Weekly Marketing and Advertising News: Audi Denmark Cookieless Test; Federal Judge tosses out Facebook Antitrust suits; Bumble Dating App Cafe; Brand Equity Building

 It has to start somewhere. It has to start some time. What better place than here? What better time than now?
 You're listening to the Radcast. If it's radical, we cover it. Here's your host, Ryan Alford.
 Hey guys, what's up? Welcome to the latest edition of the Radcast news and advertising edition. I'm Ryan Alford. I'm Josh Hill. Welcome to our show. It is Friday, July 2nd, 2021.
 We are in the future, folks, as 2021. And it's almost July 4th. We're going out with a bang here this week. Oh yes.
 Dad joke number one. Right off, right off the bat.
 Let's start my tally. I know. What's up Josh? You having a good week?
 Been a good week. Yeah. Good. Good. Any, uh, huge, exciting, special July 4th plans?
 Big cookout with some friends. Okay. Yeah. I don't know what it is. You know, throw some, throw some old meat on the Barbie.
 Oh, what was that? Dumb and Dumber. Yeah.
 I'll get a Zuckerberg on here. Smoking these meats. Smoking these meats. We have the meats. We have the smoking some meats out here.
 I know. It's a live fourth fireworks. There's no fireworks in Greenville this year. What the hell? Oh, is that real? Yeah. Like they like they're so much construction going on there.
 They're afraid they're like, you know, light something on fire. And then like the, the area that normally does it has so much.
 You know, you can't have progress around here. That makes sense. Yeah. Maybe it's crying. You got kids upset. Like moms are going, what are we going to do? There's no fireworks down down.
 I've already seen some means about the, uh, the Northwest with all that heat and dryness going on out there. Oh, yeah, they don't need fireworks. Yeah. They're like, this is, this is a great. Um, good thing.
 There's no explosion sensory holidays coming up. Yeah. I think they need to stay away from the fireworks.
 117 degrees out there. Just bring up a YouTube video and watch that. Let me be enough.
 So, uh, it's been a good week. It's been a good week. And then we're going to start a new segment here in our, in our kind of upfront for these looking at some of the Google trends of the week. And these were yesterday's trends.
 And, uh, something caught my attention. And I wanted to, you know, bring it to the forefront. If you're watching the video, you're going to see the screen of what's trending. But a certain gentleman that used to play baseball for the New York Mets.
 These Bobby Mendee Bobby Mendee Day was yesterday. And, uh, you know, this, do you, you wear a little bit of this story kind of the cult nature of it recently.
 Yeah. It's a name that's popped up here and there throughout history for me. But so if for anyone listening that doesn't know this story and yeah, it was yesterday. So you're probably already heard this. Well, you're going to hear it again.
 So I'm going to condense it really quickly. Bobby and Elliott was a huge baseball player made millions of dollars, huge contract.
 Well, he went, he declined one year and the owner didn't really want to pay their remaining like six million bucks all at once. But he told him.
 Bobby made the deal of a lifetime that he'd pay him 1.2 ish million dollars for 25 years, 11 years and starting 11 years in 2011. It was 2000 when this happened.
 And Bobby took that deal. It was only 6 million that we sowed and he took that 25 million. And, uh, the owner of the Mets who was investing with Bernie Madoff made off made off.
 Yeah, made off with a lot of money.
 The Ponzi scheme or if you don't know who that is, anyway, stole everyone's money, including the Mets owner who seemed to have enough for it to go around. But nonetheless, he thought he could invest of those 11 years and make more than the contract was worth well.
 He was dead wrong kind of like Bernie made off and he's been paying 1.2 million or 25 years since 2011. We're in year like 10 of this. He's got 15 more to go. But they it's become a cult following it's like there's probably been the day at the ballpark.
 There's been bobble heads and everything else and Ryan Reynolds, of course, is stuck at a commercial with mint. We won't go that that's not part of our news is Ryan. We've given you enough props on this. You should come on the show. We're going to get you on as a guest Ryan Reynolds. But, uh, in all seriousness, Bobby Bonilla day Bobby Bonilla was trending.
 In the top like in yesterday, significantly. Yeah, it's gosh, the things I would do for a contract like that. Deal 1.2 million. He just kind of put it in savings form. Yeah, like it became is like, you know, instead of like some of these guys spinning more than they should have human financial advisors. He, uh, signs the deal of a lifetime and it became like a savings account because he gets 1.2 and almost like living on the dividends of, you know, much larger contracts. So.
 Gosh, that's that's that's for you, Bobby. Absolutely.
 Anyway, I just it makes me laugh, you know, like that the owner was, I don't know, arrogant enough to think that that was a done deal.
 Yeah, good a good life lesson of the don't catch catch your chickens before the eggs hatch. I don't know exactly how you say it. Yes, yes.
 Yes, yes. I promised I was going to give Josh lots of laws today and, uh, no distractions. Yeah, that's it. That's your that's your cue to make an odd home.
 Yes, yes, yes. Uh, so I know, um, a bit of news. So we're radical and, um, we're doing a little partnership. There's a if you go look them up, especially on TikTok, Joey, Joe and Sean.
 This S E A N go look them up on TikTok, thank me later, hilarious dudes are actually here at Greenville, little comedy troupe. I know Joe from college, but I'm actually hiring these guys at the agency they're going to help with writing and doing some skits to really kind of take our
 content to the next level. So I'm excited about that. I might even make some guest appearances on the podcast Josh. So funny guys, Josh is probably funnier than you even realize. So, uh, I can't wait for the how this all kind of comes together when we get lots of funny people talking. And so I don't know, it's like trying to shake things up. It just strikes me is the people that are making great content that are really talented in this day and age.
 How do we partner and leverage that, especially when our fucking name is radical. Yeah.
 You know, like it's hard to be as radical. So let's be radical. So I'm excited about that more to come more content. They're going to be coming on the red cast, doing like a weekly segment.
 I'm looking forward to that. Um, Josh, did their humor.
 Oh, yeah. That was. It was kind of right down the path for you. For sure. There's a couple of moments, even just meeting with them. I was like holding back in the laps.
 Yeah, they're funny. Lots of parody to look them up. Joey, Joe and Sean coming on the red cast team and the radical team in a any time now. So, uh, speaking of TikTok.
 Uh, I think you hit your radar this week. Uh, a few things. And I'm going to bring Ryan back in. Ryan Reynolds got on. And of course, his first fucking you like TikTok video gets four million likes, uh, not views likes. It's just huge.
 Um, so he's just hitting balls hits at this point on a, um, but we had our own TikTok blow up. Yes, we did. Uh, we had one featuring our wonderful graphic designer, Sawyer.
 Uh, and one of our recent trends. So this is another trend of the, um, I don't even know who does this song, but it's just like, I'll be damned. I'll be damned. If I listen to the opinion of a man with an unwashed rear end. Um, keep going.
 Um, but yeah, he's got 125,000 views. Uh, got a few hundred followers from that is great. It's, it is a case study. Okay, people. So I'm just going to say this. So like, I give our team latitude with time to create TikToks for the agency.
 Most agencies suck at marketing themselves. We're marketers that we market ourselves. So I tell the team, hey, come out with TikToks, do all this stuff. We've got a lot of creative people, a lot of talented people. And they come out with videos. We've had some with tens five thousand views here and there.
 And you think, well, what's the point of that? Well, we had like three talented people apply to work here. It's a recruiting tool. You know, it's awareness for the agency. It's awareness for our team. It gives them, you know, a creative outlet. Like, this is why you do it. And so if you're listening out there and you run a business, this is why you give your team latitude to do these things. And, you know, who knows what comes of it, but it adds value. It's fun. We look.
 Everything's too serious. Like, let's fucking stop taking everything. So damn serious. Like, let's have fun. People. That's why TikToks blowing up.
 So I know we've had a couple like new new people on the team. We're like, all right, let's make a TikTok. And they're like, don't really have a meeting some kind of formal discussions. We shoot. No, we're just saying.
 Just come down. Yeah, come down. This is not planned. We're not like that kind of works.
 Like the cool works. Yes. Yes. Yes. So check that out. Check out the radical company. TikTok pays for all of the greatest hits that are going on and saw yours.
 Mollet. Yeah, anything had the mullet yet. Yeah, he didn't yet. That hair is something else. We'll get it. We'll get it back in there. Yes. He might play a character himself. Yes.
 Anything else hitting your right arm TikTok? A couple great. Great more sounds. Pay my bills by Destiny Child killing killing and love those.
 And then one of my favorites is the like pit bull did a song a while ago and then he was like for everyone going through tough times remember I've been there done that and everyone's like posting the most like obscure like really deep traumatic events in their lifetime. And he's like just me you like pushing through this moment just remembering that pit bull's been there with me.
 Yeah, like playing all the fact that maybe he had tough times at one time but really he's not having tough times anymore. But he's Mr. World Ride. What what hasn't he experienced is just true. It's people still popular or is the only popular in a parody instance like I want to say he's popular in parody.
 Like okay way, but like I also still see him everywhere. So I don't think it I think there comes a point where like even if you are a meme like yeah, it doesn't matter about becoming a meme. No, you want to become a meme. I'm okay with that. Like you made it I think. Yeah. Oh yeah. That's when you're like for sure a part of like history forever. Yes.
 Cool. There's your latest on Tik Tok and we'll get started on the news. So first number one, Audi.
 Claiming a 70% conversion rate. This is coming from adage. By the way, find it on adage.com. You can find it a lot of places. I did see it multiple places, but adays picked it up. So I want to give them props. Audi claims 70% conversion rate for cookie list testing leveraging exclusion list. So essentially here, you know, cookies are going away eventually though Google just announced they're extending another two years. No one's quite ready. It's like, wait, wait. Hey, can we extend that one or hey?
 You know, like the lobbyists then in Washington shoved a few more hundreds of things or millions, whatever it is in pockets to extend this because no one fight ready for it.
 But it is interesting because this goes in line. I want it. This is kind of struck me because it's some of the things that we are about to start testing are already are testing with this notion of contextual combined with first party combined with behavioral minus.
 Which is where the exclusion list. Yeah. Customers that are showing behaviors that would show them not to be interested in whatever you're selling in this case and Audi. Right. Who's not interested in an out. But you know, you got to be a small exclusion list.
 Just the ones that can't afford it. Right. But that was the only thing they would have minor like affordability. That's the one that one factor like, you know, whatever the income level.
 Yeah. Credit level. Probably have credit scores, but thoughts on this.
 Yeah. I think it makes a lot of sense and going for contextual stuff is something like we've been like really pushing for last few months, especially.
 Yeah. And that's been really successful on what I've seen in our results, but makes a lot of sense, especially with the exclusion list. I think a lot of people.
 I mean, everyone talks about. Yeah. You know, everyone's everyone talks about targeting audience targeting who we're going after. I think a key thing is like, you got to exclude people you're not going after one.
 It saves you some add money because you got to keep them out. But I think it really says a lot. I mean, people are really focusing on being all things to all people is like, no, you got to cut out some people.
 What's kind of like negative keywords on paperclip campaigns? That's like people forget about that. Oh, we're going to go out of these keywords.
 No, you need to exclude some lists on keywords too, because that will get the trash kind of out of the out of the opportunity. Right.
 And it's like, it's like finding a finding a partner today and you like focus on all the good things. And you just ignore the red flags. Yeah.
 She's, she's cute. She's nice. She cleans, but she's also a psychopath. Yeah.
 She stole my wallet. She's so nice. I'm like, she's so good to me. Yeah. You know, you know, she does. She emptied my bank account that one time. But, you know, it's okay. I didn't have 700 dollars in there. So I was okay with it.
 Well, life lesson and ad lesson. Yes, exclusions.
 Exclusionless people. Yeah. Exclude. Get some deal breakers in there. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So number two.
 So not surprising here, but so Facebook's been under scrutiny for the last few years. And there's been a huge lawsuit just to summarize, we can talk about this for an hour, but they've been called out for essentially being a monopoly.
 And they've had any trust laws and everything's been trying to throw the book out with just threw it out. Their stock price went through the roof like when this happened, because I think a lot of people weren't expecting it to get thrown out, but it did get thrown out.
 And, and you know, like, I'm, I believe in capitalism. I'm a cap like, you know, I'm independent, probably as far as voting goes, I voted both sides in my, I don't know, 20 plus years of voting. So I wouldn't call myself one, one party or another as much as I just believe in capitalism.
 And it's kind of the lifeblood of America a bit. And so I don't have a problem with Facebook growing, becoming what they are. Hey, you, everyone's got the same opportunity to make the most of it.
 However, at a certain point, like, I don't know when it's something gets so ingrained in the society and everything else that it might be too big. I don't have a firm absolute judgment on that other than just my own intuition goes, maybe getting a bit big. Yeah. We have a, we have a habit of letting entities like this become the like too big to fail. Yes.
 And that's when you just completely remove competition and everything is like working to keep them in power. And it's just like that. This one falls apart.
 My problem with Facebook goes back to just like personal freedom of stuff. It's like they have so much size and scale, which they've done and they've built not admire from a capital standpoint.
 But when they become the judge jury and censorship of anything and again, I'm not being political here. I'm just talking like on anything.
 That's when I get to have a little bit of or a lot of heartburn, you know, is like when they're censoring things when they're dictating what's real news, what's fake news, what's absolute gospel and what's not.
 Because that's and look, I'm not saying you shouldn't have some censorship and like you don't want your kids seeing bad stuff and like, you know, like all and all like criminality of course should we need some censoring.
 Right. But I think if you're paying attention, we're creeping into lots of realms now, which is where some of that's happening.
 And even that like a just like a more, I guess a different look like you get your algorithm feeding you stuff that you either get mad about and react to or just the stuff that you like.
 And so it's kind of only feeding you the extremes. And so you get caught in this feedback loop of your own perspective.
 So I mean, really though the easiest key for getting rid of this monopoly is just stop using it.
 Yeah. Hey, take a break. Don't take that too loud. Take a break here. And then you do make money off the Facebook.
 But it's a great stuff. It's great for discovery. Great for like experiencing like new things, finding new things. But like, yeah, if it's if it's coming your reality.
 It's time to make take a few that I agree with that is the problem is there's like, you know, it's why you have screen time and different things now.
 Like take a break people like, you know, it could be a source, but don't be the source of all things.
 Yeah, let it be a tool. Yeah, unless you're just shopping for like everything that I have for sale in the marketplace, then didn't use it as much as you want.
 Yeah, that is your life now.
 Whenever I sell something on marketplace, please use it as often as possible. But, you know, if I don't have anything for sale, then, you know, don't worry about it.
 That random yard lawn mower that I'm trying to get rid of from the storage or whatever, you know, I'm always on some random on Facebook marketplace.
 If I'm selling something, you know, a few cars on there. It's kind of nice. Oh, yeah. Like, I'm going to be a musician for it.
 I'm not saying let's get rid of Facebook. I'm just saying like, you know, let's just make sure we get whatever, you know, we're all know who's driving the bus here.
 Yeah.
 So third on our list, the dating app, Bumble is officially opening its first cafe. This has been talked about for two years in New York City.
 Bumble, the dating app opens a cafe. I liked where they were going to go at first. It was like, I read the article and I'm like, the first, the first plan was no soups or spaghetti.
 Because you're going to be going on dates and you don't want to get embarrassed and like, yeah, that's kind of funny to me.
 At least I could throw that a little bit more. Now it's like, you know, we're going to be all things for all people and like, I'll come on.
 Yeah, it's just obviously like a PR move, but it's so funny to me because I don't, I know it's going to be such a turn off when someone's like, oh, you've been talking for a little bit on this app and like the other person's like, oh, let's finally go out.
 And then you, you're like, where should I go? Where should I go? How about the Bumble?
 That's what I don't understand. It's like, I remember, okay, good story. I lived in New York. I had gotten divorced and was only there for a few months before I moved back to South Carolina.
 And I used the app there. And you know, went on a few dates. And it always felt like, you know, you walk in the bar and there's like, you know, eight people here. You know, we're on match.com dates.
 It's a, it's a little bit of the walk of shame. I don't know why you'd be shane everybody's dating everyone uses. This was 19 years ago. Right. Everyone's used the app then in New York. Well, before anyone else, everything in New York is mainstream before anywhere else. And so it was like, it wasn't on like everybody was doing it.
 So it was fine. But it was more just like the, you knew everybody was on it. And that's how people met, but walking in and knowing there were like five other match dates. Yeah.
 And then people had snickering like the bar teacher going match date. Yeah. So thus, if you're on a bumble date, yeah, or whatever you do with bumble, you really want to go to the fucking bumble cafe.
 You're going to wear a bumble t-shirt. I would be there. It's possible from that. You know, like, I don't want to go to the fucking bumble cafe. Gosh, yeah. Like it just says, hey, let me have a t-shirt. It says we're on a bumble date.
 It just feels uncomfortable. Yeah. You can always tell. Like I've, I've been on a few bumble dates myself. And I've seen other people. But you can, you can always like see someone out of like bar. And you can be like, they're waiting on a bumble day.
 There's going to be like all these like, you know, 40, 50 year old men and women that are like, you know, married, like trying to escape or something hanging out the bumble cafe.
 It's just the shadiest, the shadiest people in New York. Can you go there without like, can you make a bumble date while you're at the bumble cafe?
 Like, you know, like, just like have it is have like GPS like walked in like, hey, I'm, I'm hanging out at the bumble cafe. Are they checking? Are they checking your matches to make sure it's you?
 Exactly. I've seen you more questions. I just thought I don't like this is what I just think it's like contrary. But like, I don't know. This is what I think about. Yeah.
 Yeah. Do not choose the bumble cafe. Let that one go all the way down. No, no bumble cafe for me. And I don't get it from a business perspective. Other than branding. Okay. I get it. But like we talked about New York. How many fucking restaurants do they have? It's like,
 a million restaurants. I got every concept ever. If this doesn't flame out in two years or less, call me shocked. Call the demise of clubhouse for the fucking record.
 And it's already demising and which may or may not be a word, but it's demise is imminent. Yeah. And call this what you want.
 That's what I'm going to think about that. Gosh. I'm getting on the soapbox on this one. Oh, yeah, for sure. I mean, it struck me in the, in the, you know, like this, this could have been in our like, you know, bad idea episode. Yeah.
 God, it's so bad. Cause like, just being in New York City argued like compared to a lot of other countries like New York City is like our only like actual city in America. Right. And like, you have all of those places.
 Places that have been there for over 100 years. And you go, yeah, I don't want to go to any of those spots. Let's go to the bumblecafe. Yes. Yes. Thank you for that, Josh, that you're so right. And the will see what happens. And last on our list, this is not a news article.
 This is a little bit of, hey, we're on soapbox Friday here a little bit. I'm going to get on my soapbox a bit, not even the soapbox, but now I want to get your perspective on this Josh, but so we're in kind of a start of a boom a bit with the economy with people getting back out. Everyone's excited. There's money in the market.
 Money being spent a lot of our clients, a lot of potential clients, a lot of just brands in general. Life's good right now. Yeah.
 Sales are going up. Money's in the market. Things are happening. But here's what I'm going to do. I do want to give a point of view on this. So it gets real easy. I think to think what we can pull back on marketing.
 And maybe spend a little less on marketing because sales are great. And this is not self-serving. It may come across that way because we do owner. I don't add agency. But it's actually, I want to go a different angle. It's less about.
 No, it's more the opportunity to start building brand when sales are great because pull back on your performance campaigns because maybe this performance is happening as they are, but those equity building brand opportunities.
 You've been thinking about starting a podcast as a business. You've been thinking about ways to maybe sponsor a local sports team. You've been thinking about some outdoor board campaign. I'm going to cover the game here.
 This is the time to build brand because it's not always going to be great. And the more equity you can build and put in your brand now, while you've got a little extra cash or the sales are good, you can win the long game.
 Absolutely. This is another thing to keep in mind. Most people, a lot of people get caught in the ruts of thinking of marketing as a fix. Things are going bad. Better start doing some marketing. That'll fix it. It's not a band-aid.
 Yeah, I can help, but it's like taking medicine like when you should be just like be better. And also, yeah, when things are good.
 Like this is your preventative maintenance, I guess when things are good, this is also going to be way easier to.
 Yeah, it's going to be way harder when sales are not bad. And it's going to take into account to be in the tank and people don't have as much money.
 Right. It's going to take way more money to invest in marketing to get the results that you could get when you're when things are great.
 Like you're going to get more for your money, more response. And just like when you have when things are good, that's when you already have attention.
 Yeah, that's that's your time to say something.
 That's absolutely right. So if you've been thinking about a rebrand, you've been thinking about ways with which to grow your overall awareness, now's the time.
 The fish are biting. So don't stop throwing your line out there and don't start creating a halo around that pond.
 This is the time to start really doubling down because not only can you afford it because sales are good, but you want to play the long game with your business.
 Yeah, if you're selling your business next year, sure, pull, pull some money out and, you know, save some money, make the make the books look a little better.
 Yeah. But most 99% of companies are in it for the long haul. And so now is when you have just like Josh said, attention is there.
 You have money in the market. You have the opportunity because and nobody look at is there's people buying to get more of your competition share.
 You know, like, you know, because they might be being more conservative because that's the natural play here.
 You're actually going out of the norm. You're being radical by thinking about how do I double down when things are good instead of scrolling back.
 Well, I'm going to save for that rainy day. No, why don't you make this this heyday even bigger of a heyday so that then you're well positioned when things are slower.
 Because when things are slower, that brand halo those things that awareness people knowing your name being top of mind is so much more valuable because then you don't have to play the growth game of.
 I got to make people know about me. I've got to get my stuff out there because, you know, everything's, you know, so harder, you know, but like now's the time. Yeah.
 Branding and awareness can always be built. You're not going to max that out. No, absolutely not until I mean, even Apple and like the biggest brands in the world spend millions of millions of dollars.
 Obviously, that's within their budgets on these awareness drivers. They're doing it because they want to be top of mind and top of mind is a fleeting position.
 It's a fight every day against the competition, no matter what you do, you're a chiropractor, you're a bank, you're a lawyer, you're a fabric company, whatever you are.
 Awareness and top of mind is fleeting. So now's the time to stake a position.
 Coca-Cola hasn't slowed down. You shouldn't either. Exactly. That's it for this week. I hope everyone has a great July 4th.
 Have some hot dogs. I'm not in the hot dog eating contest this year. Maybe next year. I eat three, I think. I mean, how dogs could you, Josh?
 Five. Okay. All right. We put a safe safe number in there. Yeah. I can name that name that tune at five. Cool. We'll have a great holiday, Josh.
 And everywhere out there, you know where to find us, the radcast.com. I'm at Ryan Alfred on all the channels. Just chill on Instagram.
 Go look him up. Go follow him. Go follow us. Go follow our YouTube channel, the radical company, YouTube channel, all the contents there, all the video highlights, everything. We'll see you next time. Happy 4th of July on the radcast.
 To listen to full episodes or to contact us, visit us on the web at the radcast.com or follow our host at Ryan Alfred on Instagram. Thanks for tuning in.