Selfstorming Blog
Insights on advertising, creativity, marketing science and AI in Marketing.
AI slop is a context problem. Brief ZERO is the fix.
AI slop starts before the first word: a model with no brief writes the average of the internet. Brief ZERO is the brand context your AI reads first, so the output finally sounds like you.
Caution Is the Expensive Option: The Three Taxes on Safe Marketing
New Contagious x FleishmanHillard data on 1,000 marketing leaders: cautious brands get backlash at the same rate as bold ones (20% vs 21%), bold work waits 7 days for sign-off vs 3, and 85% of leaders admit delayed decisions beat imperfect ones. Safe work is the costly kind.
How 118 Cannes Winners Turn Threats into Growth
Contagious x FleishmanHillard analysed 118 Cannes Lions winners that turned live macro threats into brand growth: 92% brand-building, earned-first by design, 61% leading with information. The three hallmarks, three drivers and the diagnostic for your next post-mortem.
Runway Ads and Cheap Pixels: The Week Creative Margins Went Soft
A strategy-first breakdown of this week's AI updates from Runway, OpenAI, Anthropic, and Shopify. What automated ad creation and cheaper models mean for your brand equity.
AI slop is not bad content. It is expected content.
Two agency owners define AI slop as derivative content. Why that makes brands invisible, and the six habits they recommend instead.
Selfstorming Now Lives Inside Your AI. Bring Your Own Project.
Your AI already knows your project. Ask it for a campaign idea and it still gives you the average of the internet. The Selfstorming MCP connector plugs 1,800+ campaigns, 850+ sourced findings and our ideation engine into Claude, ChatGPT and your own skills and agents.
The Engagement Trap: Creator Metrics Point the Wrong Way Two-Thirds of the Time
Kantar analysed 15,000+ pieces of sponsored creator content: platform engagement and effectiveness align in only 1 in 3 cases, and just 6% of content is both highly engaging and strongly brand-building. Here is what to measure instead.
The CMO Title Is Shrinking. The Engineers Are Moving In.
Only 36% of the Fortune 500 still use the CMO title, down from 49% in a year. Brand matters more than ever, but it now lives in thousands of touchpoints. The marketing engineer won't automatically inherit the CMO seat - yet no CMO keeps it without understanding what the engineer can do.
Meta's Muse Surge and Google's Free Video, and What They Mean for Your Media Mix
A strategy-first breakdown of this week's AI updates from Meta, Google, YouTube, and ElevenLabs. What free video tools and agentic storytelling mean for your media budget.
Consumers Started Paying for AI. Here Is What That Changes for Marketers
Menlo Ventures' 2026 consumer AI report: paying flipped from 3% to 55% of users in a year, the top 14% of spenders carry 60% of a $40B market, and AI-labelled content takes a 2:1 engagement penalty. What to do about each.
Your AI campaign looks like a campaign. That is the problem.
Jack Conte's SXSW 2026 talk gives slop a definition that is 130 years old, counts the jobs every new medium cost, and asks the question AI-curious marketers keep skipping: what can this medium do that a camera cannot?
OpenAI enters its ad era, and what it means for brand discovery
A strategic breakdown of OpenAI's sponsored agents, Meta One, and ElevenLabs' new creative integrations. What these updates actually mean for your brand's media mix and production budget.
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