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We’re kicking off Activate win a trip, where TWO Iterable customers will win a VIP trip to San Jose, CA, for Activate (April 1-3)! Haven’t seen the details yet? Check out the announcement post to learn how to qualify and enter for your chance to win!


Reality TV Love Show Lessons for Marketers

Marketing today is all about winning hearts through AI-driven, data-powered engagement.

  • On Love Is Blind, contestants build trust without ever seeing each other through meaningful conversations in the pods. Brands can take the same approach using data and AI to craft personalized, real-time engagement. 💍

  • Love Island teaches us that sometimes, even when you think you’re safe, a new bombshell enters the villa and shakes everything up. Brands that fail to adapt or rely on outdated tactics risk the same fate, losing customer attention and relevance. 🏖️️

  • The Bachelor can teach brands to be strategic. Much like choosing who gets a rose, a misstep in strategy can leave you wondering, “Did I pick the right one?” Failing to meet customer expectations and needs can turn loyalty into indifference, ultimately damaging the customer relationship. 🌹

That’s why at Activate, we’ll explore how to future-proof your marketing with AI-powered engagement, rapid experimentation, and messaging that actually resonates. 

 

Today’s prompt: 

With Valentine’s Day approaching, we’re swiping left on outdated tactics and right on the new era of marketing. If marketing had a dating app, what would you swipe left on (a tactic of the past) and right on (a strategy for the future)? 💘💚📱 

Here are a few examples to help get you started:

  1. ❌  Swipe left to reacting to customer behavior only after it happens.
    ✅  Swipe right to predictive insights that anticipate customer needs before they take action.
     
  2. ❌ Swipe left to first-name personalization without deeper customer insights.
    ✅ Swipe right to AI-powered messaging that dynamically adjusts to behavior, preferences, and engagement patterns.
     
  3. ❌ Swipe left to ignoring mobile-first experiences when customers engage mostly on their phones.
    ✅ Swipe right to optimizing for mobile-first experiences across email, web, and apps.

Drop your answers in the comments for a chance to win a trip to Activate. Don’t forget, new prompts drop every Tuesday & Thursday, so be sure to swipe back here on Thursday for the next one! 😊

 

 

  1. ❌ Swipe left to oinsert company name that I am porting campaigns from]
    ✅ Swipe right to ITERABLE
  2. ❌ Swipe left to implied consent for SMS campaigns
    ✅ Swipe right to SMS double opt-in
  3. ❌ Swipe left to assuming you know your audience
    ✅ Swipe right to constantly analyzing your audience segments for behavioural shifts
  4. ❌ Swipe left to recycling assets in new campaigns
    ✅ Swipe right to keeping content fresh with new design assets (images, banners)

❌ Swipe left on boring basic static emails
✅ Swipe right on encouraging interactivity with polls, quizzes, gifs, product recommendations, etc

❌ Swipe left on blasting the same message to all customers.
✅  Swipe right on AI-powered personalization that fits the customer.

❌ Swipe left on only reacting to what customers do.
✅  Swipe right on predicting what the customer needs before they ask.

❌ Swipe left on forgetting mobile users.
✅  Swipe right on making every experience seamless on all devices.

❌ Swipe left on AI that feels creepy! No one wants an email 30 seconds after leaving a site saying, “We saw you looking at... 👀.”

✅ Swipe right on brand-aligned AI responses with thoughtful timing and oversight for a more natural and engaging experience.

❌ Swipe left on batch-and-blast emails—because mass messaging with zero personalization is the equivalent of sending “hey” to 50 matches and hoping someone bites.

✅ Swipe right on AI-driven, behavior-based messaging—because understanding what customers want before they even ask is the ultimate green flag.

 

❌ Swipe left on one-and-done campaigns that ghost your audience after one message.

✅ Swipe right on multi-channel journeys—because real relationships (and revenue) are built through ongoing, meaningful conversations across SMS, email, and push.

❌ Swipe left to generic mass marketing, even if the ‘mass’ is technically all one user group. 

✅ Swipe right to leaning into iterable and event triggered emails, serving up users what they need, when they need it, based on their behaviors! 
❌ Swipe left to text heavy content and emails that scream MARKETING (in Ed Tech)
✅  Swipe right to short, sweet, and succinct messaging with clear value for the customer and a clear way for them to get to that value. 

❌ Swipe left to reacting to customer behavior only after it happens or taking a guess 
✅ Swipe right to Iterable’s predictive insights that anticipate needs and drive proactive engagement

❌  Swipe left on skipping QA 
✅  Swipe right on testing all of your links, asking somebody for a proofread, and making sure the email renders correctly in all inboxes

❌ Swipe left on relying on one channel for communication

✅ Swipe right on optimizing channel preferences based on engagement 

❌ Swipe left on copying directly from generative AI copy

✅ Swipe right on using generative AI copy to help inform the final messaging based on your own brand’s unique voice

❌ Swipe left on not cross-collaborating between marketing channels
✅ Swipe right on gathering ideas from SEO, paid, in-app, email, etc., to help expand your owned channels. 

❌ SWIPE LEFT: Re: in the subject lines for not actual replies (why is that even a thing?)
✅  SWIPE RIGHT: extra effort in adding Google Annotations code 

❌ Swipe left on the more is more approach - if you’re in my inbox everyday, you probably don’t know why you’re talking to me

✅ Swipe right on making segmentation simple if you’re just beginning, it doesn’t need to be hard! Stick with the basics like recency, frequency and monetary value to get your programs started

❌ Swipe left on standardized reporting - a one size fits all approach to reporting probably isn’t going to tell you everything you need to know with highly segmented journeys 
✅ Swipe right on using AI to help make sure your copy matches your audience i.e. is customized by demographic characteristics like location, reading level, age and gender

Creative prompt! If marketing had a dating app, here’s what I’d swipe on:

❌ Swipe left to massive email blasts with no segmentation or targeting.
✅ Swipe right to using Iterable’s brand affinity AI feature to leverage personalized content and promotions via email campaigns that speak directly to each customer’s prefered engagement level.

❌ Swipe left to pushing products and promos that customers aren’t interested in.
✅ Swipe right to using historic customer data to offer product recommendations based on their activity history and preferences toward the brand.

❌ Swipe left to generalized, static content that feels bland and disconnected from the audience.
✅ Swipe right to immersive, interactive experiences that build deeper relationships with your audience through real-time engagement, such as polls, forums, promts!

❌ Swipe left to “traditional” marketing tricks to convince people to buy a product
✅ Swipe right to funny, memorable, and maybe slightly unhinged marketing practices
 

❌ Swipe left on outdated marketing lingo
✅ Swipe right on personable lingo

❌ Swipe left on executive team members being in the email marketing weeds
✅ Swipe right on trusting marketing team members to make informed and experience driven marketing decisions

❌ Swipe left on throwing ideas at the wall and seeing what sticks
✅ Swipe right on testing ideas and using data-driven decisions to impact marketing communications

❌  Swipe left to ESPs that don’t have dark mode editing.
✅  Swipe right to ESPs that have dark mode editing.

❌ Swipe left on gated content that creates friction in the customer journey.
✅ Swipe right on value-driven, interactive content that builds trust and engagement.

❌ Swipe left on chasing vanity metrics like likes and impressions.
✅ Swipe right on data-driven strategies that focus on conversion, retention, and lifetime value.

❌ Swipe left on intrusive, irrelevant ads that disrupt user experiences.
✅ Swipe right on contextual, intent-based advertising that feels natural and useful.

 

  1. ❌ Swipe left to reems of forgettable blog content to try to rank, all repackaged and blasted as a newsletter
    ✅ Swipe right to posting less, and only when you have something to say that isn’t what everyone else is saying
  2. ❌ Swipe left to migrating
  3. ✅ Swipe right to actually being migrated, and using 😄

Love this 😂

❌ Swipe left to gated content that forces a subscribe to a mailing list (why anyone thought this would be a good idea is beyond me...)

✅ Swipe right to identifying when “good” friction can be added to customer journeys to improve the quality of the customer, and boost the user experience

❌ Swipe left to “one-size-fits-all” messaging

✅ Swipe right to AI-powered triggers and predictive models delivering hyper-personalised, valuable messaging to customers

❌ Swipe left to Product and Marketing teams working in silos

✅ Swipe right to synergistic relationships and cross-collaboration that delivers a truly seamless, omnichannel experience

Love this prompt! Here’s my yays and nays:

 

❌ Swipe left on batch-and-blast email campaigns that treat every subscriber the same.
✅ Swipe right on AI-driven personalization that tailors content based on real-time behavior and preferences.

❌ Swipe left on relying solely on open rates to measure engagement.
✅ Swipe right on advanced analytics that track holistic customer journeys.

❌ Swipe left on one-size-fits-all subject lines.
✅ Swipe right on dynamic content that adapts to each customer’s interests and actions.

 

  1. ❌ Swipe left to continuing to message users who don’t engage
    ✅ Swipe right to implementing proper re-engagement and sunset policies
  2. ❌ Swipe left to considering the first name variable as personalization
    ✅ Swipe right to creating a robust data schema of profile and event data to truly personalize both templates and journey paths
  3. ❌ Swipe left to sending campaigns at the same time for every user
    ✅ Swipe right to customizing send time based on the user’s time zone and using Iterable’s AI to optimize the send schedule over time based on behavior

 

❌  Swipe left to creating multiple campaigns to offer more personalization
✅  Swipe right to leveraging dynamic templates and catalog/data feed for personalization at scale 

 

❌  Swipe left to sending the same email message/campaign regardless of customer profile 
✅  Swipe right to using Brand Affinity for segmentation and differentiation in email message

 

❌  Swipe left creating journeys alone, from scratch
✅  Swipe right to using AI prompts to get journey started

❌ Generic Mass Emails – Nobody likes an unsolicited, impersonal approach, and do not want to feel like just another name on a list.
✅ Personalized, Data-Driven Engagement – Customers want brands that “get” them. Data-driven personalization, dynamic content, and AI-powered recommendations make every interaction feel like a perfect match.

❌ Swipe left to boring AI generated content that doesn’t match experiences
✅ Swipe right to real content written that is helpful to the education of the consumer

❌ Swipe left on subject line and button color tests tests 
✅ Swipe right on testing for frequency, channel, and timing

❌ Swipe left on open rates
✅ Swipe right on inbox placement 

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