We hope the articles we’re sharing this week keep your marketing mind sharp and give you the lift you need to make it through the rest of the week…

• Microsoft has officially followed Google’s lead in updating the way phrase match behaves. Back in February, Google announced that phrase match keywords would begin to pick up the same search queries as broad match modifier (BMM), and now Microsoft has announced they will be making the same updates. This will make it easier for advertisers to manage accounts across both engines, however it’s important to monitor performance as the change rolls out.
• With Apple’s new privacy changes on the recent iOS 14.​5, only 4% of users have allowed data collection from Facebook. Read more here.
• Joe Pulizzi, the founder of the Content Marketing Institute, has a guest blog in Search Engine Watch this week titled “Why killing your content marketing makes the most sense.” He’s not actually suggesting you kill all your content marketing programs. But he is advocating the most successful content strategies have a core group of channels that allow companies to better target their audience and deliver meaningful, actionable messaging. We agree that sometimes less can lead to more. Here’s Joe’s take.
• While we’re on this topic, KoMarketing conducted a survey earlier this year to gauge how B2B marketers were measuring performance of their content marketing strategies. No surprise–over 66% of the survey respondents feel it is moderately to extremely difficult to measure their content marketing performance. More surprising–website traffic is the 2nd highest evaluation metric at 46% (barely behind conversion rate at 50% of respondents). Worse, typical B2B calls-to-action of downloads/form completions were considered important metrics by only 27% of respondents. Sounds to us like some B2B marketers need to up their content game. What do you think?
• If SEO is still a new game for you, keyword mapping may seem like an intimidating process. Don’t worry, SEO professional, Aleyda Solis, has provided 2 cheat sheets for easy keyword mapping for e-commerce and software as a service (SaaS) websites.
• Fun article from Fast Company on logo colors and brands that are flipping conventional wisdom on its head. We think you’ll like this look at branding innovation.
• Is it your impression that most people post about their politics on social media? Well, according to new research from Pew Research, that’s not the case. Here’s the skinny.

Do Good Spotlight on: Christine’s Hope for Kids

We learned about this amazing organization through our friend and talented graphics designer Kim Waters.

Christine’s Hope for Kids was born of parents’ desire to carry on the passion of their daughter, Christine, who died during an earthquake in Haiti while she and her college classmates were helping the children there.

Christine had suffered from Tourette’s Syndrome and was bullied throughout her childhood. She vowed to make life easier for the next generation by educating people about the long-term effects of bullying and how to help kids help other kids work to stop bullying.

Her parents picked up her mission to carry her dreams forward by creating Christine’s Hope, and now they have published a book, Always Better Together (buy here) to help educate children about bullying, through a story written by Linda Martin and illustrated by Anita Barghigiani.

We love everything about this organization and were happy to make a donation to help them take their mission forward. You can learn more here.

Onward…

We hope this read sparked new ideas and a few donations to Christine’s Hope too. Have a great rest of the week and be sure to reach out if you want to ask questions, brainstorm, or just catch up!