There’s a playfulness to Elya Akateva’s posters, and the way they bend the the flatness of digital type design; they burst expectations of what graphic design should look like. “Posters are my primary and beloved medium,” says Elya. “I treat them as containers for thought rather than announcements.” Challenging the authority of language through what some may call ‘low-brow’ digital typography, Elya’s posters become terrains of fascinating shapes that are defined by their digitality. Perfect angles, hard lines, computerised gradient and bevel effects are all used to inspire curiosity and humour. Letters and meanings are sometimes dissolved into an amusing, textureless languor – other times they mutate into a formidable physicality.
“I like structures that break and accidentally reassemble into something new and systems that glitch into poetry,” says Elya. In one poster, Elya incorporates a hilariously frank ‘Untitled’ text box, toying with the idea of the digital default, systematic fonts, automatic leading – Elya forces the viewer to recognise that she is always working from the starting point, smashing it and glueing it back together to create new bodies of forward-thinking graphic design. “In my work, letters are not neutral carriers of meaning but active participants,” says Elya. “I see language as a system that can be broken apart and reassembled – liberated from its original function.” From patchwork orgies of shapes, created from manipulated line and selection tools, to experimentations in minimalism and geometric mischief – Elya’s posters contain the thoughts of a well needed prankster.
If your brand doesn’t resonate on a deep level with your target audience, then pouring time and energy into aesthetics and clever messaging is a waste of resources.
Real brand power is based on your brand’s identity: knowing who you are as a company, and how your ideal customer experiences life in relation to your offering.
Search Engine Journal’s Editor-in-Chief Katie Morton sits down with Mordy Oberstein, founder of Unify Brand Marketing, to go deeper on how to build a brand with a solid foundation.
Watch the video or read the full transcript below.
Katie Morton: Hello, everybody. It is I, Katie Morton, Editor-in-Chief of Search Engine Journal, and I’m here today with Mordy Oberstein, who is the founder of Unify Brand Marketing.
So, Mordy, what are we going to talk about today?
Mordy Oberstein: Hi there, everybody. Last time we spoke about what brand marketing is fundamentally and how to approach it. Today, I’m gonna talk about how to actually develop a brand and run through that process.
We’re gonna try to be jargon-free about what brand development actually looks like and what the stages are, and how they should all flow one into the other.
Katie: That sounds great. OK, so what’s the first concept?
Mordy: OK, this is where I think brands get really messed up. If you feel like you’ve lost traction, like you don’t have direction or you’re all over the place – whatever it is – most problems come down to this issue, which is… (I’m not going to say the jargon word) but it comes down to: Who are you?
And this is where you’re doing therapy for your brand. You’re trying to figure out who you are in a real, deep way. Kind of what we talked about last time – about building some meaning for yourself. You need to think about: Who are you? Where do you want to be? How do you want to be seen? How are you seen? How do you want to be seen going forward?
This is the part where it gets a little bit scary. I’m going to ask you: What scares you? Because this is where brands kind of feel like, “Maybe we’re going to pigeonhole ourselves.” But you’re not.
I’m not going to use the identity word – wait, I said identity – used jargon. Darn it!
This is where you kind of feel like maybe we’re going to pigeonhole ourselves if we have too much of a pigeonhole kind of audience. Don’t. It’s scary, but you have to do it.
This is where brands get off the rails. You have to understand who you are in a real way, because who you are rolls right into who you’re for.
Mordy: If I was dating my wife back in the day and my wife didn’t like sports at all, I’d be like, “Oh, my wife’s not for me. I’m a sports nut,” which is not true. That’s not how dating actually works.
Knowing who you are rolls right into: Who are you for?
Once you know who you are, the next step is: Who’s actually interested in you? Who’s your core audience? And this is a direct outcome of who you are, which is why it’s important.
The next stage in brand development – once you know who you are and who you’re for (that doesn’t mean you have to be only for them, but they’re your core) – is what problems does that audience have?
And by problems, I don’t mean USPs (which I know is a jargon word, but I’m going to use it so we know what we’re talking about). I’m not talking about pain points.
I’m talking about: What’s going on in their lives as it generally relates to your product or service?
Let me give you an example: Minivans. Why do I always use minivans? If I was making minivans, I would want to know: What’s the context? What’s the life situation of the parent or guardian driving and schlepping these kids around? What’s happening in their lives around the product?
It’s not a pain point. It’s not a USP. It’s what’s happening in the life of your audience, as it relates to generally speaking about the product/service, whatever you do.
Now that you know that, the next step in brand development is: How do you fit those needs?
This is where your “USP stuff” kind of comes in. And by the way, everything here should align from who you are to your audience, to what their problems are, to how do you fit those needs (because you know who you are now, obviously)?
Mordy: Because of who you are, how do you now solve those problems that your audience or people or consumers are dealing with in their lives? Now, once you know that, stage five would be, how do you actually communicate that? Or rather, what’s important about that to communicate?
We now know who we are. We now know who we’re for. We now know what the problems and the life situation is of the people we’re for. And we know how we solve and deal with those situations with who we are as a product, as a service, as an offering.
What’s important to tell the audience about who we are and how we solve their problems?
Don’t try to refine it here. Don’t try to have it snappy and snippy. Nothing catchy. No taglines. Just what’s important conceptually as a framework to communicate to your audience.
What’s conceptually important – what should the audience understand?
And the last step is to refine that. It’s not going to come in one shot. It’ll take multiple iterations to do it. It’s not going to be perfect, and you’ll never be 100% happy with it. It’s better that it’s honest and genuine than it is perfect.
If we want to zoom out and use the jargon, we just ran through:
Katie: I like it.
Mordy: No jargon, I almost got through it!
Katie: I think it speaks to our audience to use a little bit of jargon in there. And speaking of that, I’m sure a lot of people you talk to and a lot of people in the Search Engine Journal universe are SaaS, software as a service.
I like the minivan example because it’s easy to wrap your head around. It’s an obvious life circumstance. You just say that word ‘minivan’ and it’s giving you a picture of being married with a bunch of kids, driving them around. You say one word, and it paints this whole picture. With SaaS, it’s so different.
And what would it be like, as a thought exercise to go through this, if you invent a software that’s a rabbit food feeding timer?
Mordy: Okay. A set that feeds your rabbit on a timer.
Katie: Something that’s life-oriented, right? Like, think about our universe, which is really kind of abstract, right? In terms of people’s day-to-day. And they’re really using software, probably in a professional sense, and probably not in their home life for the most part, let’s say like a marketing software or, you know, ads like PPC.
Mordy: I consult for a marketing software, so I’m not going to use a marketing software because I’m biased. Let’s say I use like a video editor tool – does that work?
Katie: Yeah, that works.
Mordy: All right, cool.
Mordy: First of all, the most important thing is where I think brands get everything wrong. It’s not like one stage, and you go from stage one, which is brand identity to messaging refinement, which is, what, stage six?
Don’t think of it as a line. I did one, and now I go to the next one, then I go to the next one. Think of it like you’re stacking a building. You’re building a building.
The foundation is a brand identity, and then you build the next floor, the next floor, the next – and the top floor, the roof is the refinement that everybody can see from the helicopter.
But they’re not—if you imagine they’re in a helicopter looking down on this roof – they can’t see all of the other layers, but you can. And you have to start with brand identity.
And this – particularly for a SaaS tool – because SaaS, it’s really easy to get stuck in being a utility. “We’re just a utility.”
The problem with being a utility is that there’s no actual connection. And as soon as somebody else finds another utility that’s better, cheaper, or whatever, they’ll move. There’s no loyalty, which is literally what I did… I used another tool. I found it a little bit cumbersome. The pricing wasn’t super clear, so I moved to this one.
Now, I don’t love this one, by the way. If something else came along, I would totally move to the other one.
There’s no identity. I don’t know what separates CapCut from the other one I was using.
I don’t use Camtasia anymore only because I have an old license. I don’t want to pay for a new one. So if I’m going to pay for a new one, I find it a little bit cumbersome.
I have no actual loyalty to any of these platforms because I don’t know who they are and what makes them different.
You know why I don’t know who they are and what makes them different? Because they don’t know who they are.
Katie: If they worked on connecting with you as a brand and developed that emotional bond, you’d be more likely to stick with them, even if something better came out, a better feature.
Mordy: Because it’d be more for me. Right. They have to ask themselves – and I can’t do this for them – I don’t even know anything about it other than the tool. Someone recommended it to me and I use it.
They have to figure out: Why are you doing this? Why do you want to do this outside of making money? Why do you find this meaningful?
“Oh, because…” Let’s just say, “Because we help. Because we are into the idea of being able to do X, Y, and Z.”
Oh, okay, CapCut. Let’s just say their big thing is (because I use this part of their tool, so I like it—they automatically remove my background and put a new one):
“We’re all about people who don’t have a professional setup feeling like they have a professional setup.”
That’s just really important because we see the value in that. “We want to democratize video content,” etc. That would be an actual brand identity.
So now I know who I’m for. I’m not for a professional. I’m a big brand, I have a whole studio, I’m Coca-Cola, I have a whole in-house studio on site. [I’m not for them.] I’m for this audience.
Now, what are their problems, and what’s going on with them, and what’s happening with them?
Now it’s kind of easier to see.
“I really want to create professional-level content, but I don’t have the skills to do it.” I’m also not an idiot, either. So I kind of know what it’s supposed to look like. I kind of know what it’s supposed to be. I don’t have the time. I don’t have the technical know-how. I don’t want to pay anybody to do it.
These are my problems. How do you come in and solve that?
Katie: So it’s like the entire market proposition is tied into that.
Mordy: But they only realize to talk to me about my problems, and how they solve my problems, once they figure out who they were first.
But everybody skips that step. Everyone goes right to the roof—because that’s the only thing you can see.
Katie: That’s fascinating, Mordy. Brick by brick – you’ve got to stack it up before you get to the helicopter view.
Mordy: Gotcha. It’ll all come crumbling down at a certain point. The messaging won’t work. It’ll all fall apart. That sounds really doomsday-ish.
Katie: It does. But I do think that I will be checking out CapCut’s branding – to see what are they doing over there?
All I know is their little logo that I see frequently at the end of some of my favorite creators.
Mordy: So that’s good branding. It’s not great branding, but better than nothing.
Katie: Exactly. Better than nothing.
Well, Mordy, this has been very enlightening, and I want to thank you for coming on and sharing with me today.
What’s next?
Mordy: I was going to shout “brand!” from the rooftops. That was so like a dad joke.
Next time, we’re going to dive deeper into Stage One, which is building brand identity, and what that actually looks like, and how you do it.
Katie: That’d be fantastic. All right, everybody, thanks for joining us. And check us out: searchenginejournal.com.
Mordy, what’s your website?…
Mordy: Oh, I should know this – good branding! unifybrandmarketing.com.
Katie: Awesome. All right. See you next time, everybody.
Katie & Mordy: Bye!
More Resources:
Featured Image: Paulo Bobita/Search Engine Journal
Digiday covers the latest from marketing and media at the annual Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity. More from the series →
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts • Spotify
Amid the AI hype, increasingly fragmented media marketplace and economic headwinds, marketers this year came to the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity looking for answers.
For Carly Carson, PMG’s head of integrated media, this year’s festival served as a temperature check for an industry in flux. As the book closes on another Cannes Lions, Carson has pocketed three takeaways.
Tune into the full episode for more from Carson on how PMG is navigating the industry’s shifting tides and what Cannes talking points mean for the second half of the year’s ad dollars.
https://digiday.com/?p=581432
The Moonlighter 2: The Endless Vault is making ‘the shopkeeper’ the heart and soul of this fantastical video game. The classic gaming character trope is lifting the counter lid and leaving the store, and it’s looking quite wonderful.
When it comes to video game NPCs, the most memorable is surely the merchant who’s always conveniently around to hawk you new wares to help you on your adventure. They come in all manner of guises, from the stylish ones whose bonds you can also grow in Persona 5 to the shopkeepers in Spelunky, who can be just as deadly if you try to rip them off. 2018’s Moonlighter, however, went with the premise of, what if in this classic Zelda-style adventure, you actually played as the shopkeeper?
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Paid media offers one of the fastest ways to promote a business event and get the right people to take action.
Event campaigns are not just regular ads with a date added. They need a dedicated strategy, setup, budget, and audience targeting to succeed.
From webinars and product launches to open houses and local promotions, you’ll get better results by treating your event like a stand-alone campaign.
Here’s how to approach it with paid search and social ads that drive participation.
Here are common examples of business events that can benefit from paid ad promotion:
For an “event,” we generally look for a special, notable activity outside of normal business, with a limited time for engagement.
Each event should have its own dedicated campaign. This gives you more control over:
Don’t try to squeeze event ads into your evergreen campaigns. Keep it separate so you can measure impact clearly.
A separate budget prevents your main campaigns from losing momentum. Even a small spend focused on urgency and high-intent audiences can produce a strong ROI.
Add event details directly into your ad copy, such as headlines or descriptions in responsive search ads (RSAs), and use the pinning feature to lock critical details into place.
For higher control, create an entirely new custom ad built specifically around the event message.
Use promotion assets in Google Ads for sales-driven events that include a discount or monetary offer.
Double-check each platform’s documentation to confirm which features are available and how they are currently labeled.
Screenshot by author, June 2025
After creating a new campaign for your event and allocating its budget, there are several other factors to consider when promoting events.
Event ads need clear details upfront:
Use direct headlines and don’t leave room for interpretation. Test countdown timers (Google) in your ad copy to build urgency.
Check out Microsoft Ads, which has a great explanation on how the countdown feature works.
If you’re offering discounts or early-bird pricing, clearly state it in both the headline and description.
Below is the Google Ads example of setting this up in a headline and steps to implement.
Screenshot by author, May 2025
The timeline for event promotion is mission-critical. Some events only require a few days of promotion, while others may need weeks or months of preparation.
Plan around three phases:
Also, confirm your ad platform’s scheduling limits. Google ends ads at 11:59 p.m. of the advertiser’s time zone. Some let you choose a specific time (in 24-hour format).
The location targeting will be largely determined by the event’s real, physical location, but there are a few things to consider.
Depending on the density of the customer base, location targeting will vary for each advertiser. Match the event’s scale to your location settings:
For example:
With national targeting, you may want to prioritize budget allocation to major metro areas. Another approach is to review your customer purchase data for trends in revenue or return on investment (ROI) by location.
Your existing keyword list or audience segments may not apply to an event. Build targeting around:
You don’t need to be directly involved in the event to benefit from event-driven ad traffic. You can also capitalize on events related to your business to gain extra exposure.
For example, if a local wedding expo is happening in your area, a florist or event planner can run campaigns targeting attendees who are searching for event services during the show.
This strategy works for:
Set up a parallel campaign with relevant offers or content that aligns with the audience’s mindset during the event.
Event campaigns deserve more than a last-minute or a generic ad slot.
With a strategic approach, they can build brand awareness, generate leads, and leave a lasting impression.
By setting up a dedicated campaign, writing clear and timely messaging, and using specific targeting, you’re setting the stage for better results.
Even if you’re not hosting the event, there are still ways to show up and be seen.
Put your event in the spotlight. When you run it like a pro with paid media, the results speak for themselves.
More resources:
Featured Image: PeopleImages.com – Yuri A/Shutterstock
Serena Williams shed new light Thursday on the forthcoming podcast she’s co-hosting with her sister Venus, which debuts in August on X.
Speaking at Stagwell’s Sport Beach during Cannes Lions, Williams discussed the personal motivations behind the show, which was announced in June, and previewed the show’s tone and topics.
“When Venus and I were playing tennis, social media was different,” she told Linda Yaccarino, the chief executive of X, during the panel. “People didn’t get to know us—now we have the opportunity to do that.”
She said the show would be more open and cover topics like Black maternal health, women’s sports, business, and motherhood.
A longtime investor and founder of a venture firm, Williams said the podcast will spotlight female entrepreneurs and disruptors in sports and culture.
She cited Jeanie Buss’ $10 billion sale of the Los Angeles Lakers as a perfect example of a subject matter that she would like to have explored on the show. She also stressed that the show would center its conversations on positivity, partly in response to criticism Williams faced during her career.
“When you’re a female entrepreneur, you work harder because you get fewer opportunities and so many no’s,” Williams said. “I feel like my whole life I’ve been going against the grain.”
The show will premiere on X before expanding to other audio platforms, and will feature interviews with “visionaries, creators, and rulebreakers,” according to an earlier press release.
Produced by Serena’s Nine Two Six Productions, the podcast joins a growing slate of original content on the platform, including shows from Khloé Kardashian and live WNBA games.
Notably, the launch marks the second time in recent months that a member of Serena’s household has struck a distribution deal with X.
Her husband, Alexis Ohanian, co-produced The Offseason, a docuseries on NWSL players, which premiered on X after traditional streamers passed due to creative control concerns.
Ohanian declined to share commercial details during ADWEEK’s Brandweek event in September. He pointed to Yaccarino’s tenure at NBCUniversal, where she led ad sales—including at marquee franchises like the Olympics—as a key reason for the decision.
As a distribution partner, X offers several key advantages. It has massive scale, reaching roughly 600 million monthly users, and—unlike many of the subscription-based streaming services—viewers can access it for free.
Still, the social network has had missteps on this front before. Former CNN anchor Don Lemon sued X in August, arguing that billionaire owner Elon Musk refused to pay him after a content deal with the social media platform fell apart.
And while Musk has expressed his aspiration for X to host more original video programming, the network has yet to produce a signature series. The second season of The Offseason will not stream exclusively on X, Ohanian said at the time.
Williams did not mention the overlap during the panel. Instead, when elaborating on why she chose X as the host platform for the show, she pointed to its value as a platform for uninhibited expression.
Williams also has a substantial following on X, with more than 10 million followers.
“It’s a place where you can be real and get feedback on your thoughts,” she told Yaccarino.
The brand’s distinctive asset is “binds”, strips of their bespoke typeface distorted to appear like ropes or leather, adding a subtly erotic edge to the campaign without nudity. The ability to suggest and entice is key in WMH&I’s arsenal of text based playfulness. “The ‘binds’ are a visual representation of Jane Grey’s psychological control,” says Mark. “Always taut, the binds emanate directly from Jane when present in the scene or act as her omnipresent control when she’s just off camera.” Aiming to disarm an audience of willing “subs”, this text-based experimentation dabbles in the dark arts of mind tricks and manipulation.
WMH&I investigated the interests of sexually submissive men when figuring out the brand identity for Jane Grey. Thanks to extensive psychological research into the minds of submissive males and the practitioners of BDSM, WMH&I could confidently traverse their desires, wishes and lust in order to create a brand identity that spoke to them rather than merely advertising sadomasochism. “Finding the tension in their attitudes led us to our audience’s insight; the Jane Grey sub seeks submission not as humiliation, but as self actualisation,” says Daisy. “They are worthy and confident enough to explore their truest desires, they just need a little nudge from someone like Jane.” The typeface itself carries an air of confidence with sharp edges and sleek line work, but more importantly – the typography intimately interacts with their campaign’s professionally photographed scenes of shibari, wax play and branding (literally, through the use of tattoos).
“In terms of advantage, all of our work is audience centric, if we were just creating beautiful designs we would be a team of artists not creatives,” says Daisy. Through the art of brand identities, WMH&I offer audiences not just a place of belonging, but introspection and character-building – using “taboo” subjects and shattering preconceived notions. After all, in today’s landscape of erotic media making a comeback, there may be no better time to flirt with the possibilities of raunchy typeface.
TikTok will remain operational in the U.S. through September 17, as negotiations over a potential ownership deal continue.
President Donald Trump issued a third executive order delaying enforcement of the TikTok ban, giving the Chinese-owned platform another 90 days to operate in the U.S.
The move was confirmed in a White House briefing and TikTok’s official statement.
The extension allows continued access while the administration attempts to broker a U.S.-based ownership deal.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed that the extension is meant to keep TikTok operational during negotiations.
Leavitt said:
“He’s making an extension so we can get this deal done. He also wants to protect Americans’ data and privacy… and he believes we can do both at the same time.”
Trump announced the order on Truth Social, continuing his pattern of last-minute executive actions.
TikTok briefly went offline in January when the congressional ban first took effect, but was reinstated.
This marks the third extension since the ban was passed by Congress. The second came in April when a deal seemed near, until China withdrew support following Trump’s tariff announcement.
By pausing enforcement, the order enables platform distributors and infrastructure providers to continue working with TikTok during negotiations.
TikTok acknowledged the extension with thanks:
“We are grateful for President Trump’s leadership and support… as we continue to work with Vice President Vance’s Office.”
Support for a TikTok ban is softening. According to Pew Research data:
TikTok’s ongoing availability gives marketers continued access to its audience.
Still, uncertainty persists. Marketers using TikTok should:
TikTok’s situation remains fluid, but the platform’s growth and political momentum suggest a negotiated outcome is likely, rather than an abrupt shutdown.
Featured Image: Charles-McClintock Wilson/Shutterstock
Marketers, and B2B marketers in particular, often face criticism for focusing on vanity metrics. Vanity metrics are numbers that are easily measurable and look good on paper but don’t directly correlate to business outcomes or provide actionable insights.
Let’s take a closer look at seven common vanity metrics, why they’re considered weak and what you can use to replace them.
Why it’s weak: More traffic sounds good, but it doesn’t tell you if the visitors are the right people, engaged or moving toward a conversion. Irrelevant traffic is, well, irrelevant.
Why it’s stronger: Conversion metrics tell you what percentage of your website visitors are completing a desired action (e.g., filling out a form, downloading a resource, requesting a demo). You can identify which channels deliver high-quality, converting visitors by segmenting conversion by traffic source (organic search, paid ads, social media, referral).
Where to find conversion data: Google Analytics or other website analytics platforms. You’ll need to set up goals or conversions within these platforms.
Why it’s weak: A large follower count doesn’t necessarily translate to brand advocacy, engagement or sales. Many followers can be inactive, bots or simply not your target audience. “Likes” are a low-effort interaction and don’t indicate genuine interest.
Why they’re stronger: This metric focuses on how many leads or actual customers your social media efforts generate. For B2B, this might involve tracking form submissions from social ads, website visits from social media that lead to a demo request or downloads of gated content shared on social platforms.
Where to find them: Native social media analytics platforms (e.g., LinkedIn Analytics, X Analytics, Facebook Business Suite), Google Analytics (using proper UTM tagging for social campaigns), CRM systems (integrating social lead forms).
Why it’s weak: A high open rate might seem positive, but it doesn’t guarantee engagement with the content or action. Many email servers and clients auto-open emails for security reasons, and users might open an email and immediately close it without reading or clicking.
Why they’re stronger: CTR tells you your audience found your content compelling enough to click on a link in the email. Measuring the conversion rate from those clicks (e.g., lead magnet download, webinar registration, sales inquiry) directly ties your email efforts to business outcomes.
Where to find them: Email marketing platforms (e.g., HubSpot, Mailchimp, Salesforce Marketing Cloud).
Why it’s weak: The number of downloads doesn’t tell you if the content is read, if it’s resonating with the target audience or if it’s contributing to lead nurturing and sales. It tells you the content was downloaded, that’s all.
Why they’re stronger: This focuses on the quality of leads generated from your content. An MQL is a lead deemed ready for further marketing nurturing, and an SAL is an MQL that the sales team has accepted as worthy of its time. This indicates that the content is attracting genuinely interested prospects who fit your ideal customer profile.
Where to find it: CRM systems (e.g., Salesforce, HubSpot), Marketing Automation Platforms (e.g., Marketo, Pardot). These systems allow you to track a lead’s journey, including content downloads and subsequent actions that qualify them.
Why it’s weak: Generating a large volume of leads without proper qualification can overwhelm sales teams with low-quality prospects, wasting time and resources. Not all leads are created equal.
Why they’re stronger: These metrics measure the effectiveness of your lead generation efforts in producing actual sales opportunities and ultimately closed deals. The lead-to-opportunity rate shows how many of your generated leads progress to a sales opportunity, while the opportunity-to-win rate indicates how many of those opportunities become customers.
Where to find them: Your CRM system is essential for tracking the progression of leads through the sales pipeline.
Dig deeper: Build a winning marketing attribution framework
Why it’s weak: Impressions merely indicate how frequently your ad was displayed. It doesn’t tell you if anyone saw it, paid attention, or took action. It’s a measure of reach, not engagement or impact.
Why they’re stronger: CPA tells you the average cost of acquiring a new customer through your advertising efforts, directly linking your ad spend to business outcomes. ROAS measures the revenue generated for every dollar spent on advertising, providing a clear picture of profitability.
Where to find them: Ad platform analytics (e.g., Google Ads, LinkedIn Ads, Facebook Ads Manager), integrated with CRM and sales data to calculate actual customer acquisition and revenue.
Why they’re weak: While seemingly indicative of engagement, a long time on a site could mean a user is struggling to find information, or they left the tab open. Many pages visited could indicate a user is lost, not necessarily engaged.
Why they’re stronger: A high bounce rate on a critical landing page could suggest the content or messaging is failing to resonate with the audience, or the page isn’t guiding them to the next step. Tracking the completion rate of key user flows (e.g., visiting a product page –> adding to cart –> checkout) provides insight into how effectively your website is guiding users towards conversion.
Where to find them: Google Analytics, other website analytics platforms.
Dig deeper: A guide to attribution models in GA4
Game design and development is one of the most exciting fields in the creative sectors today, and it’s constantly evolving. Real-time development software like Unreal Engine and Unity are allowing developers to take visual fidelity to cinematic levels for consoles and PC, and there’s a booming market for innovative indie games for mobile.
It’s an area that increasingly involves crossover skills that are in demand in other disciplines too, since some of the same tech is also revolutionising movie VFX, animation and brand design. That makes one of the best tickets into the industry the National Film and Television School (NFTS). Widely recognised as one of the world’s best film schools, the NFTS also provides industry-standard programmes in game design, from short courses to a fully fledged Masters in Game Design and Development, whose alumni have gone on to work at major studios.
(Image credit: National Film and Television School)
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