Ben Haynes

Here's a fun, free new resource for your competitive intel program: CompeteKit by Healthy Competition 🥦 It's a directory of recommended software and agencies to help you gather competitive intel, learn why you win or lose, and differentiate from other players in your space. Each vendor on the list came from one of two places: 1. recommendations from the Healthy Competition community 2. conversations / demos I've seen from promising up-and-comers I don't think there's another resource out there that accurately captures the CI tooling space. The other ones I looked at were either too bloated (anyone who's anyone can claim a spot), or they don't take into account really early stage startups that are approaching CI in new ways. In either case, I feel really good about all the tools listed on the Competekit. Hopefully you discover some new ones you've never heard of before! It's a living, breathing resource. So if I stumble on more, I'll be sure to add them in. Check it out here: https://lnkd.in/gv6Fh9Gv PS: if there are any tools that are missing that you think should be included, fill out the form at the bottom of the directory and I’ll take a look at them! 🙂

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This 👇. If you aren’t pre-testing you are burning media dollars. And cost or qualitative insights is no longer a barrier. DM if you are in #influencer or #creatoreconomy, hit us up on how to Create, Measure, and Learn so your pre-tests leverage your own knowledge base against realtime benchmarks at scale.

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Many years of building product messaging and positioning have taught me a lot of lessons. I ❤️ all my fine marketers and founders in the security space, so I didn't mean to choose this as my example...but here it is... Shift Left is Full of Shift https://lnkd.in/g5UeWcXG #startup #messaging #gtm #positioning #startupmarketing

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Leveraging AI assistants for marketing is 🔥! At my agency, AI tech has boosted our creativity and efficiency big time. Combining human insights with AI is key for killer campaigns. It's like having a super-smart sidekick, in this case a team of sidekicks! 🚀 #AIInnovation

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WARNING: Adobe's new terms of service (TOS) are a land grab of rights to use all of your content, no matter how secret or sensitive, to improve their offerings. TOS here: https://lnkd.in/gwrCH7ti Read the two clauses below carefully. They essentially give Adobe unlimited rights to use all of your content, even if highly secret, to improve their Software and Services. Given that generative image generation is part of their "Services and Software", it clearly includes the right to use even your most sensitive content for training their generative AIs. 2.2 Our Access to Your Content. We may access, view, or listen to your Content (defined in section 4.1 (Content) below) through both automated and manual methods, but only in limited ways, and only as permitted by law. For example, in order to provide the Services and Software, we may need to access, view, or listen to your Content to (A) respond to Feedback or support requests; (B) detect, prevent, or otherwise address fraud, security, legal, or technical issues; and (C) enforce the Terms, as further set forth in Section 4.1 below. Our automated systems may analyze your Content and Creative Cloud Customer Fonts (defined in section 3.10 (Creative Cloud Customer Fonts) below) 𝐮𝐬𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐞𝐜𝐡𝐧𝐢𝐪𝐮𝐞𝐬 𝐬𝐮𝐜𝐡 𝐚𝐬 𝐦𝐚𝐜𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐞 𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐢𝐧 𝐨𝐫𝐝𝐞𝐫 𝐭𝐨 𝐢𝐦𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐯𝐞 𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐒𝐞𝐫𝐯𝐢𝐜𝐞𝐬 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐒𝐨𝐟𝐭𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐮𝐬𝐞𝐫 𝐞𝐱𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐞. Information on how Adobe uses machine learning can be found here: https://lnkd.in/gG3DJvZr. 4.2 Licenses to Your Content. Solely 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐩𝐮𝐫𝐩𝐨𝐬𝐞𝐬 𝐨𝐟 𝐨𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐨𝐫 𝐢𝐦𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐯𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐒𝐞𝐫𝐯𝐢𝐜𝐞𝐬 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐒𝐨𝐟𝐭𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐞, 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐭 𝐮𝐬 𝐚 𝐧𝐨𝐧-𝐞𝐱𝐜𝐥𝐮𝐬𝐢𝐯𝐞, 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐥𝐝𝐰𝐢𝐝𝐞, 𝐫𝐨𝐲𝐚𝐥𝐭𝐲-𝐟𝐫𝐞𝐞 𝐬𝐮𝐛𝐥𝐢𝐜𝐞𝐧𝐬𝐚𝐛𝐥𝐞, 𝐥𝐢𝐜𝐞𝐧𝐬𝐞, 𝐭𝐨 𝐮𝐬𝐞, 𝐫𝐞𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐝𝐮𝐜𝐞, 𝐩𝐮𝐛𝐥𝐢𝐜𝐥𝐲 𝐝𝐢𝐬𝐩𝐥𝐚𝐲, 𝐝𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐫𝐢𝐛𝐮𝐭𝐞, 𝐦𝐨𝐝𝐢𝐟𝐲, 𝐜𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐝𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐯𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐯𝐞 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐤𝐬 𝐛𝐚𝐬𝐞𝐝 𝐨𝐧, 𝐩𝐮𝐛𝐥𝐢𝐜𝐥𝐲 𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐦, 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐬𝐥𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐂𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐧𝐭. For example, we may sublicense our right to the Content to our service providers or to other users to allow the Services and Software to operate as intended, such as enabling you to share photos with others. Separately, section 4.6 (Feedback) below covers any Feedback that you provide to us. 𝐈𝐟 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐚𝐠𝐫𝐞𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐢𝐬 𝐞𝐠𝐫𝐞𝐠𝐢𝐨𝐮𝐬, 𝐩𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐬𝐞 𝐡𝐞𝐥𝐩 𝐦𝐞 𝐬𝐩𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝. Thank you, Hoff

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"Page-Building" CMSs can deliver fast results for time-crunched production teams, but they suffer when content needs to stick around beyond a quick campaign. Karen McGrane and I had a chance to sit down and talk to Preston So of #DotCMS about his vision for a "Universal CMS," how it impacts content sustainability, and how analytics changes in a world where "Visits" aren't enough. Check it out!

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Google has postponed the removal of third-party cookies from Chrome once again, for the third time. I remember our first meeting about the threat cookieless could have on the fundamentals of our business back in 2020. I’m assuming we will still be hearing about future delays into 2025. #DigitalMarketing #PrivacySandbox #Google #AdTech #DataPrivacy https://lnkd.in/eDZPTiaR

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If you're accountable for complex multi-site experiences, built leveraging large volumes of content, created by multiple content editors, and reliant on integrations with third-party systems - 👉 This. Post. Is. For. You. 👈 Creating, personalizing, experimenting with and securing high-performing websites shouldn’t be this frustrating. It shouldn’t take months (or years - you KNOW that's happened!). It shouldn’t require a degree in coding. 😥 As stakeholders breathe down our necks to deliver “faster”, generate “more demand” and “be more cost efficient” - we’re spinning our wheels trying to get even the most basic tasks done. Sound familiar? 1️⃣ Got a new landing page to create, need a developer. 2️⃣ Revamping the header layout or adding a new social feed, raise a ticket for dev support. 3️⃣ Personalizing your homepage - don’t even get started without tech help. 🙊 Pssst! The not-so-secret-secret: Our developer friends have MUCH more interesting and impactful things to do with their time than help us on day-to-day operations. So what gives? The tools we’ve had at our disposal were accepted as industry standard, but they weren’t built for us. The lack of self-sufficiency it provides is just outdated. ❌ It’s time to stop the madness. As the alpha users of our own Squiz DXP Product crew to remove unnecessary developer reliance. We demanded to move faster. It's been gruelling but exhilirating 12 months, and we're thrilled with the outcomes! My teams are getting back into going from idea-to-go-live in minutes or days, not weeks or months. We're ensuring our Digital Experience Platform (DXP) helps teams do these five key jobs quickly and independently, without developer reliance. 1. Create pages and campaign landing pages, fast. 2. Manage content creation, reuse, and governance with ease. 3. Use A/B Testing, analytics and SEO insights to improve performance. 4. Personalization of content to the right users at the right time. 5. Making sure sites are accessible for different types of users. It's exciting to see that more complex, enterprise-scale website management is becoming self-sufficient, easier and faster. Best of all, our developer mates are focusing on innovation and customization, not our day-to-day tasks. I hope you're demanding more of your CMS or DXP provider. If the life above doesn't seem possible - it's time to consider your options. Because, life's too short to live in the backlog! Blog link in the comments to dig deeper into what you should expect from your DXP. 👇 👇 #DXP #Websites #Marketing #Squiz

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Claude 3.5 Sonnet just outpaced GPT-4. Yup, you read that right. The latest from Anthropic is setting new benchmarks and making waves. It's a compelling read for anyone fascinated by the AI race. At Hexium AI, we're always pushing the envelope and staying ahead of the curve. This article sheds light on future possibilities and innovations that we believe in. I'd love to hear your take on Anthropic's leap forward. What do you think this means for the future of AI?

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Developer Tools Need a Network Effect Network effects are as critical to business-to-developer (B2D) company strategy as to business-to-consumer (B2C). Improving product quality through viral usage should be critical to a startup’s G2M strategy. You can see the effect in these products, which keep improving even as more people use them. 1. GitHub Copilot has more repositories than other coding assistants to train on, and feedback from millions of engineers accepting or rejecting its suggestions. 2. trunk.io ’s linting product improves with every pull request run through it, keeping all customers’ code cleaner as it evolves. 3. http://sweep.dev also improves from having more requests run through it than do other AI coding agents. Whether you’re a builder, investor or buyer, you likely grasp that a developer tool with far more users is going to improve faster than its competitors, which will lead to even more developers using it, which further accelerates improvement. It’s how the early open source tools at first challenged incumbents on adaptability, but soon left them behind on innovation.

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It's officially two weeks since I began my time at Writer. We are going up against the heavyweights, but it's become clear that my team's mission #1 is to establish Writer's platform and tech stack as the dominant design for enterprise generative AI. I know it seems audacious but I have been floored by the vision, team and results(we blew past our Q2 targets weeks ago for our biggest quarter ever). More evidence - on Friday, I asked May Habib for a couple of customers that we could get on an analyst call in a short timeframe. After a few texts we had five Fortune 50 CIOs ready to speak for this Monday. What series B company can do that so effortlessly? It's special here. I took a deep dive with one of them last week. He was excited to share how his team is using Writer as the way to empower AI-first enterprise workflows across the business. He gives his line of business AI-powered apps built in Writer to supercharge their productivity. The consensus is that co-pilots have limited productivity potential. End users need applications that are more specific to the workflows they run day after day. Secondly, his developers use Writer's new AI Studio product to call AI into every process and workflow that they are building programatically. This is extremely powerful. It's how you build an AI-first organization. And this has been Writer's vision for years. Marketing was our first segment that we dominated, but the use cases are exploding across the entire enterprise. And it's time for the world learn more. I cannot wait to share more about Writer in the coming months and years. We are hiring across the board - if this sounds exciting let me know and I'll see if there is a fit at Writer for you!

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AI doing a podcast with AI. The stuff of Sci-Fi shows and movies is becoming reality, and I think you'd struggle to realize it wasn't humans having the conversation if you didn't know. What does this mean for marketers and other producers of content - it raises the bar on what you're putting out, it also allows you to focus on the content and less about the production. AI clones that can do a great job representing you in almost any language you choose can deliver the messages you want to deliver even if you're too busy or uncomfortable in front of a camera. The downside is people will find it easier to produce low value content and our feeds and inboxes could quickly get clogged up with junk. It's never been more important to have a clear and differentiated Point of View that comes through in all your messaging and content. https://lnkd.in/gAeJ9xqn

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I know - the FixedOps UX sit down with John Schmidt of Next>Level was so last week, but so many gems. I just had to give him some extra time to showcase this bonus content. John has amazing insight on mobile repair - I couldn't leave this segment on the cutting room floor. We're diving in on the overlap between recall effectiveness and mobile repair! Watch the full episode here - https://lnkd.in/gBYXPwmJ . #recallmasters #fixedopsux #fixedops #dealership #dealerships #customerexperience #coaching #customerinsights #customerloyalty #customerreview #userexperience #employeeengagement #technicians #mechanics #autodealers #autoindustry #culture #organizationalculture #teambuilding #efficiency #innovation  

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💡I need your help! 💡 Appeals Doctor is rebranding prior to launching our new self-managed SAAS product and I need help finalizing our logo. I’d really appreciate your input on which design resonates best with you. 👉 Please take a moment to fill out this quick poll: https://lnkd.in/eAUSttQU Your feedback means a lot, and I can’t wait to hear what you think! At Appeals Doctor, we help Amazon sellers manage their account and listing health, saving them both time and money. From unfreezing funds to reinstating accounts and brands, reopening listings, and fixing suppressed listings, we’ve got sellers covered. #AmazonSellers #Branding #LogoDesign #Startups #Ecommerce #FractionalCTO #AppealsDoctor

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something different today - word vomited a longer text on the mysterious Substack platform. more of a personal story on how I ended up here, and what lead to the current iteration of reconfigured. will likely write more long-form content there - beats setting up a CMS in Remix right now. 😅 Topics will most likely be around the analytics life, ways of working and especially the interesting things we hear from people in the field.🙂 kinda nice to write story-style for a change. like and subscribe: https://lnkd.in/dU-u4Kwv

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We just saw a 100% spike in engagement from new subscribers. Not a dime in additional marketing spend. No big features launched. No bells and whistles. Just a small yet powerful change. We simplified the user flow so that construction site owners get to the aha moment faster. We removed all the distractions, all the cognitive overload. We guided their focus to just two steps. Now one glance and Eureka! They can track progress at all their projects. Visibility — their toughest challenge — is Powerplay's core promise. We simply offered it upfront. Takeaway: People often miss the basics in trying to chase aha moments… …when it’s the basics that lead to aha moments. #startups #design #product #userexperience

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For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. Wynter's message testing data is showing how AI-focused website messaging is turning off more and more people. It’s just that so many companies are using AI as the focal point that people are getting fed up. Instead of “wow, they have AI,” it’s leading to more eye rolls. Yes sure people want the benefits of AI, but it’s becoming a standard feature in products instead of a unique advantage. Pushing too hard on AI-focused messaging creates resistance; it might be time to zag.

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Public engagement got you down? I get it. There are so many tools. And the more you do - the less insights you have. I'll show you a better way in this interactive webinar! You'll discover: - How to craft questions that get real answers - Ways to reach a wider audience easily - Techniques to make engagement meaningful Includes hands-on practice to build your skills. https://buff.ly/3RXBhxi #CivicEngagement #LocalGovernment

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Most lead magnets suck. And it’s no different for agencies. The core issue is that they don’t actually address a problem worth solving. (Go read about the PRISM Model on my Substack if you want to shortcut that issue.) Often, these lead magnets are more self-serving than helpful. Like FAQ lists that include, “Why are you so awesome?” No one’s asking for that, just like no one wants you shoving biased recommendations down their throat. What they want is a quickly digestible asset that gets them a quicker win. It doesn’t need to be a massive win. It just needs to solve a problem they’re having. And by helping them solve that problem, you’re building trust. You’re giving them a reason to come to you for bigger problems. Because you’re someone who can actually deliver results. I talked about this and all the other offers you need in your agency with Logan Lyles on Agency Life by Teamwork.com. It’s a jampacked hour of strategic and tactical advice to ensure you’re not leaving money on the table. Check it out at the link below. #podcast #agency #agencylife #offers PS - Know an agency founder that might like listening to this one? Tag them. You never know what bit of advice could help someone’s business.

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