Forwarded this email? Click here to get your weekly slice.

 

🪩 Volume 152 | September 16, 2026

 

WE'RE HEADED TO BOSTON. Sarah and I are getting on a plane first thing tomorrow morning to attend my personal favorite marketing conference: INBOUND (which is now officially UNBOUND (HubSpot rebranded the whole thing after 15 years, wild).

 

I have never left one of these conferences and NOT radically transformed something in my own business, or for our clients, for the better. I am a firm believer that "getting in the room" is the best growth mindset you can have in almost any business situation, and UNBOUND is no exception.

 

If you've been around for a while, you've seen my recaps, and I'll be posting them daily this week over on LinkedIn… maybe on Threads (let's see how motivated I am lol). But Funnel Cake-rs, YOU are getting the biggest and best deep dive of all next week when we're back—particularly in the audio format that Sarah and I will inevitably sit down to record. Look forward to what we've learned and what you can take with you to your own business growth endeavors.

 

HOORAY. 🍰

 

 

The Sydney Sweeney / Novig ad had me chuckling big time this week. And I wouldn't be shocked if you totally hated my opinion on first read… I just ask that you stay with me.

 

Setting the stage: Y Combinator sports-betting startup → peer-to-peer "prediction market" → $500M valuation → first-ever national ad → nudity/female empowerment discourse of the week.

 

I'm a marketer!!!!!!! Of coooooourse I'm not just going to have a surface-level opinion. If I had a surface-level opinion, I'd be over here saying: wow, how dare a woman put down women in sports in this manner.

 

As a marketer? Wake up, people. Novig's primary target audience… IS MEN. What do men like? PRETTY WOMEN. Who is Sydney Sweeney? Probably MOST Gen Z and Millennial men's #1 hall pass. YEAH I SAID IT.

 

And you know what else I say? I say that being polarizing in your campaign initiatives is brilliant, and you will ALMOST ALWAYS get haters out of it. There's a line, of course (cough… Frida Baby… cough). But I see nothing wrong with Novig's campaign here, and you know what—go Sydney. Get your bag.

 

The sexy ad and the strategy are doing TWO jobs at once, because if you actually listen to the spot, the entire hook is "just sports." They are NOT talking about betting on wars, deaths, or politics. Just you, and your take on sports. THIS is Novig drawing a hard line against the Kalshis and Polymarkets of the world (last valued around $11B and $9B) while a nearly-naked movie star holds a football over the messaging. Sex got you in the door. Positioning is what's waiting inside.

 

The "Just Sports" spot dropped Sept 9 and immediately did what polarizing work is supposed to do:

But give this a quick Google and you’ll mainly only see…. This:

 

Y’all, this is a company most people couldn't have named a week ago. Novig CEO Jacob Fortinsky told Front Office Sports the campaign was "the bulk of our marketing dollars" ahead of football season. They spent the budget on VINEGAR (metaphor here is “catching more bees with honey than vinegar.”)

 

Now, I already hear it. "But Lauren, only 4% of those posts were actually about the APP. Everyone was just talking about Sydney!" (Peak Metrics noticed that too, and it's a fair point!)

 

Cool. You know what 0% of people were doing two weeks ago? Talking about Novig AT ALL. You cannot convert attention you never captured. Awareness is step one, and they NAILED step one. Ask me if the "conversion" conversation even EXISTS without the ad that made you mad enough to click.

 

To be frank, I'm kind of over the criticism of most marketing campaigns. And I'll go there: I saw NOTHING wrong with her American Eagle campaign either. LIKE DO WE REALLLYYY THINK that everyone sat down in a boardroom and went "the 'great genes' pun carries historical undertones related to eugenics"? NO. Do we think maybe someone brought up that it might be the PERCEPTION of those who saw the campaign? I'm sure someone did. And I'm sure internally, it was defended and discussed, as told by American Eagle's own public statement on the matter.

 

Thanks (no thanks) to social media, widespread media, and the illness that is all of us being chronically online but behind a computer screen, it is EASY to have opinions. It is EASY to be swayed by other opinions when they match your own moral compass. It is also EASY to completely overlook the simple fact that there are brilliant marketers out there looking to reach their intended audiences—and, in moments like Novig's or American Eagle's, ruffle feathers with UNINTENDED AUDIENCES lol.

 

 

Playing it safe is sometimes the OPPOSITE of what you should do. Marketing and advertising is NOT a game of "catch more flies with honey than with vinegar." VINEGAR IS A NECESSARY COMPONENT OF GREAT MARKETING.

 

For your business: Where are YOU defaulting to honey when the moment actually calls for vinegar? Find the one place you've been playing it safe out of fear of the wrong audience being mad, and ask what the brave version looks like.

 

 

1. Duolingo won an Apple keynote with zero ad spend. I was DYINGGGG over Duolingo's social during the iPhone event. Quick context that makes it 10x funnier: Apple's new foldable is literally called the iPhone Duo—which, yes, is also the name of Duolingo's little green owl. So the second Apple announced it, Duo the owl had a full public meltdown: "oh god oh god my SEO my SEO." Then, when Samsung tried to rope them into a mock #Solidarity moment, Duolingo turned around and roasted Samsung too. The SEO panic is the joke, but the actual lesson is the flex: they hijacked the news cycle of a $1,999 Apple launch on pure reaction speed and a name coincidence. THAT is what real-time relevance looks like.

 

2. Speaking of the iPhone Duo—creators and brands are freaking TF out about "new website sizing," and it's sending me. The Duo folds like a passport and opens up to a 7.6-inch screen, which means every responsive-design person on earth now has a brand-new aspect ratio to wrestle with. This one feels like it caught me on hidden camera.

 

Also… anyone here actually planning on getting this thing? I'm still traumatized from my flip phones snapping in half back in the day, pre-iPhone. A folding $2,000 phone feels like a personal attack. Is the future… bendy? And are we ready? 🤔