HOUSTON, We’re Ready for Takeoff! 🚀

WELCOME to my inaugural newsletter! I will be experimenting with formats over the next few weeks to see what resonates best. I want this newsletter to be informative, entertaining, and easy to read. I always welcome feedback; please reply to this email any time you have anything to share with me.

1. Sheryl Sandberg to Leave Meta Board in May

Meta’s longtime former COO and current board member, Sheryl Sandberg, announced that she will be ending her tenure on the company’s board of directors.

It seems like she won’t be going very far and will remain an advisor to Meta. She was a critical leader for the company through its 860% stock gain since its 2012 IPO and a stabilizing force throughout the political and legal headwinds it’s faced throughout the years.

Given that she’s likely only stepping down to focus on personal philanthropic efforts and will remain connected to the company, this news does not concern me that anything negative is happening behind the scenes.

2. Email Deliverability Updates 2024 (MUST READ)

Beginning THIS WEEK (February 1, 2024), there is a massive update happening on Gmail and Yahoo (two of the most widely used email providers in the world) that will decide whether or not bulk senders’ emails end up in the spam folder.

💥 Bulk Sender = sending thousands of emails per day

Here are the 4 main updates that will impact bulk email deliverability:

1️⃣ Authenticate Your Emails - bulk senders must authenticate their emails with SPF or DKIM and DMARC

• SPF: Sender Policy Framework

• DKIM: Domain Keys Identified Mail

• DMARC: Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting, and Conformance

2️⃣ 1-Click Unsubscribe - emails must give readers the option to unsubscribe with one click. No more fancy hidden ways of clicking through to another page to then retype your email in manually (only to screw it up or lose patience to complete the process). Honestly- I’m pretty happy with this.

3️⃣ 48 Hour Processing of Unsubscription Requests - This is logical and should not be an issue.

4️⃣ Spam Thresholds 😵‍💫 - Senders need to remain a spam rate of < 0.3%.

If you’re not good at math, this is less than 3 spam complaints for every 1000 emails. HOWEVER, senders may see deliverability issues at even lower rates, so it’s critically important to keep it as close to 0 as possible. This one is actually the scariest and could really impact email marketing as we know it. List hygiene, segmentation, and message frequency all need to be top of mind and paid close attention to for brands.

👉 Need professional support to ensure you don’t end up in spam? My team can help. We handle all of the above. Our deliverability service includes:

• Placement on a dedicated sending domain

• Domain warming

• Compliance confirmation

• Sending/segmentation strategy to avoid the dreaded spam threshold, meeting compliance, and have a strategy to avoid exceeding the spam threshold?

  Cost: $175/hr (approx 10hrs). If interested, reply to this email.

3. The Rise of TikTok Shops

For those who read my 5 Predictions for eCommerce in 2024 piece, you already know how enthralled I am by TikTok Shops. This past week, I tweeted about Tarte Cosmetics’ TikTok Shop dominance. They’ve already done $10M+ in TikTok Shop revenue organically (with no paid media) in less than a year. They also reported a 100%+ halo effect on physical retail sales for the products that were present in TikTok Shop.

Tarte’s CEO, Maureen Kelly, said it best:

This underscores the opportunity right now on the platform. Brands large and small that are absolutely crushing all have one thing in common…

TikTok Shop is purely a numbers and effort game. Whoever wants it more will come out on top. I know of brands that you’ve never heard of that have printed $100k days organically on TikTok Shop.

TikTok organic and affiliate influencer creative is the highest leverage piece of creative on the internet. Find something that works organically? Boom, amplify it via spark code with TikTok ad dollars. Even better? Throw it in your Meta ad campaigns and watch your ad account hit another level of scale.

If setting up TikTok Shop isn’t in your 2024 plans yet, stop what you’re doing and fix that. Set your shop up and earmark a significant investment of time and capital in creating viral organic content and securing affiliate influencers. If you need help, give me a holler.

You will be seeing a LOT more content from me on TikTok Shops this year.

Brush before or after coffee? ☕️

This interesting debate hit 𝕏 this past week.

Whenever I get to interject my dental opinion, I will take that opportunity 100% of the time. Honestly, as long as you brush each morning, the order really won’t make a difference in your overall dental health.

Here’s my routine (take it or leave it):

1. Mouthwash when you wake up

2. Eat breakfast/drink coffee

3. Drink water to balance acidity

4. Brush/floss immediately after

What I’m Listening to 🎧

For those who don’t know me: I do not work in silence. I’m a music lover. Especially house music. It’s one of my passions. It all started when I began college and needed to hunker down and power through studying. I always found it difficult to keep the energy high… until I found music.

People tend to enjoy my playlist at parties, in the office, you name it.

So I’m gonna keep you updated on

What I’m Listening to This Week: MOOJO (Live from Dubai; 2023)

MOOJO is bursting on the scene and is going to make this newsletter nearly every time he drops a live set on YouTube. You’re welcome 👇

I welcome all feedback. Good, bad, everything in between.

Have any thoughts to share? Hit reply, and let’s hear it! 👂

📧 Reply to this email & share your thoughts or what you want me to cover next!