The Puck Drops on Massive Growth

NHL sponsorship growth has reached a record-breaking milestone this season. According to a report by SponsorUnited, the NHL generated $1.7 billion in sponsorship revenue — a 10% year-over-year increase. These numbers reflect a league that has fundamentally transformed its commercial model. Moreover, brands across every category are now investing heavily in hockey at every level.

However, this growth did not happen by accident. The NHL has invested heavily in fan experience, digital infrastructure, and global marketing. As a result, the league has diversified and strengthened its sponsorship base significantly. Furthermore, the timing aligns with a broader surge in live sports advertising value across the entire industry.

Why NHL Sponsorship Growth Is Attracting Major Brands

Several factors explain why NHL sponsorship growth continues to outpace expectations. First, hockey fans show extraordinary brand loyalty. They consistently support the brands that align themselves with the sport they love. Consequently, sponsors see higher engagement and stronger returns compared to many other leagues. For more on why live sports drive powerful advertising results, read our piece on live sports ad spending set to dominate TV.

Furthermore, the NHL has expanded its digital presence significantly. Enhanced digital advertising, streaming rights, and social media campaigns now reach fans wherever they are. Therefore, brands can engage NHL audiences across traditional TV broadcasts and digital platforms at the same time. This dual-channel reach is a major selling point for sponsors.

In addition, the league’s global footprint continues to grow. The NHL now has fans in over 100 countries. Moreover, expanded scheduling has created more prime broadcast inventory throughout the season. This gives sponsors more opportunities to reach audiences during high-stakes moments that generate massive viewer attention.

The rise of family-friendly arena marketing has also contributed to this growth. Brands see NHL games as premium event experiences. As a result, categories like banking, automotive, and consumer goods have deepened their investments considerably. The data from SponsorUnited confirms this trend is accelerating.

The Marketing Playbook: Strategies That Score

The most effective NHL sponsorship strategies share a few key traits. First, they integrate authentically into the game experience. Instead of simple logo placements, top brands create memorable fan moments. For example, jersey patch deals and arena naming rights drive daily brand visibility far beyond game day alone.

Furthermore, data-driven campaigns now dominate top NHL partnerships. Brands use fan behavior data to personalize their marketing across multiple touchpoints. Consequently, sponsorship activations feel personal rather than generic to audiences. This builds deeper emotional connections between brands and the passionate hockey community.

In addition, brands are leveraging the NHL’s growing portfolio of media partnerships. TNT, ESPN, and Sportsnet are all part of the broadcast mix. Therefore, sponsors benefit from national TV exposure alongside official digital channels. As a result, the combined reach of an NHL sponsorship rivals that of other major sports leagues in North America.

What This Means for Marketers

NHL sponsorship growth offers a clear and actionable lesson for every marketer. Authentic, community-driven partnerships build lasting brand equity over time. Moreover, long-term sponsorship commitments consistently outperform short-term ad buys in terms of fan trust and recall. The SponsorUnited data reinforces this point decisively and powerfully.

However, entering NHL sponsorships does not require a league-level budget. Local team partnerships, broadcast sponsorships, and community-level activations are all accessible options for smaller brands. Therefore, brands of all sizes can tap into hockey’s passionate fanbase effectively. See also our coverage of Fox Sports’ World Cup marketing masterclass for additional sports marketing inspiration.

Ultimately, NHL sponsorship growth reflects a broader truth in modern marketing. Sports remain one of the most powerful platforms for building genuine human connections between brands and consumers. As the NHL continues its growth trajectory, smart marketers will be ready to skate alongside it.

Image credits: Tony Schnagl / Pexels (IDs 6468586, 6468714), Lukas / Pexels (ID 590022). Video: NHL / YouTube. Data: SponsorUnited NHL Sponsorship Intelligence Report.

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Absolut Teams Up with the Queen of Pop

The Absolut Madonna collaboration is one of the more interesting brand stories of this year. Ahead of Confessions II dropping July 3, Absolut Vodka has signed on as the album’s official vodka partner, and the campaign they built together is worth paying attention to. They called it “ABSOLUT ICON,” and per Adweek, photographer Ricardo Gomes shot the visuals with Madonna in the purple corset bodysuit she made famous at the 2006 Grammys and in the “Sorry” music video. A deliberate nod to her past that makes the whole thing feel intentional, not thrown together.

Absolut has always had a thing for artists who actually move culture. Partnering with Madonna for her return to the dance floor wasn’t a reactive PR play. It’s the kind of call that makes sense when you look at both brands’ histories. Absolut brings cultural credibility and decades of art-world partnerships. Madonna brings one of the most loyal, cross-generational fanbases in music. The Absolut Madonna collaboration gives both sides something real.

Inside the Absolut Madonna Collaboration Strategy

What’s interesting here isn’t just the name recognition. It’s how the partnership was actually put together. Absolut didn’t just license Madonna’s likeness and call it a day. They brought in Special Offer, the same design team already building the visual identity for Confessions II, so the campaign and the album feel like they came from the same creative universe. That level of integration doesn’t happen by accident.

The brand association is doing real work here. When Absolut’s iconic bottle silhouette shows up next to Madonna, it’s making a statement: this is a brand that belongs in the same conversation as artists who shape culture. That’s a harder thing to buy than billboard space, and the campaign earns it through the history Absolut actually has.

The generational reach is worth noting too. Madonna’s fanbase doesn’t fit neatly into one demographic. Launching during Pride month and placing the campaign in queer publications and along Pride parade routes is Absolut being consistent with its own values. The brand ran one of the first major ads in The Advocate back in 1981. That’s not a trend play. That’s 45 years of showing up for a community.

Timing-wise, launching weeks before the July 3 album release was clearly intentional. Both parties generate buzz at the same moment when every entertainment outlet is already covering the comeback. And the storytelling choice to call it an “icon treatment” positions Absolut as a brand that recognizes cultural greatness and has the receipts to back it up. Consumers respond to that kind of narrative because it feels earned, not manufactured.

Absolut’s Legacy of Artistic Partnerships

This campaign didn’t come out of nowhere. Absolut’s relationship with the creative world goes back to 1985, when their collaboration with Andy Warhol launched what became one of the most ambitious brand-art programs ever assembled, commissioning over 350 artists across four decades including David Bowie, Keith Haring, Versace, and Herb Ritts. That history is what makes this feel earned rather than opportunistic. You can see how the campaign fits into that lineage on Absolut’s official ABSOLUT ICON campaign page.

The marketing world has already taken notice. Campaigns built at this scale, with this kind of creative depth, tend to draw attention at events like Cannes Lions, and for good reason. When a brand builds genuine cultural credibility over time, their partnerships carry weight that paid media simply can’t replicate.

If brand legacy and long-term credibility interest you, check out our analysis of Amica Insurance’s contrarian marketing strategy. It’s a completely different category, but the same instinct: build trust before you build reach.

A Toast to Strategic Brilliance

What makes the Absolut Madonna collaboration land is pretty simple: both sides earned their seats at the table before they ever sat down together. Absolut spent decades investing in art, culture, and the LGBTQ+ community. Madonna spent four decades becoming someone whose return to the dance floor is actually news. When those two things collide, you don’t have to manufacture excitement. It’s already there.

The real lesson for marketers is one that’s easy to say and harder to actually do: the best partnerships are built on shared values, not just shared audiences. Anyone can rent a celebrity. Building something that feels culturally coherent takes a lot more than that, and this campaign is a good example of what it looks like when both parties actually bring it. For more on why that foundation matters, read our piece on why trust trumps optimization in modern marketing.

Campaign images: Pernod Ricard / PR Newswire. Photography by Ricardo Gomes via Adweek / Absolut. Video: Madonna / YouTube. Source: PR Newswire.

The post Absolut Gives Madonna the Icon Treatment For Her Dance Floor Comeback appeared first on Marketeller.

The problem is that optimization answers the wrong question if the underlying issue is trust. You can run the most precisely targeted campaign in the history of your company against an audience that doesn’t believe what you’re saying, and no amount of A/B testing will fix it. That’s the uncomfortable argument at the center of recent Adweek coverage from Cannes Lions, and it’s one the industry is slowly starting to take seriously.

Consumer Trust in Marketing Has a Real and Measurable Deficit

Consumer trust in advertising and brand communications has been declining for years. Annual surveys by organizations like Edelman consistently show that people trust brands and institutions less than they did a decade ago, and that the gap between what brands claim and what consumers believe is widening.

This isn’t just a sentiment problem. It has direct implications for the effectiveness of marketing investment. When trust is low, conversion rates suffer. Message recall suffers. The threshold of evidence a brand needs to provide before a consumer takes action rises. You can compensate for some of this with frequency, show the message more often, reach more people, but that’s an expensive and increasingly ineffective way to address what is fundamentally a credibility problem.

The signs of a trust deficit tend to show up in the data before brands name them. High click-through rates that don’t convert. Strong awareness metrics that don’t produce consideration. Campaigns that perform well in testing but disappoint in market. When the numbers look like this, the reflex is to question the creative or the targeting. The harder question to ask is whether the audience simply doesn’t find the brand believable.

Where Trust Erodes

Understanding the trust problem requires understanding where it comes from, because it’s rarely a single cause. Several structural factors have been chipping away at consumer-brand trust for years.

Data practices have been a significant one. Consumers are far more aware than they were a decade ago of how their personal information is collected, shared, and monetized. When brands use targeting that feels intrusive, the ad for the product you were just talking about with a friend, the retargeted display ad that follows you across the internet for weeks after a single product view, the sophistication of the targeting works against the brand. It signals surveillance rather than service.

Broken promises are another consistent trust eroder. Marketing that promises an experience the product doesn’t actually deliver trains audiences to discount brand claims across the category, not just from the offending brand. In a market where competitors are readily available and switching costs are low, a single bad experience can permanently alter how a consumer evaluates any future claims from a company.

And then there’s the volume problem. Consumers are exposed to thousands of marketing messages a day across digital, social, outdoor, audio, and ambient channels. The cumulative effect of that exposure, much of it irrelevant or mildly deceptive, is a generalized skepticism that applies to any new message a brand tries to deliver. Even honest, well-crafted communication has to work against the accumulated noise of everything else.

What Actually Rebuilds Trust

The good news is that trust isn’t permanently broken, it’s just built differently than most marketing departments are currently structured to support. The mechanisms that build genuine consumer trust tend to operate on longer timelines and through different channels than traditional advertising.

Transparency about how things work tends to pay significant dividends. Brands that clearly explain their pricing, their data practices, their product limitations, and their policies create a kind of pre-emptive credibility that makes everything else they say easier to believe. It sounds obvious, but it requires a genuine willingness to show things that aren’t flattering, which goes against most marketing instincts.

Consistency between what a brand says and what it does over time is the other major lever. Trust is built through repeated reliable experience, not through a single compelling campaign. Every customer service interaction, every product experience, every social media response, every policy decision that touches a customer is either building or eroding trust. Marketing can claim whatever it wants, but the accumulated record of actual behavior is what consumers ultimately use to judge credibility.

Social proof has also become more important as institutional brand trust has declined. Consumers increasingly trust people who have firsthand experience with a product more than they trust the brands themselves. This is why review platforms, user-generated content, and genuine customer advocacy have become structurally important parts of the marketing mix for brands that are serious about closing the trust gap.

The Optimization Trap

The reason the trust problem persists despite broad awareness of it is that solving it requires a different kind of investment than most marketing measurement systems reward. Building trust takes time, consistency, and willingness to prioritize long-term credibility over short-term conversion. The payoff, an audience that’s genuinely receptive to what you say, lower acquisition costs, higher retention, is real, but it shows up in ways that are difficult to attribute to any single campaign.

Optimization, by contrast, is legible. The A/B test either wins or loses. The channel either delivers or it doesn’t. The quarterly report either shows the numbers or it doesn’t. Organizations under pressure to show short-term results will keep optimizing because that’s what generates visible answers on the timelines that matter to them.

Consumer trust in marketing is not a soft metric or a brand values statement. It is an operational challenge that affects conversion rates, retention, and long-term brand equity. You can see how brands like Amica have built their entire strategy around it in our piece on the Amica Insurance marketing strategy. The Cannes conversations about trust aren’t proposing to abandon optimization. They’re proposing to add a prior question: what are we optimizing toward? If the answer is a metric that signals engagement or conversion without accounting for the underlying trust environment, the optimization is building on an unstable foundation. The brands that figure out how to measure and manage trust as a strategic asset, not just a communications value, will have a durable advantage over those that don’t.

The post Marketing’s Core Challenge: Why Trust Trumps Optimization Every Time appeared first on Marketeller.

Amica Insurance, founded 119 years ago, has taken the second path. And according to Tory Pachis, the company’s Executive Vice President and CMO, the logic behind that choice is simpler than most marketing strategies tend to be: empathy is their best policy.

What Amica Insurance’s Marketing Strategy Looks Like in Practice

When Adweek profiled Amica as part of their Marketing Vanguard series, they described the company’s creative approach as “contrarian.” In the context of insurance advertising, that word does a lot of work. The category has become famous for mascots, jingles, celebrity spokespersons, and a kind of aggressive friendliness that tries to make buying insurance feel like a lifestyle choice. GEICO’s gecko. Progressive’s Flo. State Farm’s Jake. These campaigns are well-executed and they move the needle on brand recall.

Amica hasn’t followed that path. Their advertising tends to be quieter, more emotional, more focused on the actual experience of being an Amica customer rather than on the brand’s personality or quirks. The difference isn’t just tonal, it reflects a fundamentally different theory about what builds lasting brand loyalty in the insurance category.

Pachis’ argument, essentially, is that insurance customers aren’t primarily looking for entertainment from their insurer. They’re looking for confidence, confidence that when something goes wrong, the company will respond in a way that’s fair, fast, and genuinely helpful. All the advertising in the world doesn’t build that confidence. Actual customer experience does.

Word of Mouth as a Marketing Channel

Amica’s growth has historically been driven more by referrals and word-of-mouth than by paid media. That’s not an accident or a resource constraint, it’s a strategic choice rooted in a clear-eyed view of how insurance purchasing decisions actually work.

Think about how most people choose an insurance company. They’re not browsing options because they enjoy comparison shopping. They’re either switching after a bad experience with their current provider, or they’re taking the recommendation of someone they trust who has had a good one. The person whose neighbor had Amica and got treated well after a claim is a far more powerful influence than any TV spot.

This means that Amica’s marketing investments are, in a meaningful sense, distributed across their entire customer base. Every positive claims experience is a potential marketing moment. Every customer who would enthusiastically recommend Amica to a family member is, functionally, a member of their marketing team. That’s an asset that scales with customer satisfaction rather than with advertising budget.

It also means the floor on Amica’s marketing effectiveness is largely determined by the quality of their operations: claims handling, customer service, policy communication, and the entire experience of actually being insured. In that sense, Pachis’ role as CMO is inextricably linked with the company’s operational decisions in a way that’s less common in categories where the brand is more separable from the product.

The Creative Expression of Empathy

When Amica does advertise, the creative work tends to center on what happens at the moments that matter most to insurance customers: the call after an accident, the claim after a house fire, the reassurance that someone is genuinely looking out for you. These are not moments that lend themselves to humor or entertainment. They’re moments that call for warmth, clarity, and the quiet confidence that things will be handled well.

This is the creative expression of Pachis’ “empathy is our best policy” positioning. The advertising doesn’t try to make insurance fun. It acknowledges that the circumstances under which you need your insurance are often genuinely difficult, and it positions Amica as the kind of company that shows up differently than you might expect, more personally, more thoughtfully, more helpfully.

It’s a harder sell than a mascot, in some ways. You can’t summarize it in a tagline that plays well in a 15-second pre-roll. But it builds a different kind of trust, the kind that translates into customers who stay for decades and who actively recommend the company to people they care about.

Lessons for Any Brand Building on Trust

Amica’s approach isn’t specific to insurance. The underlying logic applies anywhere that customer trust is the primary driver of purchase decisions and long-term retention, which is, to varying degrees, most categories.

The first lesson is about alignment between marketing and operations. A brand built on trust can only sustain that positioning if the customer experience actually delivers on it. Marketing that promises empathy and service, backed by an operation that’s slow, frustrating, or impersonal, will erode trust faster than any campaign can build it. Amica’s model only works because they’ve invested in making the actual customer experience match what the marketing implies.

The second is about the patience required for relationship-based marketing to compound. Word-of-mouth and referral growth are slower than paid acquisition. The payoff, a customer base that stays longer and costs less to retain, takes years to fully materialize. Brands that measure marketing effectiveness only through short-term metrics will find this approach impossible to justify. Those willing to think in longer time horizons will recognize it as one of the most durable competitive advantages available.

Amica Insurance’s marketing strategy proves that word-of-mouth and operational excellence can outperform advertising budget at almost any scale. For more on how trust drives brand longevity, see our piece on why consumer trust trumps optimization in marketing. The Amica Insurance marketing strategy is, in short, a proof that patience and operational excellence can compound into one of the most durable competitive advantages in any category.

The post Cracking the Code: How Amica Insurance Masters Marketing with a Contrarian Approach appeared first on Marketeller.

McDonald’s: Swinging for the Fences on the World Cup

McDonald’s put together what Adweek describes as the brand’s largest-ever World Cup campaign—an all-star roster of football legends developed with Wieden+Kennedy. The campaign had a complicated origin: the original concept was reportedly scrapped and rebuilt from scratch before the team landed on something that actually works. The result leans hard into nostalgia and fan culture, pairing McDonald’s with the kind of players and moments that global audiences already love.

This is textbook event-driven marketing. McDonald’s knows that a World Cup with billions of viewers globally is an enormous attention window, and they’re meeting it with collectible cups, Happy Meal tie-ins, and a global cast designed to connect with fans across every market. The approach isn’t subtle—it doesn’t need to be.

• What’s driving it: Global event timing, nostalgia, and celebrity association at scale.
• The objective: Sales lift during the tournament window, plus stronger brand affinity with football fans worldwide.

Nike: Rethinking the World Cup Marketing Playbook

Nike’s approach this tournament looks nothing like what you’d expect. Instead of a single hero film, they released a six-minute cinematic piece designed to launch 12 full weeks of content—product drops, collaborations, and creator campaigns rolling out across every day of the tournament’s 39-day run. It’s a deliberate rejection of the big-bang model Nike has relied on for years.

The strategy reflects how people actually consume media in 2026. Spreading your firepower across 12 weeks means staying present across different platforms and audience communities rather than dominating a single news cycle. Whether it outperforms Nike’s classic blockbuster approach will be one of the more interesting marketing debates to follow this summer.

• What’s driving it: Audience fragmentation and a bet on sustained presence over single-event spectacle.
• The objective: Brand relevance at every stage of the tournament, not just opening weekend.

Apple: Making Privacy Impossible to Ignore

While nearly every other brand this week went sports-first, Apple took a completely different angle. Their new campaign animates rival browsers’ trackers as creepy “Chrome stalkers”—characters that follow users around the web, making the abstract concept of data collection feel visceral and uncomfortable. Safari is the natural solution.

It’s a classic Apple formula: identify something confusing and slightly threatening, visualize it memorably, present Apple’s product as the fix. No celebrity, no global event—just a sharp insight executed cleanly. In a week full of big, loud campaigns, it stands out by being precise. The creative was highlighted by Adweek as one of the week’s best.

• What’s driving it: Growing consumer anxiety about data privacy and Apple’s ongoing competitive positioning against Chrome.
• The objective: Safari adoption and reinforcement of Apple’s privacy-first brand identity.

Calvin Klein: Desire as Strategy

Calvin Klein keeps doing what it does best—bold visuals, carefully selected celebrity talent, and imagery designed to generate a reaction. In a week where nearly every major campaign is built around football, CK’s fashion-forward work stands out by contrast alone. The brand’s target audience isn’t the sports crowd, and it doesn’t try to pretend otherwise.

Desire-based marketing is its own discipline, and Calvin Klein executes it as well as anyone in fashion. The formula hasn’t changed dramatically, but when done well, it doesn’t need to.

• What’s driving it: Celebrity endorsement, aspirational positioning, and provocative imagery.
• The objective: Cultural relevance and brand desirability with a fashion-forward, younger demographic.

Lego: 314 Million Views Before Breakfast

The headline number of the week belongs to Lego. Their campaign brought together Messi, Ronaldo, Mbappé, and Vinícius Jr.—four of the most recognizable athletes in the world—and filmed them around a table building a Lego version of the FIFA World Cup trophy. Created by Lego’s in-house team with Wieden+Kennedy Amsterdam, the spot hit 314 million views across the players’ Instagram accounts within 24 hours of release.

Beyond the raw numbers, what works here is the framing: four fiercely competitive rivals, sitting together doing something playful. It’s a genuine expression of what Lego stands for—creativity, imagination, shared experience—wrapped around the world’s biggest sporting event. It’s also an object lesson in influencer activation at scale: getting four athletes with a combined following of hundreds of millions to organically promote your campaign is genuinely hard to pull off.

• What’s driving it: Universal themes of play and one of the most powerful celebrity line-ups assembled for a brand campaign in recent memory.
• The objective: Cross-generational brand appeal and a massive earned media spike ahead of the World Cup.

What the 2026 World Cup Marketing Campaigns Teach Us

An extra $10.5 billion in global ad spend is expected to pour into Q2 2026 off the back of the World Cup, and the competition for attention is already underway. The brands cutting through this week aren’t necessarily spending the most—they’re the ones with the clearest sense of what they’re trying to say. McDonald’s bet on star power and nostalgia. Nike bet on longevity and breadth over spectacle. Apple ignored the sports cycle entirely and won with a sharply targeted message. Lego turned four footballers and some plastic bricks into a storytelling engine.

The lesson isn’t that one approach beats the rest—it’s that knowing why you’re doing something tends to show in the work. For another example of that thinking in action, see how Pepsi’s Football Nation campaign turned a word debate into a global brand platform.

The post Marketing Masterclass: A Deep Dive into the Week’s Top Brand Campaigns appeared first on Marketeller.

Who Is Sean McGinty?

McGinty isn’t new to high-growth retail. He joined Jollyes in October 2025 after three years as Marketing Director at furniture chain Dunelm, and before that spent four years as Marketing Director of Aldi UK, a brand famously built on challenger positioning and value leadership. He has also held previous roles at Debenhams and Asda, giving him a deep well of experience across both value and mid-market retail.​

In his new role at Jollyes, McGinty takes direct ownership of customer strategy, marketing, digital platforms, and the brand’s loyalty proposition. His mandate is clear: make marketing the engine that drives Jollyes from a well-kept secret into a household name for UK pet owners.​​

The ‘Unapologetic’ Challenger Strategy

Jollyes has been on a quiet but relentless growth trajectory, almost doubling its number of UK stores over the past three years and surpassing 100 locations nationwide. New openings in Hartlepool, Ponders End, and Whitehaven in February 2026 continued that momentum, following eight store launches in the preceding three months alone.

Despite that physical footprint, brand awareness sits at around just 15%, a number McGinty openly acknowledges but sees as a massive opportunity rather than a problem.

“There’s a huge opportunity for marketing to come and make a difference,” McGinty has said, describing marketing as “an absolute growth engine for the business.”

Part of the fix is surprisingly simple: Jollyes is rebranding its storefronts from “Jollyes, the pet people” to “Jollyes Pets,” a direct and clear name that tells shoppers exactly what they’ll find when they walk through the door. It’s a small change with a big strategic intention, because clarity builds awareness, and awareness builds market share.

Building the Marketing Growth Engine

McGinty’s approach to growth is built on a few interconnected pillars, and it reflects exactly what modern retail marketing needs to achieve in order to cut through in a competitive landscape:

• Going all-in on social: Jollyes already maintains a social presence, but McGinty wants the brand “all over social,” with serious attention paid to platforms like TikTok Shop, where he sees customers having “one-to-one conversations with brands.”​
• Physical stores as the heartbeat: Despite the digital push, McGinty is clear that shops are “the heart of the brand” and that digital should “amplify the strength of the stores” rather than replace them. The goal is a seamless experience as customers move between online browsing and in-store buying.​
• Local footfall, frictionless digital: Marketing is focused on “driving footfall locally, while using digital to remove the friction and add value,” McGinty explains. These aren’t competing strategies — they’re the same strategy working in parallel.​
• Data-driven effectiveness: McGinty is working closely with Jollyes’ internal data science team to measure every pound spent, noting the business is “more set up from a marketing effectiveness point of view than many businesses” due to its tight focus on EBITDA-level growth.

The ‘Value Specialist’ Positioning And Why It Matters Now

The linchpin of Jollyes’ brand strategy is its commitment to being the UK’s only specialist pet discounter. In January 2025, the retailer lowered more than 3,000 prices, previously available only to loyalty cardholders, to all shoppers, covering over two-thirds of its 4,500 core product lines.

Then in February 2026, Jollyes went further by launching Simply Jollyes, billed as the lowest-priced own-label pet range in the UK, covering essential food and accessories designed to help households care for their pets without financial strain. CEO Adam Dury put it plainly: 

“Shopping at a specialist pet retailer doesn’t have to come with a premium — customers can care for their pets on the tightest of budgets.”

This matters because the UK pet care market is under real pressure from cost-of-living challenges. Jollyes is betting that being both a specialist and a discounter, offering quality and affordability under one roof, fills a gap that neither budget supermarkets nor premium pet chains can credibly occupy. For businesses looking to carve out their own defensible niche, it’s a textbook example of strategic positioning done right. Marketeller helps brands develop exactly this kind of differentiated identity through targeted creative marketing and brand strategy.

What Challenger Brands Can Learn from Jollyes

Jollyes’ playbook is relevant well beyond pet retail. Any challenger brand operating in a crowded market can take notes:

• Low awareness isn’t a failure, it’s an opportunity: Jollyes built a strong physical presence before investing heavily in brand awareness. McGinty is now unlocking that latent equity with sharp, focused marketing.​
• Value positioning is a genuine competitive moat: Offering quality at accessible prices, backed by specialist knowledge, builds trust across multiple customer segments and not just budget shoppers.​
• Digital amplifies physical, not the other way around: In an era of online-first thinking, Jollyes is a reminder that stores still drive brand love, and that digital works best when it supports the in-store experience.​
• Hire marketing leaders who’ve done it before: McGinty’s pedigree at Aldi, a brand that turned value into a cult identity, is not accidental. Leadership with proven challenger experience accelerates growth.

The Road Ahead for Jollyes

Backed by TDR Capital, also the private equity backer of Asda, Jollyes is well-funded for its next chapter. With over 100 stores, more than 1,200 employees, and a freshly sharpened brand identity, the pieces are firmly in place. The question now is execution, and with McGinty at the marketing helm, armed with data, digital ambition, and an unapologetic challenger spirit, the brand looks ready to grow its 15% awareness into something the competition genuinely has to reckon with.

Businesses watching from the sidelines should take note: strategic marketing leadership, a clear value proposition, and a seamless omnichannel presence aren’t just advantages in pet retail; they’re the new table stakes for growth in any competitive market. If your brand is ready to build that kind of momentum, Marketeller’s marketing services are built to help you get there.

The post Jollyes Pets: Unleashing an ‘Unapologetic’ Marketing Mission to Conquer the Pet Retail Market appeared first on Marketeller.

The big shift: from posts to places

Style Crew includes over 600 creators, and Macy’s has been actively expanding how those creators show up across the customer journey, not just on Instagram or TikTok.​

For the 2025 holiday season, Macy’s tested direct mailers featuring Style Crew picks and a QR code that recipients could scan to view more creator content, showing there’s appetite for creator curation in offline formats too.​

What “offline creators” looks like

Macy’s also tested bringing Style Crew “storefronts” into physical stores via pop-ups in three cities (Dallas, Miami, New York), each tied to a creator and a distinct focus (family picks, holiday style, beauty).​

The brand framed these IRL tests as a way to reach both existing fans and regular shoppers who happen to be in-store, while also resonating with the 30–45 segment they’re prioritizing with in-store experiences.​

Why this is an omnichannel win

This approach blends affiliate marketing’s measurable outcomes with influencer marketing’s trust and storytelling, which Macy’s notes are increasingly overlapping in practice.​

It also turns “creator content” into owned-channel assets (mail, stores, QR-driven experiences), helping Macy’s show consistent curation across multiple touchpoints instead of relying on fleeting scroll-by impressions.​

What businesses can copy (without Macy’s budget)

• Build creator campaigns that travel: one styling concept can become short-form video, an email module, a printed mail piece, and an in-store event presence.​
• Make offline shoppable: use QR codes to connect print or events to creator storefronts/content so attribution doesn’t disappear in the physical world.​
• Treat creators like partners: Macy’s emphasizes community engagement and not only sales, which helps affiliate programs stay authentic and sustainable.​

Creator-led styling events, QR-enabled postcards, and creator-driven product “edits” can work well for retail, salons, fitness studios, restaurants, and service brands when the creative and tracking are planned together; Marketeller can help package that into an integrated campaign that includes content creation, design/print, and digital marketing execution.

The post Macy’s Style Crew: How the Retail Giant is Flexing Influencer Power Beyond the Screen appeared first on Marketeller.

Hey marketers! Get ready to take notes because Home Depot, your go-to for all things home improvement, is making a huge splash in the influencer world. They’ve just launched a brand-new ‘creator portal’ – a fancy term for a platform designed to connect directly with content creators and influencers. This move isn’t just about pretty pictures; it’s a strategic play to reach more customers and build stronger connections.

What’s a Creator Portal and Why Does it Matter?

Imagine a special online hub where people who love making home improvement content – think DIY gurus, interior design experts, and gardening pros – can easily team up with Home Depot. That’s essentially what a creator portal is. It’s a dedicated space for influencers to discover partnership opportunities, get access to resources, and collaborate with the brand.

For Home Depot, this means a more organized and efficient way to work with hundreds, even thousands, of influencers. Instead of individually reaching out or relying solely on agencies, they’re creating a direct line. This approach is a cornerstone of modern influencer marketing, allowing brands to scale their efforts and foster authentic relationships with creators.

The World Cup Play: Kicking Off with a Bang

To make sure their new portal gets noticed, Home Depot isn’t just quietly launching it. They’re making a big statement by highlighting creators who are also tied to the World Cup. This is a brilliant marketing strategy to capture immediate attention and generate buzz. By linking their launch to a major global event, they’re tapping into a massive audience that might not typically think about home improvement during a soccer tournament.

Cross-Promotion Power: This strategy allows them to leverage the excitement and reach of a global sporting event, bringing a fresh perspective to home improvement content.
Broader Appeal: It shows Home Depot isn’t just for contractors or seasoned DIYers; they’re connecting with a diverse audience through relevant cultural moments.
Initial Momentum: Tying into the World Cup creates immediate conversation and media interest, giving the portal a strong start.

This move demonstrates smart content marketing and strategic brand partnerships, showing how a brand can creatively launch a new initiative by riding the wave of existing public interest.

Analyzing Home Depot’s Marketing Strategy

Home Depot’s creator portal isn’t just a shiny new toy; it’s a well-thought-out expansion of their digital marketing and SEO strategy. Here’s why it’s a big deal:

1. Authenticity and Trust: People trust recommendations from creators they follow more than traditional ads. By working with genuine home improvement enthusiasts, Home Depot can showcase its products in real-world, relatable scenarios. This builds trust and makes their products seem more accessible and effective.
2. Scalable Content Creation: The portal enables Home Depot to generate a massive amount of diverse, high-quality content. Instead of producing all content in-house, they empower a community of creators to do it for them, reaching different niches and demographics.
3. Enhanced SEO and Online Presence: Every piece of content created by an influencer – whether it’s a blog post, a YouTube video, or an Instagram reel – acts as another touchpoint for Home Depot online. This drives traffic back to their site, improves their search engine rankings, and boosts their overall social media presence.
4. Community Building: Beyond just marketing, this platform fosters a community around home improvement. It connects creators with each other and with Home Depot, creating a valuable ecosystem for ideas and inspiration.
5. Data-Driven Insights: A dedicated portal can help Home Depot track performance, identify top-performing creators, and understand what types of content resonate best with their audience. This data is crucial for refining future marketing campaigns.

What This Means for the Marketing Industry

Home Depot’s move highlights a growing trend: the creator economy is booming, and brands are finding more sophisticated ways to engage with it. This isn’t just for fashion or beauty brands anymore; even established retailers in seemingly traditional industries like home improvement are leveraging influencer power.

It’s a clear signal that if you’re not thinking about how to integrate influencer and content creators into your marketing mix, you might be falling behind. Brands need to think beyond simple sponsored posts and consider building dedicated ecosystems for creators to thrive within their brand’s sphere.

The Takeaway

Home Depot’s new creator portal is a smart, forward-thinking move that solidifies their position in the digital landscape. By strategically linking with World Cup creators and providing a dedicated platform for home improvement influencers, they are setting a new standard for how large retailers can effectively engage with the creator economy, driving authenticity, reach, and ultimately, sales.

This initiative underscores the power of genuine content and strategic partnerships in today’s fast-evolving marketing world. It’s a win-win: creators get new opportunities, and Home Depot gains a powerful channel for connecting with consumers in a more relatable way. Keep an eye on this space; other brands are sure to follow suit!

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The AI Tsunami: Reshaping Agencies at Lightning Speed

There’s no denying it: AI in marketing is here, and it’s moving fast. Reports from major research leaders like McKinsey’s AI insights hub and the Marketing AI Institute’s State of Marketing AI report show that agencies are rapidly adopting AI tools to speed up work, improve efficiency, and help teams spend less time on repetitive tasks.

This rapid digital transformation doesn’t only mean “robots taking over.” It’s more about people working with AI. And when that happens, what humans do best becomes even more valuable.

The Future of Marketing: It’s All About Being Human

If AI can write ad copy, analyze data, and generate visuals, what’s left for people? A lot.

AI can process patterns, but it can’t truly understand emotions, cultural nuance, or why something will feel “off” to a real audience. That’s why human judgment still matters so much—especially when brands are trying to build trust, stay authentic, and avoid mistakes that could damage their reputation.

A helpful breakdown of this idea is explained in Harvard Professional & Executive Education’s piece on AI and the future of marketing, which highlights how AI supports the work, but human skills help create real meaning and differentiation.

Top Marketing Skills for 2026 and Beyond

Here are the human strengths that will matter more—not less—in an AI-heavy marketing world:

• Creativity and innovation: AI can remix and generate variations, but humans create truly original concepts, fresh brand worlds, and new angles that cut through noise.
• Emotional intelligence and empathy: Understanding people, reading the room, and communicating with care is still a human advantage—especially in sensitive cultural moments.
• Strategic thinking and problem-solving: AI can suggest options, but humans set direction, make tradeoffs, and decide what matters most for the brand long-term.
• Ethical AI use and critical thinking: Humans must spot bias, check accuracy, and ensure the work matches brand values and legal standards.

The Marketing Strategy: Invest in People, Not Just Programs

For agencies, the message is clear: yes, invest in strong AI tools—but don’t stop there. The real advantage comes from building teams that think creatively, understand people, and can lead strategy with confidence.

The agencies that win in 2026 won’t be the ones using AI the most. They’ll be the ones using AI well, with human judgment guiding every step.

The post Beyond the Bots: Why Human Skills Are Your Agency’s Gold in an AI World appeared first on Marketeller.

The Shifting Lanes of Motorsport Marketing

For decades, NASCAR symbolized high-speed thrills and embodied Americana in the racing world. However, the global motorsport scene has radically evolved. The meteoric rise of Formula 1, significantly driven by innovative marketing and hit series like Netflix’s Drive to Survive, has attracted a diverse new generation of fans. This transformative shift presents NASCAR with both a challenge and an opportunity: to transcend being “just about racing” and embrace storytelling and lifestyle marketing that resonate across different demographics.

NASCAR’s Strategic Pit Stop: Rekindling the Flame

NASCAR’s collaboration with 72andSunny marks a forward-thinking marketing strategy, centered on reigniting its historic roots while modernizing its appeal. The campaign’s core message—rekindling the “rebellious American spirit”—touches on deep themes of ingenuity, grit, and individualism that have long defined the sport. This brand revitalization goes beyond surface changes, delving into NASCAR’s unique identity to engage longtime fans and draw in fresh audiences.

Key Aspects of This Marketing Playbook:

• Tapping into Core Identity: The “rebellious American spirit” highlights NASCAR’s distinct heritage of raw competition and rugged charm, setting it apart from more corporate, international racing leagues.
• Strategic Agency Partnership: Teaming with 72andSunny, known for culturally resonant campaigns with Adidas, Call of Duty, and Google, signals NASCAR’s commitment to authentic storytelling and high-impact engagement. The agency’s Los Angeles office will lead the creative efforts, covering brand design, digital, social, and major tentpole events.
• Modernizing Heritage: Rather than erasing history, NASCAR seeks to translate its essence of speed and Americana into a fresh narrative that embraces diversity and relevance for today’s audiences.

Why This Rebranding Matters for Marketers

NASCAR’s rebrand delivers vital lessons for the marketing world:

1. The Power of Authenticity: In an age inundated with digital clutter, authenticity stands out. NASCAR’s embrace of its authentic roots reminds brands that their history and values are unique assets.
2. Adapting to Market Dynamics: The rise of Formula 1 and other motorsports shows that brands must evolve or lose cultural relevance. NASCAR’s proactive rebranding underscores the importance of continuous market analysis and strategic responsiveness.
3. Storytelling in Sports Marketing: NASCAR’s partnership with 72andSunny highlights the essential role of compelling narratives in shaping fan engagement and expanding audience reach.
4. Balancing Tradition with Innovation: Legacy brands face the challenge of preserving heritage while embracing fresh strategies. NASCAR’s approach shows how to carefully navigate this balance to stay competitive and relevant.

Looking Ahead: The Race for Relevance

NASCAR’s collaboration with 72andSunny is more than a campaign; it’s a bold declaration of intent. As the sport sees momentum—such as its Cup Series broadcasts averaging 2.7 million viewers per minute and ticket sales growing 6% year-over-year—it aims to cement its place in American culture and the broader motorsport landscape. The first major campaign rollout is anticipated around the 2026 Daytona 500 in February, with drivers front and center and a focus on partnerships that bridge mainstream culture and new audiences.

Through authentic storytelling, modernized branding, and strategic partnerships, NASCAR seeks to reclaim its rebellious spirit and drive a fresh era of excitement—proving that even the most established brands can find new roads to relevance and renewed passion.

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