Today, a fizzy new member of the subscription class. And April Dunford of Ambient Strategy is here, as product positioning pro. Plus, Campfire Labs takes a deep dive into Drift’s conversational marketing approach. And we have the inside scoop from their team.

Your top subscription news

Grab a Coke and a smile (if you can)

Coca Cola just launched a subscription service for $10 per month. And the first 1,000 "insiders" will get an exclusive first taste of some 20-plus new beverages—giving us vibes of the ol' Arby’s subscription, with that exclusivity factor.

The Coca-Cola crew gave a limited number of fans a taste of 2020 with exclusive access to all-new beverages, some of which haven’t hit shelves yet. Because the Coke team is constantly looking for ways to innovate, not only in their products, but also in the consumer-centric experiences they offer. 

“People want choice, convenience, and customization. The Insiders Club will allow us to showcase the diversity of the drinks we offer and get some of our newest innovations into the hands of fans who want to be among the first to enjoy them.” - McCrea O’Haire, Digital Experiences Manager at Coca-Cola North America

And apparently, Coke just keeps on nailing it, with better than expected second quarter results and net revenues rising 6% during the quarter, and sales volume another 3%. 

Maybe we could all learn a thing or two from this classic brand going subscription. 

A productivity powerhouse

April Dunford, Founder and CEO of Ambient Strategy, tweeted out her talk from last year at Industry—a conference all about product. As a product positioning pro, she knows positioning can make or break a new product, yet it rarely gets the attention it deserves. In her talk, she outlines the positioning process that will spotlight your product’s best features. She also provides repositioning examples and shows the impact on the overall business that resulted from that shift in context. 

"I like to think of it this way: If everything the company does in marketing and sales is the house, positioning is the foundation upon which the house is built."

April is a powerhouse in product, so be sure to check out the full talk. Plus, in the coming weeks we’ll release her talk from our Recur conference—also a knowledge drop in how to make your market category work for you. 

"Positioning defines how our product is the best in the world at providing something that a well-defined set of customers cares a lot about."

Gather round the campfire for a lesson in content

The crew over at Campfire Labs drops an awesome piece on how Drift’s conversational marketing approach makes content marketing more human.

“When [former VP of Marketing] Dave Gerhardt took over marketing at Drift, he wanted to do things differently. He wanted to use real stories and real people to stand apart from the thousands of tech companies vying for attention. In other words, he wanted to build a brand that people could relate to.”

“Content is a commodity—everyone is doing it,” Gerhardt says. “The current model for content marketing is broken. We want to challenge it in everything we do.”

As a content marketing agency, the crew at Campfire Labs is always on the lookout for the highest quality of content—content which shapes brand identity, builds trust and loyalty, and elevates marketing and sales efforts across the board. So earlier this year, the team launched a series profiling content marketing that does just that. 

Luke Starbuck, GM at Campfire Labs, gives us the scoop from the inside. 

"For this particular article, we wanted to look at the concept of conversational marketing and how, really, that's made their content marketing more human."

In a similar realm, the Campfire Labs team published an article on Drift’s blog all about long- form content marketing formats that are proven to drive results, linked here. 

"We hope that these two pieces give you some insight as you fine tune your content strategy for the year ahead."

Protect the Hustle

"Whoever gets closer to the customer wins." That phrase first uttered by brilliant marketer and storyteller Bernadette Jiwa could not be truer today. If you think about some of the major shifts that have happened in the past couple of decades, we can see this notion pretty clearly with Airbnb taking down hotel chains, Ubers beating out cabs, Netflix getting physically closer than Blockbuster, and the list goes on...

On this episode of Protect the Hustle, we talk to Drift CEO David Cancel about getting as close as possible to the customer, the broken system of purchasing software, and questioning if you can truly brute force change in a market. David used his skills from building the precursor to Facebook, Threadless, and modern blogging to help HubSpot and Drift reach hypergrowth through product.

And that’s a wrap for your December 18 subscription news. Recruit your teammates into the subscription know: profitwell.com/recur/recurnow to sign up for episodes on the daily.

If you have news to share, hit me up at abby@recurnow.com and we'll collaborate.