Weekly Marketing Rundown - December 13th, 2024

Weekly Marketing Rundown - May 2, 2025 Hi everyone! In this week's edition of Kavanah Media's Weekly Marketing Rundown we discuss weak Meta's potential breakup, Open Ai's new foray into social media, Government censorship on Bluesky and more. Enjoying the Weekly Marketing Rundown? Support our work and keep it free for missions teams worldwide: https://www.kavanahmedia.com/donatetoKM Government Censorship on Bluesky and Türkiye Bluesky, at the request of the Turkish government, has restricted 72 accounts on the platform. This development raises concerns about freedom of expression and the potential impact on user content. What this means for mission teams: This is a good reminder to always be prepared to shift strategies and highlights the importance of implementing cybersecurity measures. Government censorship could affect how you share your message and engage with your audience, making it important to stay informed and adapt your strategies accordingly. Kavanah Media Founder and CEO Jon Ralls discusses risk management in missions in a 3 part series of the Christian Media Marketing Podcast. Listen here. https://techcrunch.com/2025/04/23/government-censorship-comes-to-bluesky-but-not-its-third-party-apps-yet/ OpenAI Explores New Social Media Platform OpenAI is exploring the development of a new social media platform to rival X, following a $40 billion funding round. This move aims to create a competitive alternative in the tech industry, potentially reshaping the landscape of digital platforms. What this means for mission teams: This development is significant as it could offer new opportunities for outreach and engagement for missions teams to integrate into their digital strategies. https://www.marketingtechnews.net/news/openai-explores-platform-to-rival-x-following-40b-funding-round/ Meta Breakup Threat: What Marketers Need to Know Meta is facing a potential breakup due to antitrust concerns, which could lead to the separation of its major platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp. This situation raises questions about the future of digital advertising and the impact on marketers. What this means for mission teams: Changes in Meta's ownership of it's platforms could SIGNIFICANTLY affect digital engagement strategies and how teams use these platforms for outreach. https://www.marketingtechnews.net/news/meta-breakup-threat-what-marketers-need-to-know/ Meta Advantage+ Tools and Ad Performance In their latest update Meta claims that their Advantage+ AI ad tools are showing impressive results across various campaigns. AI-generated backgrounds have increased click-through rates (CTR) by 11%, and advertisers using Advantage+ earn $4.52 for every $1 spent, which is a 22% increase compared to standard campaigns. The new sales setup has reduced the cost per action by 9%, and opportunity score recommendations have cut the cost per result by 5%. What this means for mission teams: While most mission teams likely are not utilizing Meta's systems for sales ads Advantage+ ads and utilizing AI content tools could improve your results. Members of the Kavanah Media team have experimented with these AI tools and did see similar performance improvements and lower costs. It should be noted, however, that any targeting parameters advertisers set when using Advantage+ Audiences (i.e. age, gender, location) are merely suggestions and the algorithms can and will ignore them if it believes it can achieve your performance goals elsewhere. In these scenarios it is best to utilize Original Audience targeting. https://www.socialmediatoday.com/news/meta-advantage-plus-ads-overview-ai/746042/ Branding in Ads Manager: AI-Generated Text and Images Meta has rolled out another update to it's Branding tools under the Identity section of Ads Manager. Previously users could upload logos and select font and colors choices. However, now they can ad text tone and visual style. These selections help guide the AI content tools in ads manager. What this means for mission teams: These AI tools can significantly improve your content creation process. Meta claims they can lead to lower engagement costs and higher performance. It should be noted, however, that these tools - especially the text specific ones, do not always function well in languages other than English. Teams should experiment in their context before utilizing the new features. http://jonloomer.com/qvt/branding-in-ads-manager-ai-generated-text-and-images/ WhatsApp Adds AI Tools Without Sacrificing Privacy WhatsApp is rolling out a new feature called Private Processing, which allows users to use AI features like message summarization or editing suggestions—all without breaking the app’s end-to-end encryption promise. The messages will be processed in a secure environment where neither WhatsApp nor Meta can access the content, even as AI is applied. This move aims to balance privacy with the growing demand for helpful AI features, and Meta plans to open the system for feedback, bug bounties, and security audits. What this means for mission teams: This is a positive move for user privacy, especially as concerns grow about LLMs being trained on scraped user data. If Meta follows through with these features missions teams could feel safer when experimenting with WhatsApp's AI integrations in their digital strategies. https://therecord.media/whatsapp-in-app-tools-secret-messages Stay Equipped for Digital Engagement At Kavanah Media, we’re committed to helping mission teams use digital tools to make God known around the world. Whether you’re looking for inspiration, practical insights, or in-depth strategy, we’ve got resources to help: Intentional Newsletter – Be encouraged each month with stories of transformed lives, ministry milestones, and the latest updates from our team. Subscribe here. Kavanah Media Blog – Learn from our experiences serving hundreds of mission teams worldwide. We share practical lessons, real stories, and best practices to help your team avoid mistakes and grow in digital outreach. Subscribe here. Christian Media Marketing Podcast – Tune in for weekly deep dives with CEO Jon Ralls on everything from digital strategy to cybersecurity. Subscribe here or on your favorite podcast app. Digital Strategies got you stumped? Reach out anytime—we’re ready to help. Contact Us Thanks for reading this edition of Kavanah Media's Weekly Marketing Rundown! For more up-to-date insights in digital marketing, make sure to follow us on Instagram @kavanah_media and stay connected through all our social media channels via the link below. https://linktr.ee/kavanah_media Authors: Cody Adams and Cherry Messimer Article Published: May 2, 2025

Weekly Marketing Rundown - March 28, 2025 Hi everyone! In this week's edition of Kavanah Media's Weekly Marketing Rundown we discuss WhatsApp's security flaw, Meta's new branding tools for Ads Manager, important metrics for advertiser to monitor and more. Enjoying the Weekly Marketing Rundown? Support our work and keep it free for missions teams worldwide: https://www.kavanahmedia.com/donatetoKM WhatsApp Patches Critical Security Flaw WhatsApp has fixed a serious vulnerability that allowed hackers to install spyware on devices remotely. The flaw, which involved specially crafted video calls, could have exposed users to surveillance and data theft. Meta has urged all users to update their apps immediately to stay protected. https://www.techradar.com/pro/security/whatsapp-patches-security-flaw-which-let-hackers-install-spyware Facebook Stops Using Personal Data for Ad Targeting After Lawsuit A UK woman, Tanya O’Carroll, successfully sued Meta to stop Facebook from using her personal data for targeted ads. She argued that Meta’s advertising practices violated direct marketing laws under GDPR, allowing individuals to object to their data being used this way. The UK’s Information Commissioner’s Office supported her stance, disagreeing with Meta’s claim that its ads target groups, not individuals. For mission teams using Facebook ads, this case signals growing scrutiny over personalized advertising. It may lead to stronger privacy regulations and more user control over data, impacting how ads reach specific audiences. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c1en1yjv4dpo Meta Introduces Branding Definition in Ads Manager Meta is rolling out a feature allowing brands to define brand colors, fonts, and even upload logos. Previously, this was possible through Overlays, but the system was buggy and often did not function at all. For mission teams, this could make adding branding to ads a much more efficient process, potentially replacing burning logos onto creatives prior to uploading them into ads manager. https://www.jonloomer.com/define-branding-in-ads-manager/ Why Brand-Owned Communities Are the Future of Growth Some brands are shifting toward building their own online communities rather than relying solely on social media platforms. These owned communities allow direct engagement, better data control, and long-term customer loyalty without the risks of algorithm changes or platform policies. Companies are using forums, apps, and exclusive groups to nurture deeper connections. For mission teams, this highlights the importance of creating dedicated online spaces for seekers and disciples rather than relying only on social platforms. Private groups, websites, or apps could provide more stability, deeper engagement, and better discipleship pathways. It is worth some experimentation. https://martech.org/why-brand-owned-communities-are-the-future-of-growth/?utm_source=tldrmarketing   CPM, CTR, and CPC- What Metrics Are the Most Important? Metrics like cost per mille (1000 impression), click through rate, and cost per click are important metrics in digital marketing, but marketers should be careful to not ONLY focus on those metrics. It is very easy for these metrics to look good, but not reflect reality. In the world of sales, your most important stats are actual conversions, or sales. It is possible to have an incredibly high click through rate, for example, but have no sales. Even though mission teams may not have sales, they do have conversions such as messages, leads forms and more. It is a reminder that we need to look deeper when trying to determine if an ad was successful. If a team's goal is messages, and their ad has a high CTR or lower CPC, it still may not be considered successful if it brings no messages or all negative messages. Teams should look beyond their ads metrics to determine if an ad strategy or campaign is successful, and let that data drive adjustments. https://www.jonloomer.com/qvt/the-most-important-ads-metrics/ Intentional - Kavanah Media's Newsletter Subscribe to Intentional, Kavanah’s monthly newsletter, and stay inspired by stories of lives transformed, ministry milestones, and the latest business updates on how we’re intentionally leveraging digital platforms to make God known across the globe. Join us on this journey of purposeful digital engagement and global impact! For more on this, click the link below: https://www.kavanahmedia.com/sign-up  Christian Media Marketing Podcast Looking for more in depth information regarding all things digital engagement? Look no further than the Christian Media Marketing Podcast. For 5 years Kavanah Media CEO Jon Ralls has gone in depth on everything from websites to online messaging. Subscribe here ( https://www.kavanahmedia.com/podcast) or wherever you listen to your podcasts. Thanks for reading this edition of Kavanah Media's Weekly Marketing Rundown! For more up-to-date insights in digital marketing, make sure to follow us on Instagram @kavanah_media and stay connected through all our social media channels via the link below. https://linktr.ee/kavanah_media Authors: Cody Adams and Cherry Messimer Article Published: March 28, 2025