He admits that, initially, he didn’t expect much from this design tweak. “However, the results were astonishing: chat opens increased threefold, while first messages increased by 42% in a single week. We only changed one design element — not the copy, layout, or visuals.”

Masroor said that what he believes made it work was that the animation felt real. “It triggered the same reaction we have when we see typing dots in a text thread. People didn’t want to miss a message.”

That small shift in perception completely altered how customers engaged on the Your Doctors Online site.

Compress your images.

Reducing image sizes isn’t just about improving your landing page load times — it can also impact the placement and effectiveness of your CTA buttons, as explained by Antje Eggersdorfer, senior marketing manager at Seton.de.

“The clearest conversion lift we saw from a specific design change was shrinking our hero image height from 850 pixels to 420 pixels. It sounds small, but it shifted the CTA button above the fold on 13-inch screens,” she said.

What was the result? Bounce rate dropped 11% within the first two weeks. In some of their tests for this change, the scroll depth analytics showed users hit the CTA 2.4 seconds faster on average. No color change, no copy update, no added animations. Just less dead space.

In reality, people are scanning, so when the action button gets buried under an oversized banner, that second click dies.

“We had spent six weeks fine-tuning SEO headlines, but none of it mattered when the CTA floated below the fold. After resizing, form submissions went up 19% in 30 days without touching a single word of copy,” explained Eggersdorfer.

If you want engagement, compress your visuals. Let people act before they scroll.

Serve data in an engaging format.

Landing page design should not only circle on making a page functional and aesthetically pleasing. It can also be used to communicate brand values.

In the case of Electricity Monster, it was about displaying authenticity and building trust.

Benjamin Tom, the company’s web designer, told us that he converted the company’s header background from “flat blue” to a looping live data grid showing electricity prices across three states.

“The numbers refreshed every 15 seconds. People assumed it was fake at first, but the live tool-tip showed timestamps, which sparked curiosity, ” Tom said. “That change alone drove scroll depth up 61% in the first week.”

As Tom explains, this interactive module wasn’t simply “for show.” The design anchored the company’s promise: “We help you beat the market.”

“Users kept watching that grid like a stock ticker. The team embedded it with a raw SVG overlay from a JSON feed, which took some finagling. But the ambient motion and live pricing made the value prop visible without needing to read. Basically, the background became the pitch,” Tom said.

Landing Page Copywriting Tips

After good design comes excellent copy; your objective is to be compelling, instructive, likable, concise, effective, trustworthy, and informative. How? Keep reading.

1. Cover the main points.

No matter how you position it, there are a few main points that you need to hit with your copy.

Those main points are:

• Your persona’s pain point.
• The solution to that pain point.
• How your solution works (features).
• How your solution will improve their situation (benefits).
• Verification that it works (social proof).

Most of what you write needs to address how you can help your prospect, not how awesome you are (because that’s implied).

Let’s go into more depth on these points.

The Pain Point

The pain point that you focus on should be the one that your offer solves. Not to sound negative, but it’s important to touch on the problem your persona is facing so they know you understand what they’re going through.

Empathy is an effective way to build trust. And if they know you get their problem, they’re more likely to trust your solution.

Your Solution

The solution to their pain point is what you’re offering in exchange for their information. Illustrate a clear path between their problem and how your solution is the remedy they need.

Features

Knowing your solution may not be enough to convert leads, so you need to mention what’s included in that solution. If it’s an ebook, what are the subjects you cover?

If you’re promoting a webinar, how will it work, and what will you teach?

If it’s a service, what can they expect? Give your potential lead all the information they need to make a decision.

Benefits

Your copy should be heavy with benefits to the user because that’s what they care about — what’s in it for them. While features list what your offer has, benefits tell visitors how their situation will be improved.

Using your solution paints a vivid picture of how much better their life could be.

Social Proof

Studies show that social proof is adequate for persuading people to take a desired action.

Social proof comes in the form of logos of brands you’ve worked with, testimonials from previous clients, reviews of your product, or confirmation that others have purchased your service.

In essence, people also want to know that others have used and benefited from your solution. I like the social proof that Justin Welsh offers on his landing page for his Creator MBA course. It includes both ordinary users and leaders in the business world, and I immediately trust what he has to offer in the program.

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Pro tip: Don’t worry if, after doing all the research and ground work, you’re experiencing writer’s block. You can use tools like HubSpot’s Landing Page GPT to generate different versions of copy based on your main points.

2. Preemptively respond to objections.

A key part of writing persuasive copy (copy that gets people to convert) is dismantling objections before they even come up. Now, this takes some skill … or at least some help from a friend.

Once you’ve laid your foundation by addressing all the main points, put yourself in your prospect’s mind and think about where they might protest or challenge you as they read.

For instance, if you say, “We’ve helped Fortune 500 companies bring in customers,” your reader might scoff or doubt it unless you follow that statement with social proof.

Personally, I’ve found that doing a quick “what would I question here?” pass before hitting publish has saved me a ton of back-and-forth later. It’s surprisingly effective at tightening up your message and building trust from the start.

Do this exercise for every section of your page (or ask an unbiased friend to help) until you’ve covered every possible objection. When you get questions from people visiting your landing page, use that as feedback to further sharpen your copy.

To ensure your landing page meets every need, seek constructive criticism from your first few converted leads.

3. Build trust with your prospect.

You read a sales page, and the company wrote, “Our product has helped 100 people, and it might work for you, too!” Meh. I’d probably pass and find a company with a solution that can work for me.

Your goal is to build trust with your visitor, and the way to do that is to come across as an authority.

Besides using social proof, some other ways to build trust are:

• Write how you speak and address your prospects like a live customer.
• Cite statistics that support your message.
• Use case studies that highlight customers similar to your target.
• Be relatable. Show your audience that you’re human by admitting failures, opening up about doubts you’ve had, and being honest. The caveat is you should only share what is relevant to their struggle; don’t just divulge anything.

4. Use click triggers.

Click triggers eliminate that last bit of doubt before a visitor converts. You can think of them as click Probability Enhancers (yes, I made up that term). I’ve noticed that some call them “reasons to believe.”

In essence, they are copy-positioned next to your CTA, which pushes your prospect over the edge by easing their mind and mitigating the risk of converting.

Below are some practical ways to employ click triggers:

• Money-back guarantee.
• Easy unsubscribe.
• Quote from a successful or happy customer.
• Blurb on “what to expect.”
• Price slashing.
• Privacy policy.
• Some other creative method.

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Whatever you choose, click triggers will give your conversions the boost they need.

A/B Testing Your Landing Page

Everything we’ve discussed until this point is great … in theory. However, your business differs from others, and your target audience is unique. How do you know if the copy you chose is working?

Or if your CTA placement is correct? Or what colors perform best? Or which image to choose?

You test it. That’s how. Split testing (or A/B testing) is probably nothing new to you as a marketer, and split testing your landing page is just one more experiment to add to your list.

Let’s briefly go over how to best A/B test your landing pages.

What is A/B testing?

A/B testing simply splits your traffic into two (or more) page variations to see which performs better.

While you could do this manually by launching one take for some time, then another for the same amount of time, it’s far more efficient to use software that allows you to split test and track your results.

The main components of an A/B test are variants, or the two versions of the page, the champion, or the original page, and the challenger, or the page you modified to test against the original.

How to A/B Test

The most essential trick to split testing is minor tweaks with each experiment.

For instance, you don’t want to split-test your headline and image simultaneously because you won’t know which element garnered the results.

For this reason, stick to testing one element at a time. If the “winner” becomes your champion, you can create a new challenger to test the next element.

You repeat this cycle until you reach a conversion rate that you’re happy with (and that falls within realistic expectations, which we’ll cover below).

What should you test?

You can test virtually anything on your landing page. But while that’s possible, you may want to limit your test to a few of the most impactful elements of your page, like:

• Headline copy.
• Image.
• CTA color.
• Click triggers.
• Copy on the page.
• Lead form length and fields.

These tests will have the most significant impact on your conversion rates. Try starting with the simplest change, like a headline or CTA color, then work your way to the more significant undertakings, like your page copy.

Pro tip: This free A/B testing kit can help.

Landing Page Metrics to Track

Metrics will tell you everything you need to know about how well your landing page is performing and give you some insight into improving it. It’s hard to know exactly what will work when you launch a page.

Measure and track meticulously in the beginning until you reach a relatively good conversion rate; then, you can track your metrics less frequently.

Page Visits

How many visits are you getting on your landing page? The more visits, the more you increase your probability of conversions. Adjust your paid strategy or redefine your keywords to drive more traffic to your page.

You can also inform your current followers about your offer through emails, social media, and your website.

Traffic Source

Knowing where your traffic is coming from will let you know where to double down or ditch your efforts. Most marketers have a landing page promotion strategy. (In fact, only 3% don’t.) Here’s where they invest their efforts:

• 7.9% — link building.
• 32.7% — paid advertising.
• 43.6% — email marketing.
• 5.9% — podcast promotion.
• 13.9% — YouTube promotion.
• 51.5% — social media promotion.
• 28.7% — Internal links in blog posts.
• 35.6% — search engine optimization.
• 17.8% — Partner/affiliate marketing.
• 20.8% — CTAs and banner advertisements on the website.

Submission Rate

This is the number of people who have completed your lead form and landed on your thank you page. You can tweak your page to increase this number, but make sure to A/B test so you know what’s working.

Contacts

Contacts refer to the number of leads that you generate from your form. This differs from submissions because duplicate contacts are only counted once, meaning if a current lead fills out your form to get your offer, they don’t affect the count.

Heat Mapping

This is more of an observation of how people interact with your page than a metric. Heat mapping can show where people scroll, what they read, and how they engage with your page. This is all valuable data when thinking about your page layout and structure.

Bounce Rate

If visitors are coming to your page and leaving immediately, you must examine whether the content aligns with the offer. Does your copy capture visitors’ attention, and do visitors automatically know what to do when they land on your page?

Is your page a reflection of the copy you used to get people to visit it?

Form Abandonment

This metric tells how many people start filling out your form but don’t complete it. If this number is particularly high, some adjustments to consider are introducing new click triggers, shortening your form, or making it more transparent what you want your visitor to do.

Benchmarks

You must judge your landing page against industry norms and across a similar audience to know if it’s performing as expected. Check out some industry benchmarks to set as your baseline, but don’t be discouraged by other companies’ results.

No matter what’s going on, diagnosing and healing your landing pages is possible if you pay attention to the metrics.

How to Make Your Landing Pages More Effective

There are always tweaks you can make to boost landing page performance. Below are a few great tips to get your landing pages leveled up.

Optimize your landing page.

Optimize is such a confusing word, isn’t it? Are we talking about imagery, copy, keywords, or UI? The answer is yes — we’re talking about all of it. Optimize just means to make your landing page the best it can be, and that can include a myriad of modifications.

You’ll need a pretty expansive guide if you want to know everything you can do to optimize your landing page. And, guess what, we have one here.

Present an outstanding offer.

You could argue that anything free qualifies as “good,” but that isn’t exactly true. Not only should your offer be free (we’re not talking sales pages here), but it must also be good enough to warrant a stranger giving you their personal information.

Let’s face it — many companies are competing for your audience’s attention, asking for their information and soliciting them via email. So, what’s going to make you stand out from the pack? An outstanding offer, that’s what.

I always ask myself one simple question before finalizing an offer: Would I actually sign up for this? If the answer isn’t an easy yes, then it’s probably time to rethink it. People are more selective than ever, and your offer has to earn their click.

Here are a few questions to determine if you have a compelling offer or not:

• Does my offer solve a pain point for my target audience?
• Is there a clear benefit that a lead can gain from this offer?
• Can my offer rival the competition?

Decrease page load time.

A single-second delay in page load time means 7% fewer conversions and 11% fewer page views. Slow page load times can also result in customer dissatisfaction and frustration.

Landing page load time is a metric to take seriously.

Keep the buyer’s journey in mind.

Since you’re driving traffic to your landing page, you should know where your visitors are in their buyer’s journey. That means you’ll see if they’re trying to diagnose a problem (awareness), looking for a solution to their problem (consideration), or are ready to close (decision).

Your copy and offer should reflect this if you want to convert. It’s no different from other marketing materials: meet your visitors where they are.

Create a seamless experience.

No one should be surprised when they arrive on your landing page. It should be exactly as advertised, meaning it should be consistent with your copy.

Use the exact words on your landing page that you used to get people to arrive there, whether it was a paid ad, social post, blog CTA, or email. If you want people to stick around, you must avoid the bait and switch at all costs.

Create a clear path to conversion.

There should be no guesswork involved in navigating your landing page. Once someone arrives on your page, what you want them to do should be clear — submit their info to your lead form. Your goal is to guide visitors to your form using creative directional cues.

Here are some ways to point your visitor to a conversion:

• Choose a graphic or image of a person that is gazing toward your form, or leading the eye toward it.
• Make your CTA a contrasting color to draw attention to it.
• Use arrows that point to your lead form.
• Insert anchor text that brings people back to the form when clicked.
• Give your CTA some negative space on the page.
• Frame your lead form with a bold color or outline.

Add scarcity to your offer.

Few emotional marketing tactics work, as well as fear and the fear of missing out (more formally known as FOMO).

Consumers don’t like to lose their ability to choose, and once you make it clear that your offer is in high demand and/or short supply, they’re going to clamber to get it.

The other reason this technique works is that people want things that are hard to obtain — that signifies value and exclusivity.

I’ve seen even the most hesitant leads (including myself) jump into action when there’s a ticking clock or a limited number of spots. Scarcity nudges people off the fence, but it only works if it’s genuine. So be honest with your limits and clear in your messaging.

To show scarcity, mention how little of your offer is left, include a countdown timer, and use words like “ends soon” or “last chance.” We want you to be genuine, so only employ actual tactics for your business.

Bottom line: There are many ways to use and benefit from this technique.

Use video.

HubSpot research found that 38.6% of marketers said video is the number one landing page element that impacts conversion.

Video marketing is becoming increasingly popular for good reason. Not only do customers prefer to see videos from companies, but 88% of video marketers say that video gives them positive ROI.

The key is to create a compelling video that doesn’t distract visitors from your ultimate goal: the call-to-action. If you’re on the fence about using video, here are some reasons that might push you over the ledge:

• Increases conversion rates.
• It is a more personable way to share a message and connect with prospects.
• It can be more engaging than an image and will get visitors in the habit of clicking (and converting).
• It can reduce the number of support calls or tickets you receive.
• It is processed 60,000x faster than text.

If you plan to employ this tactic, VidYard has some helpful landing page video guidelines to follow.

Are you excited yet about how you can improve your landing pages? Sure, there are quite a few, but that just means that a poor-performing landing page doesn’t have to stay that way. Take it one tactic at a time and build as needed.

What to Do Post-Conversion: Lead Nurturing

So, you have an optimized landing page that converts like a charm. Now what? You don’t want to leave those leads hanging. Instead, you want to nurture them into becoming customers, then nurture them more. Here’s how.

Optimize your thank you page.

I hope you’re not tired of optimizing yet. Your thank you page is the first thing someone sees after they convert, so it is an excellent opportunity to delight your new lead even more than you already have.

Your objective is twofold: Deliver your promised offer and get them interested in something else on your site.

Your thank you page should:

• Thank your new lead (go figure).
• Provide links to relevant content on your site.
• Invite your lead to follow you on social media.
• Ask your lead to subscribe to your blog.
• Automate a follow-up email with the offer.

Guide them along their buyer’s journey.

Your new lead will make their way to the decision stage with or without you. You want to be the one to help them get there. You’ve gathered valuable information about your lead to anticipate what they need next.

Provide content or resources to bring them to the subsequent stage of their journey; you might just be their option for the decision stage. After all, we know that prospects buy from companies that they know, like, and trust.

Form a relationship.

Once someone signs up to receive information from you, they become a potential customer with whom you should work hard to build a relationship and connection.

The good thing is you already know what they’re interested in and their pain points, so you can target them with additional, helpful content and personalized marketing.

In my experience, this is where the real magic happens. When you stop treating signups as transactions and start seeing them as the beginning of a conversation, people respond. I’ve had leads turn into long-term customers simply because we kept showing up with the right message at the right time.

Grow Better with Landing Pages

Over the years, I’ve come to realize that landing pages aren’t just another marketing asset — they’re often the moment of truth. They either invite someone into your world or quietly send them away. And that’s why they deserve your full attention.

Landing pages will likely account for a big share of your new leads, and the good news is they’re full of opportunities. With a few thoughtful tweaks and a clear focus, you can absolutely build pages that not only convert but also genuinely reflect your brand.

If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that no page starts perfect — but if you keep testing, learning, and applying best practices like the ones we covered here, you’ll get there. And once you do, the results are well worth it.

Editor’s note: This post was originally published in August 2017 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

When I first started managing social media for my first brand, I felt like I was constantly throwing spaghetti at the wall. Every day was a scramble to come up with something — anything — to post. Some days it was a motivational quote; other days, it was a rushed product promo. Engagement was inconsistent, my team was frustrated, and honestly, so was I.

It wasn’t until a bit later down the line when I learned about content pillars for social media that things started to click. Instead of guessing what to post, I had a clear roadmap. My posts became more consistent, engagement rates improved, and planning for socials became a lot less stressful.

So, if your social media planning feels a bit chaotic, you‘re definitely not alone. I’ve been there myself and I know just how overwhelming it can be. Content pillars helped me bring some much-needed structure and focus to the process, and they still do today. With that said, let’s get into what content pillars actually are and how they can help you, too.

Table of Contents

• What are content pillars?
• Why Content Pillars Matter
• Types of Content Pillars to Consider
• How to Identify Your Ideal Content Pillars
• How to Create Content Pillars for Social Media
• Content Pillars for Social Media Examples

Without content pillars, posting can feel pretty random and disconnected. But when you have a few strong pillars in place, holding up your overall strategy, everything gets a lot easier.

Pillars give you a structure to work from without boxing you in. I like to think of it like building a house; the pillars are what keep everything standing, but you still have plenty of room to decorate it however you want.

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When you’re thinking about content pillars for social media marketing, there are a few common categories that tend to work for most brands:

• Educational. Sharing tips, how-tos, or resources that help your audience learn something useful.
• Inspirational. Motivational quotes, success stories, or anything that sparks positive emotion.
• Promotional. Highlighting your products, services, launches, or special offers.
• Community-building. Asking questions, starting conversations, and encouraging user-generated content.
• Behind-the-scenes. Showing the human side of your brand — your team, process, or day-to-day moments.

You don’t have to stick to these exactly, but having a few go-to categories like this can make it so much easier (and less stressful) to plan your social content. I’ll dive into how to actually build yours a little later on.

Why Content Pillars Matter

When I first started experimenting with content pillars, I didn’t realize just how much they would transform not just my planning process, but also the way my audience connected with our brand. Once I saw the difference firsthand, it was hard to imagine going back to posting without a plan.

Here are a few reasons why having clear content pillars can make such a big impact

They streamline your content creation process.

Sitting down to plan a month’s worth of posts usually ended with me staring at a blank calendar, feeling stuck and overwhelmed. I’d sit there staring at the screen for way too long, struggling to come up with ideas that actually made sense together.

Once I had a few solid pillars to work with, everything started to fall into place. Brainstorming got faster, scheduling felt less hectic, and I wasn’t second-guessing every post. It was a simple shift, but it made a huge difference.

Turns out a lot of people feel the same. Having a documented strategy is one of the habits that sets successful marketers apart. In fact, 80% of very successful content marketers have a documented content strategy — and content pillars are often a big part of making that possible.

They keep your messaging consistent.

Another big shift I noticed? Our messaging became way more consistent.

When you’re jumping between unrelated topics, it’s easy for your brand voice to get lost. I noticed a huge difference once our posts tied back to a few key themes. It felt more cohesive, and over time, it helped reinforce what we wanted our brand to stand for. Our audience knew what to expect from us, and trust started to build.

If you’re aiming for stronger brand recognition, staying consistent really matters. In fact, 68% of organizations say that brand consistency has contributed at least 10% to their revenue growth.

Pro tip: One thing that helped me was doing a quick “pillar check” before posting. I’d ask myself, “Which pillar does this support?” If I couldn’t answer clearly, it was a sign to rethink or refine the post.

They help you engage your audience more effectively.

One of the biggest benefits I noticed after building out our content pillars was how much better our posts connected with our audience. When you’re posting about topics your followers genuinely care about (and expect from you), engagement almost always goes up.

I’ve definitely seen this firsthand — posts tied to our content pillars consistently outperformed random one-off content in likes, comments, and shares.

Plus, it’s not just about the short-term boost. Showing up consistently around core topics makes it easier to build a community, and it’s great for staying visible in social media algorithms, which tend to favor steady engagement over sporadic viral hits.

But I’ll let the numbers speak for themselve: Did you know that brands that posted consistently at least five times per week grew their audience 2-3x faster than those that posted inconsistently, according to recent research by Buffer?

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They make content repurposing easier.

One of the best parts about working with content pillars is how much easier it is to repurpose. Instead of starting from scratch for every post, you can take one strong idea and spin it into different formats — whether that’s a blog post, a short video, a carousel, or a handful of social posts.

In my experience, having a clear set of pillars easily doubled the amount of usable content I could create from just one brainstorming session. Plus, it kept our messaging tight and made it easier to stay consistent across platforms without feeling repetitive.

According to a recent report, 48% of B2B marketers say a lack of content repurposing is one of their biggest challenges when it comes to scaling content production. It’s easy to see why. Without a clear framework, turning one idea into different formats can feel like a lot.

I’ll give you a real example:

Based on the educational content pillar — which was one of the main pillars for a recent B2B sales tech company I worked with — I had the idea to create a survey to gather our own original data.

After analyzing the results, I wrote a comprehensive report to highlight the biggest insights. But I didn’t stop there. I broke down key statistics from the report into bite-sized pieces and shared them across social media over several weeks. I also turned major insights into short videos, carousels, and infographics, all carefully mapped back to the educational pillar.

This approach helped us extend the life of the research and reach different segments of our audience without overdoing it.

They improve your content strategy results.

At the end of the day, social media isn’t just about showing up — it’s about supporting your bigger goals. After I first started organizing my strategy around content pillars, one of my clients saw a 25% increase in traffic from social media to their website over the first six months. Not too shabby.

Content pillars gave me a way to stay focused, create posts that actually mattered to our audience, and get way more mileage out of every idea. I’ve been using content pillars ever since — and honestly, I can’t imagine building a strategy without them now.

Still not convinced? Stick with me.

Back when we first talked about what content pillars are, I mentioned five common categories that most brands lean on. Now, let’s dig a little deeper. Each type of pillar plays a different role in your strategy, and understanding how they work can make it easier to plan your social content.

Educational

Educational content is all about teaching your audience something new or helping them solve a problem. This pillar focuses on giving value first — whether it’s through tips, tutorials, how-to guides, or breaking down complex topics into something easy to understand.

Personally, educational content has been a major pillar for almost every brand I’ve worked with. It’s one of the easiest ways to build trust because when you consistently show up with advice or insights that genuinely help people, they start seeing you as a go-to resource — not just another brand trying to sell something.

Pro tip: One of my favorite ways to approach educational content is by breaking bigger ideas into small, actionable takeaways. For example, instead of just saying “Create a content strategy,” I might share a simple five-step checklist to help someone actually get started.

Inspirational

While educational content teaches, inspirational content connects. It’s about sparking emotion — making your audience feel motivated, connected, or just a little bit more hopeful. It could be anything from a customer success story to a powerful quote or a personal lesson learned along the way.

In my experience, inspirational posts often work best when they’re authentic. It’s not just about throwing up a generic quote graphic — it’s about sharing moments that feel real and meaningful to your brand or community.

For one health brand I worked with, we highlighted customer milestones and weight loss transformation stories, and those posts consistently sparked some of our highest engagement. People love cheering others on — and when your brand is the one inspiring them, it builds a deeper, more emotional connection over time.

Promotional

As its name gives away, promotional content is your brand’s way of saying, “Hey, we made something great — come check it out.” It’s about giving your audience a clear, helpful invitation to engage with what you’re offering, whether that’s signing up, booking a demo, making a purchase, or downloading a guide.

Over the years, I‘ve learned that the key to good promotional content is balance. If every post you publish is a sales pitch, people will most definitely tune you out. But when promotional posts are thoughtfully sprinkled into a broader mix of valuable content, they’ll feel natural — not pushy.

Pro tip: One approach that’s worked well for me is framing promotions around the value they deliver. Instead of just saying “Check out our new feature,” I would highlight how the feature solves a real problem for the audience, connecting it back to the educational or inspirational pillars we’ve already built up trust with.

Community-Building

If you really think about it, the brands you connect with most are most likely the ones that actually talk with you — not at you. That’s the power of community-building. It’s not just about broadcasting updates; it’s about starting conversations, listening, and making your audience feel like they’re part of something bigger.

Community-building content doesn’t have to be complicated. Some of the strongest connections I’ve seen started with the simplest questions — asking for opinions, highlighting a customer story, or just celebrating a small win together.

Pro tip: One thing I’ve learned is that it’s not enough to post a question and disappear. True community-building means sticking around, answering comments, spotlighting thoughtful replies, and genuinely showing people their voice matters.

Behind-the-Scenes

There‘s something about seeing the messy whiteboard sketches, the 5 PM coffee runs, or the team celebrating a small win that makes a brand feel real. That’s the magic of behind-the-scenes content — it reminds your audience there are actual people behind the polished posts and campaigns.

I’ve found that behind-the-scenes moments are some of the easiest ways to build trust without even trying. It could be a casual office snapshot, a sneak peek of a work-in-progress, or a quick video showing how a product comes together. None of it has to be fancy — in fact, the more human and raw it feels, the better.

Pro tip: If you’re not sure what to share, start by thinking about what your audience doesn’t normally see. A little peek behind the curtain can go a long way toward making your brand feel relatable — not just another logo on their feed.

How to Identify Your Ideal Content Pillars

Choosing the right content pillars isn‘t just about picking topics that sound good — it’s about truly understanding who you‘re talking to and how you can show up in a way that’s helpful, relevant, and true to your brand.

When your pillars meet your audience where they are and reflect what your brand genuinely stands for, planning content stops feeling random and starts feeling purposeful, and a whole lot more rewarding. Here’s my tried-and-true process for identifying yours.

1. Understand your audience.

Start by digging into what your audience actually wants to see. Look at your comments, DMs, survey responses, and analytics. What questions come up again and again? What types of posts get the most saves, shares, or clicks?

The better you understand your audience’s interests and challenges, the easier it is to choose pillars that actually resonate.

Pro tip: Tools like Instagram Insights, LinkedIn Analytics, or even a quick poll can give you direct clues about what types of content your audience actually wants.

2. Audit your existing content.

You probably already have hints about what’s working (and more importantly, what’s not). Go back through your top-performing posts from the past few months and look for patterns. Are your tutorials always getting saved? Are behind-the-scenes reels getting the most comments? Those trends can point you toward natural pillar ideas.

3. Define your brand’s core themes.

Your pillars should reflect what your brand actually stands for — not just what’s trendy. Ask yourself:

• What topics do we want to be known for?
• What expertise or value can we uniquely offer?
• What conversations do we want to lead?

The sweet spot is where your audience’s interests overlap with your brand’s strengths.

4. Choose your core pillars.

Once you know who you’re trying to reach and what your brand stands for, focus on picking a few core pillars that feel like the most natural fit. Think about the topics you can genuinely show up for — the ones that spark ideas and conversations, not just fill up your calendar.

You can start by pulling from the examples we covered earlier — or mix in your own based on what fits your brand best. The goal is to have enough variety to keep your content fresh, but enough focus that your messaging stays consistent and recognizable.

Pro tip: Think about balancing emotional pillars (like inspirational or community-building content) with practical pillars (like educational or promotional content).

5. Stay flexible and adapt.

Content pillars aren’t carved in stone. As your audience grows or your brand evolves, you might find yourself adjusting or refining your pillars, and that’s a good thing. Pay attention to what’s resonating and don’t be afraid to tweak your strategy as you learn.

Even starting with a few basic pillars puts you ahead of the curve. Many brands still post randomly, so with a little strategy, you’re already building something stronger.

How to Create Content Pillars for Social Media

Knowing your content pillars is one thing, but building a system that actually uses them is another. Over the years, I’ve helped brands turn loose ideas into full strategies that keep their posting organized, consistent, and surprisingly flexible.

Here’s the process I’ve used (and refined) to help teams bring their pillars to life without losing their creativity along the way.

1. Align each pillar to a clear purpose.

Start by connecting each pillar to a bigger-picture goal. Are you trying to build brand awareness? Drive website traffic? Increase engagement? Assigning a purpose to each pillar helps ensure your content is working toward something meaningful.

Pro tip: Not every pillar has to serve the same goal. Your educational content might drive traffic, while your community-building pillar is focused on boosting engagement.

2. Brainstorm content ideas for each pillar.

Once your pillars are aligned with specific goals, it’s time to get creative. For each one, brainstorm a mix of formats that support the theme — think carousels, short videos, stories, infographics, or even live Q&As. The key is to generate ideas that stay true to the pillar’s purpose while keeping your content mix fresh.

One trick I use is asking myself, “What does this look like as a how-to? As a story? As a visual post?” That mindset helps me unlock more diverse and engaging ideas without getting off-topic.

3. Build a simple content plan.

Now it’s time to organize those ideas into something you can actually use. You don’t need a complicated system — just a way to make sure you’re covering your pillars consistently. That might mean assigning each pillar a day of the week, planning monthly themes, or using a content calendar to map everything out.

Pro tip: Keep it flexible. The goal isn’t to force content into a rigid structure — it’s to give yourself a clear rhythm so you’re never starting from scratch.

4. Create a few plug-and-play templates.

Once you know what kinds of posts you want to create for each pillar, make it easier on yourself by building a few ready-made templates. That could mean a weekly Q&A format for community-building, a recurring tip carousel for education, or a product spotlight layout for promotions.

Templates give you a repeatable way to show up without reinventing the wheel every week.

Pro tip: Keep a swipe file of posts you love (from your brand or others) to inspire new formats and frameworks you can test.

If you need a little extra help getting started, HubSpot’s free Content Marketing Workbook is packed with templates and exercises to help you map out your pillars and build a strategy you can actually stick to.

5. Track what’s working and tweak as you go.

Once your system is up and running, the real magic happens in the refinement. Pay attention to which posts are getting saved, shared, or sparking conversations — and like I said before, which ones are falling flat. Over time, those signals will help you double down on what works and adjust the rest.

Pro tip: I like to review pillar performance monthly and jot down what felt good (and what didn’t). Sometimes the best content insights come from your own gut check.

Content Pillars for Social Media Examples

It’s easiest to understand how content pillars work by seeing them in action, so I’ve rounded up a few of my favorite examples.

These brands have done an amazing job of building their social strategies around clear pillars — and it shows. Some have been doing it for years, while others are jumping on new trends in ways that feel fresh, smart, and intentional.

Let’s break down a few of my personal favorites to see how different pillar types show up across industries.

Hubspot (Educational)

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I know it might seem biased to mention HubSpot here (given where you’re reading this), but honestly, I’ve been obsessed with HubSpot’s content for years — long before working with them.

Their blog, templates, and free resources are a masterclass in educational content done right. Every guide, checklist, and how-to post ties back to their broader mission of helping businesses grow better, while also gently reinforcing the value of their platform.

And while education is clearly one of their biggest strengths, they keep their content feeling fresh by mixing in lighter, more entertaining moments, too. It’s a reminder that even with a strong pillar, variety still matters.

Nike (Inspirational)

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I think Nike is one of the best examples out there when it comes to using inspiration as a core pillar. They don’t just sell shoes or workout gear — they sell ambition, perseverance, and self-belief.

From short motivational videos to powerful athlete stories, nearly everything Nike shares feels like a rallying cry. It’s not about the product as much as it is about making you feel something, and then tying that emotion back to their brand.

Poppi (Promotional)

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Poppi is a great example of how to do promotional content right. They don’t just post about their gut health sodas: They build an entire lifestyle around feeling good from the inside out.

Their product features are playful, colorful, and tied to moments their audience cares about, like wellness routines, beauty trends, and everyday self-care. It never feels like a hard sell — it feels like an invitation to join a movement. Pop off, Poppi!

Duolingo (Community-Building)

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If you’ve spent any time on TikTok or Instagram, or honestly the internet, you’ve probably seen Duolingo’s mascot, Duo, causing chaos — in the best way possible.

Duolingo has mastered the art of community-building by leaning into humor, trends, and audience interaction. Whether it’s jumping on viral challenges, replying to comments with inside jokes, or staging hilarious “dramas” involving their owl mascot (yes, I’m heavily invested), their content invites users to be part of the story.

It’s a perfect example of how showing personality and engaging back with your audience can turn followers into a real community. ‘Til death Duo us part.

Rhode (Behind-the-Scenes)

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Rhode, aka Hailey Bieber’s skincare brand, does an amazing job of pulling back the curtain without losing their polished, or should I say “glazed,” feel.

They regularly share glimpses into product development, photoshoots, and everyday brand-building moments. You’ll see behind-the-scenes looks at brainstorming sessions, lab work, packaging decisions, and team wins — all through a lens that feels aspirational but still relatable.

It’s a perfect example of how behind-the-scenes content can make a brand feel more human, even when it’s operating at a luxury level.

Take It One Post at a Time

If there’s one thing I hope you take away from this article, it’s that content pillars aren’t about adding more rules to your strategy — they’re about making everything simpler, clearer, and a whole lot more sustainable.

Looking back, the biggest shift I felt after building my first real pillar strategy wasn’t just better engagement rates or easier planning (although those definitely happened). It was confidence. I stopped treating every post like a shot in the dark and started showing up with a sense of purpose.

Remember, your pillars don’t have to be perfect or set in stone. They just have to be real. Start small, stay flexible, and trust yourself to figure it out as you go.

Because when you build your strategy on clarity and connection, everything else gets a lot easier — and a lot more fun, too.

I’ve worked with clients across dozens of industries, and I’ve learned that content only works when it’s planned. You can create brilliant blog posts, scroll-stopping videos, or perfectly-timed X posts, but if it doesn’t fit into a strategy? It disappears.

No momentum. No message retention. No ROI.

That’s where media planning comes in. It’s not just about scheduling posts. It’s about making your content work together across channels in a way that builds authority and trust over time.

Because let’s be real: Buyers don’t convert after one blog post. They read your newsletter, scroll past your ad, hear your name on a podcast, and then maybe, just maybe, they click.

And if you’re not showing up consistently across touchpoints? You’re forgotten. That’s why I always tell clients, strategy beats spontaneity every time. Create less. Plan more.

In this guide, I’m breaking down what media planning actually means, why it matters, and how to do it in a way that saves time and grows your brand. Plus, I’ve included a free media planning template to help you start building your own system.

Let’s dig in.

Table of Contents

• What is media planning?
• What is a media plan?
• Types of Media Plans
• Benefits of Media Planning
• Media Planning Process
• Media Planning Strategy Components
• How to Create a Media Plan
• Media Planning Templates
• Media Plan Examples That Actually Help You Execute
• Media Planning vs. Media Buying
• Media Planning Tips That Work

It sounds simple, but with so many moving parts — timelines, messages, audiences, platforms — it’s easy to fall into reactive posting mode or lose track of what’s actually working.

That’s where smart media planning steps and simple media planning templates come in. They help you get clear, stay consistent, and build content that actually moves the needle.

Some media plans support larger campaigns or company initiatives, aligning with pre-approved messaging and themes. Others are built to drive always-on content strategies across multiple channels.

Either way, a good media plan keeps your content focused, intentional, and impactful.

Types of Media Plans

The best media plan for your brand depends on your goals, your budget, and what you’re offering. But before you choose, you need to understand your options.

1. Continuous Media Plan

A continuous media plan involves a steady, uninterrupted run of ads over a period of time.

It works best for non-seasonal products or services that benefit from consistent consumer reminders, such as toothpaste, soap, or subscription services.

The goal here is to keep your brand top-of-mind year-round through frequent, predictable exposure.

2. Flighting Media Plan

A flighting media plan alternates between periods of high ad activity and complete quiet. It is designed for brands with seasonal demand where big moments matter more than constant presence.

Say you’re selling holiday decorations. You’d go heavy in the weeks leading up to the season, then pause afterward. This approach builds urgency and anticipation when it counts most but it only works if you know your peak periods.

Use tools like HubSpot’s marketing analytics software to track sales cycles across channels and plan your “flights” for maximum impact.

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3. Pulsing Media Plan

Pulsing combines the best of both worlds: a steady base level of advertising with occasional spikes of higher intensity. You’re always present, but you go big when it matters most.

I like this approach because (1) it balances budget efficiency with ongoing brand visibility, and (2) it’s flexible.

You can adapt quickly to changing markets, launches, or unexpected opportunities.

4. Seasonal Media Plan

A seasonal media plan zeroes in on specific times of year when your product or service is most relevant.

It’s built for maximum impact during high-demand periods and it’s cost-effective, too, because you’re only spending when interest is highest.

A travel company, for example, might lean into winter and summer campaigns, using seasonal themes and promos to drive relevance and resonance.

5. Roadblock Media Plan

A roadblock media plan blasts your message across multiple channels at the same time.

It’s all about making a splash fast. Launching a new product? Run the same ad across TV, radio, YouTube, and social media to dominate attention in a single day or week. The upside is total visibility and message control. The trade-off is that it takes serious coordination to make it land.

6. Drip Media Plan

A drip media plan releases content slowly and steadily like a faucet dripping over time. It’s ideal for long-term nurture campaigns, educational content, or B2B lead gen where trust builds slowly.

We used this strategy in an email sequence for a B2B software brand sending valuable, tailored messages each week to address specific buyer pain points. Every email added value. Every touchpoint moved the prospect closer to purchase.

The goal? Stay helpful. Stay consistent. Stay in their mind.

Benefits of Media Planning

Media planning doesn’t just keep your content organized. It gives your strategy direction, clarity, and power. Here’s how I’ve found it helps me:

• Understand your target audience deeply and reach them effectively.
• Choose the right media channels and platforms for your message.
• Get the timing and frequency right, so content lands when it matters.
• Stay on top of trends, tech, and shifts in how media is consumed.
• Stick to your budget without compromising content quality.
• Measure what works (and what doesn’t) with clean, data-driven analysis.

As you build a media plan, remember that how you apply the insights from each step will depend on your business, audience, and goals.

No two plans are the same. But the process? That’s consistent.

Here’s how I start.

1. Conduct market research.

Before developing the media plan, I conduct market research to understand who I’m trying to reach.

I’m not just trying to “reach” someone — I want to resonate. That means creating or updating my buyer personas. These are behavior patterns, decision-making timelines, motivations, and media preferences.

From there, I look at which channels make sense. Where does my audience actually spend time? What formats do they respond to, such as short-form videos, in-depth blogs, and social carousels?

The goal is to match the message with the moment. Right content. Right place. Right time.

For example, if I’m targeting busy ecommerce founders, I’m thinking podcasts during commute hours and email for data insights. TikTok? Probably not. LinkedIn? Definitely.

Choosing your channels isn’t about being everywhere. It’s about being where it matters.

Featured Resource: HubSpot’s Market Research Kit + Templates

Download the Kit

2. State your media planning objective.

I always keep one clear goal in mind before building out the rest of the plan. This gives the process structure, and more importantly, it gives me permission to say “no” to the things that don’t align.

A vague objective leads to scattered efforts. A specific one makes sure you gain traction. Here are a few examples of strong media planning goals:

• Strengthen collaboration across teams’ content, design, video, blog, and social so everyone’s working from the same strategy.
• Streamline how and when content gets published across channels.
• Tighten up distribution timelines to make sure content lands while it’s still fresh and relevant.
• Build in enough lead time to actually analyze performance so your next campaign’s even sharper than the last.

For example, say you’re planning Facebook and Instagram content. Your goal might be to simplify content creation, batch your posts, and schedule them out.

That way, you’re not scrambling to stay visible. Your posts are already teed up to be relevant, timely, and on-brand.

3. Create your media plan using a template.

A good media plan doesn’t live in my head or on a scattered thread of Slack messages.

It lives in a document my whole team can see, edit, and follow. That’s how we stay aligned. That’s how we stay accountable.

In my experience, the best media plans outline not just what you’re publishing, but how each piece connects to your audience and your goals.

Written, video, audio, and social content should all ladder up to your core strategy. This is where media planning templates come in.

Templates save time. They cut decision fatigue. And they keep your plan organized, especially if you’re juggling multiple formats or teams. There’s no one-size-fits-all here. The template you use depends on your channels, cadence, and team structure.

Some brands use multiple templates for different stages like a calendar for scheduling, a checklist for production, and a dashboard for performance. Don’t be afraid to test a few until you find your flow.

For example, one of HubSpot’s clients was building out a Facebook and Instagram plan. We introduced a simple social media calendar template. It aligned the team, boosted productivity, and significantly improved engagement metrics.

Bottom line? The right template turns a strategy into action.

4. Implement your media plan.

Planning’s great, but implementation is where things get real.

Make sure everyone involved knows the plan, has access to the tools, and understands their role in the rollout. This is the moment where clarity matters most.

When we build media plans, we always share the name and contact info of the media planning lead. That way, there’s no confusion. No bottlenecks. If someone has a question, they know exactly who to talk to.

Let’s go back to that Facebook and Instagram example.

Once we had the social media calendar template ready, we didn’t just hit “share” and walk away. We made sure the creative team, the publishing team, and even the analytics folks had access and knew how to use it.

Because a plan only works if it’s visible and usable.

Give your team the tools and access they need, and implementation will become less chaotic and more effective.

5. Evaluate your success.

Whether you’re rolling out a quick social post or a multi-week, cross-channel campaign, success isn’t just about launch. It’s about learning.

I always take time to pause and ask: Did the plan do what we set out to do? If not, why? Did our tools and templates actually make the process smoother, or did they create friction?

The way you evaluate success should be directly related to the goals you set in Step 2. Are you seeing more engagement, stronger collaboration across teams, a faster workflow, or clearer data?

For example: After wrapping up the recent Instagram and Facebook campaign, we didn’t just look at likes and reach.

We reviewed whether the content calendar helped the team stay aligned, whether our publishing cadence matched audience behavior, and whether those efforts actually moved the needle on business objectives.

And we always ask: What’s worth repeating? What needs to change next time?

Because a media plan isn’t a one-and-done doc. It’s a living system. The more you evaluate, the sharper it gets.

Media Planning Strategy Components

There are a few additional things to consider when crafting your media planning strategy.

First, what’s your media planning budget?

Media Planning Budget

If you’re planning to secure earned media only, skip this part. But if paid placements are on the table, it’s time to talk budget.

Start by sitting down with your marketing lead or finance team to define your media spend. You want clarity here as this is the number that will shape every decision that follows.

Lock it in before you start researching platforms or building out content. Nothing stings more than designing a campaign you can’t afford to launch.

Pro tip: Remember the extras. If you plan to expand media coverage later, include the cost of building and distributing media kits. It’s a small line item, but it’s easy to overlook.

Need inspiration? Ramona Sukhraj, principal marketing manager at HubSpot, curated a collection of standout media kits you can use as a benchmark. They’re smart, strategic, and worth a look.

Once your budget is clear, shift focus to messaging. What exactly do you want your media placements to communicate?

The budget defines your reach. Messaging defines your impact. Nail both before choosing where to show up.

Media Planning Messaging

You don’t need to pre-write every headline and caption up front but you do want to lock in your messaging themes early. These themes anchor your entire media presence. Without them, your campaign risks feeling scattered or off-brand.

Your messaging should come directly from your audience research. What do they care about? What do they need to know? Those insights will shape not just what you say, but where and how you say it.

So before you pick platforms or brainstorm creative, get your core messages straight. This step informs everything: content types, ad copy, PR angles, influencer briefs, even your media kits.

Next comes the content itself. This is the stuff you’ll actually publish.

Media Scheduling Strategy

A solid media scheduling strategy gives you the best of both worlds: space to create content when inspiration hits, and structure to fine-tune your ad strategy when the data says it’s time.

It saves time, reduces stress, and keeps your content machine humming. However, scheduling isn’t one-size-fits-all. It depends on the type of media you’re working with.

For organic and paid social posts, timing is everything. You’ve got to show up when your audience is online, even if that’s not convenient for you.

Tools like HubSpot’s social media management platform can automate the heavy lifting so you don’t have to set alarms for 6 AM post drops.

Meanwhile, if you’re working on newsletters or blog posts, consistency trumps timing. Show up regularly. That predictability builds trust and anticipation and, over time, a community.

Here are a few best practices I recommend:

• Study your readers and prospects. Know when they’re active and where.
• Batch your content. Working ahead avoids last-minute scrambles and keeps frequency stable.
• Use the right automation tools. One size doesn’t fit all. Pick the right stack for each channel.
• Be consistent. Seriously. Frequency builds familiarity, and familiarity drives results.

Now that your scheduling foundation is in place, let’s walk through building a media plan.

How to Create a Media Plan

1. Target your buyer personas.

You’re not here to market to everyone. You’re here to connect with the right people who are actually interested in what you’re offering. That’s where buyer personas come in.

A buyer persona is a semi-fictional profile of your ideal customer built on real customer data and market research. Think of it as a cheat sheet for speaking to the right audience on the right platform with the right message.

When your media plan is built around clear personas, you stop wasting budget and start attracting high-value buyers who convert, stay loyal, and advocate for your brand.

When I build personas, I focus on a few core traits:

• Demographics. Age, income, location, identity markers.
• Background. Career path, job title, lifestyle.
• Identifiers. How they prefer to communicate, which platforms they live on.
• Goals. What they want personally and professionally.
• Challenges. What’s standing in their way.

The more specific you get, the better your media plan performs. Broad messages miss. Targeted ones stick.

2. Define your SMART goals.

Before you build anything, set the goalposts. A media plan without goals is just noise. The SMART goal framework keeps things focused: Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Time-Bound.

Use this model to turn vague ambitions into trackable outcomes. It helps align your team, streamline execution, and gives you a reason to celebrate when you hit your numbers.

How to Set SMART Goals for Your Business (Guide)

Here’s what SMART goal-setting looks like in action:

• Specific. “We want to generate a greater number of qualified leads.”
• Measurable. “We want to gain 2,000 followers across X, Metaverse, and Instagram.”
• Attainable. “Last quarter, we hit 70% customer engagement. This time, we’re aiming for 75%.”
• Relevant. “We want more engaged followers to strengthen brand reputation and grow advocacy.”
• Time-Bound. “We’ll hit that 2,000-follower goal in the next three months.”

Once I set my goals, I reverse-engineer my plan to achieve them. Then, I explore tools and tactics to accelerate my progress.

3. Find the media planning tools best suited for you.

I’ll share some top-tier media planning templates for your business later in this post, but first let’s look at the software that can do the heavy lifting for you.

If you’re just getting started, HubSpot Marketing Hub is a solid all-in-one option. It’s built for drafting, scheduling, and tracking conversions, so you can manage the entire planning process in one place.

And here’s where things get interesting: Some platforms include AI media planning features that take the guesswork out of media planning. These features help you identify channels likely to perform better, recommend optimal posting times, and even forecast content trends based on historical data.

That means less trial-and-error and more data-backed decisions, which is helpful when you’re working across multiple formats or audiences.

Looking for more flexibility? I’ve curated a list of 13 essential media planning tools, from scheduling platforms to analytics dashboards, to help you build, launch, and measure smarter campaigns.

4. Analyze historical data.

You can’t move forward without knowing where you’ve been. I always start by reviewing past media plans to assess what worked and what didn’t.

The goal isn’t just reflection, it’s gathering insights to help you optimize your media plan, messages, and channels to improve engagement and ROI.

Let’s say your brand is already active on Facebook. I’d head straight to Business Page Insights:

• How did your old posting schedule perform?
• Which posts drove the most engagement?
• What time slots brought the most traffic?
• And most importantly: What content actually moved people from follower to customer?

This isn’t just a look back. It’s fuel for what’s next. Take the wins from your last strategy and use them to guide your next move. Build on what worked and leave the rest behind.

5. Choose your media mix.

Your media mix should be built on two things:

• Current channel performance.
• Where your buyer personas actually spend their time.

According to HubSpot’s State of Marketing Report, over 1,400 global marketers ranked the top channels by ROI:

• Websites and Blogs
• Social Media
• Email Marketing
• Content Marketing

No surprises there, but remember, this isn’t one-size-fits-all.

In my experience, an omnichannel media plan delivers the best results. It meets your audience where they already are and creates more touchpoints across the funnel.

The key? Do the research. Find out where your personas hang out, how they consume content, and what influences their decisions. Then build a mix that reflects that, not just what’s trending.

Be strategic, flexible, and stay open to testing new platforms when the opportunity’s right.

6. Put your media plan into action.

As you roll out your media plan, keep a close eye on performance. Are your insights aligned with your SMART goals? If not, don’t panic, just pivot.

Marketing is always in motion. What worked last quarter might stall this one. The best media planners adjust fast, based on real data, not assumptions.

Track, analyze, refine. Then do it again.

Now that you’ve established the framework, let’s explore the resources that will make your media planning process smoother and more efficient.

Media Planning Templates

There’s no shortage of media planning templates online both free and paid — and honestly, they’re a huge time-saver.

What I love most is how flexible they are. You can customize them to fit your business’s goals, tools, and workflow.

If you’re using platforms like HubSpot (free) CRM, Marketing Hub, or Sprout Social, chances are they already include built-in planning templates.

I’ve used HubSpot myself and they offer a solid range of options depending on your campaign type and media mix.

If you prefer to build from scratch, Google Sheets is your friend. I’ve created my own templates this way to lock in a format that mirrors my internal processes.

It takes a little more upfront work, but the payoff is a system that fits like a glove.

Whichever route you take, one thing’s key: Your templates should evolve. As your audience grows and your goals shift, your planning tools should keep pace. Don’t be afraid to tweak and refine as you go.

Free Media Planning Template [Download Now]

Download This Template

Types of Media Planning Templates

To make things easier, here’s a curated list of go-to templates to jumpstart your media planning. (Click the links to access each one.)

Choose the ones that fit your goals and workflow. There’s no one-size-fits-all; it’s about what works for your team and your business.

• Media planning template. Keep all your paid media efforts and expenses in one clear, visual dashboard.
• Social media strategy template. Align your content with your audience and your business goals so every post works harder.
• Social media calendar template. Plan your publishing timeline in a way that’s simple, organized, and manageable.
• Editorial calendar template. Map out all your content from blog posts to campaigns to stay consistent and strategic.
• Blog post template. A plug-and-play structure to help you skip the blank page and start writing with direction.
• Ebook design template. Make your ebook look polished, professional, and on-brand without reinventing the wheel.
• Infographic template. Use PowerPoint or Illustrator to create scroll-stopping visuals that present data with clarity and style.
• Analytics and reporting template. Track your KPIs easily in Excel, Google Sheets, or PowerPoint. It’s clean, consistent, and shareable.
• Budget template. Stay on top of spend across platforms with a flexible template for tracking and forecasting.
• Advertising template. Plan and manage ad campaigns that convert while keeping strategy, spending, and performance aligned.

Media Plan Examples That Actually Help You Execute

I’ve talked about media planning. I’ve even shared templates.

But let’s be honest: putting it into practice is another story.

That’s why I’m sharing a few sample media plans below. I’ve built these using templates I regularly use with my team and clients so you’re getting examples that are both tactical and easy to implement.

Social Media Plan Example

Social media can be your biggest asset or your biggest time suck. It’s often the first thing marketers jump into, but it’s also where many get stuck. Too many platforms, not enough strategy.

Most people waste hours posting where no one’s listening.

Avoid this by choosing the platforms where your audience actually spends time. If you’re not sure which that is, it’s fine to experiment. What matters is that you test, track, and then double down on what works.

Run content experiments for a week: Track likes, saves, and click-throughs and then focus on the channel that shows momentum.

Most people give up because they lack a clear plan. This solves that.

Here’s a sample social media plan using HubSpot’s Social Media Content Calendar Template to help you explore multiple channels with structure.

Source

Pro tip: Pick one platform to start. Build a one-week content calendar. Track engagement, clicks, and conversions and then iterate.

Blogging Media Plan Example

Consistency is the game with blogging.

Not only does publishing regularly help your SEO and brand authority, it also keeps your team aligned. If you manage multiple writers or contributors, you already know how easy it is to lose track of deadlines or follow-ups.

That’s where a blogging media plan saves you. Here’s a simple example you can adapt using HubSpot’s Blog Editorial Calendar.

Source

Use it to:

• Assign topics and deadlines.
• Track drafts and final approvals.
• Log published links and performance metrics (pageviews, backlinks, etc.).

Pro tip: If organic traffic is a key KPI, add a column for SEO focus keywords and a link-building target.

PR Media Plan Example

PR planning is a little more involved but worth it.

Coordinating with external publishers and managing long lead times means you need structure. A good PR media plan helps you prioritize key stories, time your outreach, and align internal messaging with your external efforts.

In the example below, I’ve included just the “Reach Out” and “Content Planning” phases. These are the tactical building blocks. (The full PR Media Plan Template from HubSpot includes budgeting, timelines, and more.)

Here’s what a basic PR activity table might look like:

Activity	Description	Start Date	End Date
Guest posts	Promote new workout pants	3 Mar 2025	3 Jun 2025
Press releases (major outlets)	General brand awareness	10 Jul 2025	20 Dec 2025
Monthly newsletters	Keep audience informed	3 Mar 2025	29 Dec 2025

Use this to visualize campaign timing and identify overlapping promotions across channels.

Just starting out? The free HubSpot PR Course gives a great overview for beginners.

Bringing It All Together

Media planning is the foundation. Use the examples above to jumpstart your plan then refine based on performance.

And remember: These plans work better when connected. Your blog drives traffic to social. Social feeds your PR buzz. Your PR opens the door to backlinks and media coverage.

It’s all connected.

Now that we’ve built the plan, let’s talk about media buying because reaching your audience at scale means putting dollars behind your content.

Let’s dive in.

Media Planning vs. Media Buying

Digital media planning and media buying go hand in hand but they’re not the same thing.

Depending on your team size and budget, one person might wear both hats. But if you’re scaling your strategy or optimizing for ROI, it’s important to understand what each process entails.

So what’s the difference?

Media planning is the strategic process of deciding what content to create, where it will live, and who it’s for.

That could include organic blog posts, podcast placements, influencer content, or paid ads, but it’s not limited to paid efforts.

Media buying, on the other hand, is all about execution. It’s where you purchase ad space whether that’s paid social, display, broadcast, or out-of-home, then negotiate rates and placements to maximize visibility and conversions.

Put simply:

• Media Planning = Strategy
• Media Buying = Execution

When these two processes are aligned, your marketing dollars go further and your campaigns have a greater impact.

I’ve seen great content underperform simply because it wasn’t part of a clear, strategic media plan. Over the years, I’ve built systems for startups and scaled brands alike. While every plan is different, there are a few core principles I return to again and again.

These are the strategies that keep campaigns focused, efficient, and effective.

1. Before anything else, know your media objectives.

Jumping into media planning without a clear objective is like building a house without a blueprint. I’ve seen teams pour hours into content production, only to realize later it didn’t ladder up to any real business goal.

The best plans start with a sharp focus whether that’s brand awareness, lead generation, or product adoption. That focus should guide every channel and creative decision that follows.

2. Prioritize audience over platforms.

Content doesn’t perform just because it’s on the latest platform. It performs because it meets the right person at the right time in the right place.

According to Alex Orap, founder of social listening platform YouScan, one of the most common blind spots in media planning is the assumption that audiences are only active on mainstream platforms.

“Real influence isn’t always happening on the loudest platforms,” Orap explains. “Sometimes it lives in more niche, authentic corners of the internet; places like Reddit or Letterboxd that traditional media plans often overlook.”

These overlooked spaces can be cultural goldmines. For instance, Letterboxd is typically seen as just a movie review site. However, it has a rich subculture where people reflect their identities and share raw, emotional takes, not just about films, but also books, music, and podcasts.

Ignoring these spaces means missing where real connection happens.

3. Use a channel scoring matrix.

Media planning often starts with “Where should we show up?” However, not all channels are created equal. A simple scoring model cuts through the noise.

I consider three factors:

• Cost efficiency.
• Reach.
• Ease of execution.

If a channel ranks low across the board, it doesn’t make the cut. This approach keeps the plan grounded in value, not hype.

4. Build campaigns around key content anchors.

Strong campaigns don’t rely on scattered content ideas. They start with one meaningful asset — a video, a webinar, a research report — and repurpose it across formats and channels.

This keeps the message tight, the execution lean, and the performance trackable. When every piece points back to a central idea, campaigns feel more intentional and cohesive.

5. Align planning with buying cycles.

It’s easy to plan in isolation: Create content, schedule posts, push it live. But great media planning happens when timing aligns with both audience behavior and media market dynamics.

That might mean holding a launch until after Q4 ad rates drop or ramping up spend during your category’s peak season. Planning around demand isn’t just strategic. It’s cost-effective.

6. Measure backward from business goals.

Media plans shouldn’t start with tactics. They should start with outcomes. What’s the business trying to achieve — more leads, faster sales, stronger retention?

That’s the filter. Every media decision gets mapped back to a KPI. If it doesn’t support the goal, it doesn’t get planned.

7. Keep it collaborative, not siloed.

The best media plans are cross-functional. They bring together content, design, analytics, and ops, not just for input, but for ownership.

I’ve worked on launches that moved faster simply because everyone could see the plan, understand their role, and flag blockers before they happened.

Visibility isn’t optional. It’s the difference between hitting deadlines and chasing them.

8. Let data shape, not dictate, your plan.

I always review performance data before building a new plan. But I also leave room for testing and creative risk.

Social listening is one way to find that balance, says Orap. “A strong signal is a noticeable shift in how people are talking: the tone, emotional intensity, or even the content format. If your campaign isn’t aligning with that, it’s time to reassess.”

He adds that emerging trends like BookTok often start quietly, outside of traditional research methods. “BookTok didn’t begin in a media plan. It started with emotional, aesthetic posts from a niche group of creators. But it grew into a massive sales driver.”

Tapping into these shifts early can mean the difference between riding the wave or playing catch-up.

9. Choose automation tools that fit your workflow.

Tech doesn’t make a plan better. Workflow does. The right tools are the ones your team actually uses. Sometimes that’s a shared spreadsheet and scheduling app.

Other times, it’s an integrated platform with publishing, analytics, and reporting in one place. Complexity only works when it’s matched by capacity.

10. Stick to a cadence, then optimize.

Consistency builds momentum. Plans don’t need to be perfect to perform, they just need to show up on time.

When content is published regularly and tied to a clear system, it’s easier to track what’s working and improve from there. A smart cadence isn’t rigid. It’s repeatable.

Media Planning: The Smarter Way to Stay Visible Without Burning Budget

Media planning is what determines whether your message reaches the right people or disappears into the void. It’s an integral part of your business’s ability to create, publish, and share content that actually lands.

If your audience engagement tends to ebb and flow, I recommend using the pulsing media plan where you can. It gives you the consistency of continuous advertising with the intensity of flighting, ensuring a steady presence while still allowing for strategic bursts of activity.

For example, keep a low-level awareness campaign running throughout the quarter, then ramp up during peak sales periods or key launches.

I’ve always been surprised by how dynamic media planning can be. No two campaigns are ever quite the same, and that’s part of the challenge (and the excitement). One brand might surge during holiday season, another might need to stay top-of-mind year-round through evergreen content. Each one demands its own rhythm.

The key is knowing when and where to show up. Map your media calendar to your audience’s behavior, and your planning becomes a growth engine not a guessing game.

Editor’s note: This post was originally published in February 2020 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.