r/DigitalMarketing

Hi again!

My last post was about Instagram hashtags, and I mentioned briefly how the Instagram algorithm works. Now, I'll explain the algorithm in detail, starting with the example of a 1k followers Instagram account.

When you post something on Instagram, that post is initially shared with the first 10% of your followers. But who are these first 10%?

They are the people who have been following you and interacting with your account from the beginning, such as liking, commenting when the post is live, or replying to your stories.

Now, every post you make has certain parameters. When these parameters are met, the post is further pushed to the next set of followers. This phase is what I call the "initial."

So, what is "initial"?

In simple terms, "initial" represents the average engagement of multiple posts. Here's an example:

Suppose you have 1k followers, and on average, within 10 minutes, you're getting 70 likes and 5 comments. This average is obtained by analyzing the last 10-20 posts.

Why is "initial" so important?

Whenever you make a post on Instagram, if the post fails to surpass the initial engagement, it acts as an instant result of whether or not that content is going to work on Instagram. This is because it reflects the reaction of your audience - the same first 10% of people who love your content. If the post fails to please them, it lacks something. So, for the next time, try to improve.

Continue this process until you manage to increase your initial engagement from, for example, 70 likes to 80-90 likes. That's how you do it.

And that's how I managed to grow from 100 to 360k followers on Instagram.

You should focus on this magical 10-minute data called "initial." I've spent the last 7 years studying the algorithm, and while I don't claim to understand it 100%, I know enough.

I've grown more than 10 accounts from 0-10k during the lockdown and sold them to other people.

This is just the tip of the iceberg; there is a lot more to this, and I don't want to bore you. So, I'll cover another topic in another post.

If you want me to cover other topics as well kindly let me know in the comments I'll try my best to provide the information

UPDATE:

This post went really viral last time, and I want to do this again and answer questions you guys had.

1. Biggest tip, Biggest Tip, Seriously, the only thing that matters in succeeding in this space is CONSISTENCY. Everyone says this, but no one is consistent; that's why the winners win and losers lose
2. Make your videos really high quality, don't use CapCut, invest in Adobe Premiere, or get a video editor not on Fiverr but on Discord communities ( cheap and better)
3. Don't waste your time on scripts and hooks and finding content, use Social_Hunt for that, it does everything, and you can train it based on viral content in your niche

 

Maybe I’m missing something obvious, but this feels like a huge gap.

I manage Meta Ads, Google Ads, and Amazon Ads daily, and I make so many micro changes that after a few days I genuinely cannot remember:

• what changed
• when it changed
• why performance shifted

And platform change histories are technically there… but useless for actual understanding.

I wish there was:

• a lightweight desktop app or Chrome extension
• that passively watches ad platform activity
• detects meaningful actions
• and generates an AI summary/changelog automatically

Almost like:
“Here’s everything you changed in your accounts this week.”

I don’t want another Notion template or spreadsheet.
I want automatic memory for performance marketing work.

Has anyone found something close to this?

I've been working with this client for a month now, and we went through the brief, the strategy, the media planning, etc., and then we launched. My POV was that this client was a little demanding, definitely more "sales" focused, and less data-savvy and educated about digital marketing.

Anyways, we launch our campaign (paid social, search) and then all of a sudden, her emails turn into this academic, hyper-analytical essay heavily critiquing our strategy, targeting, creative, marops/tracking, etc.

At first I was like, "Wow, these are good questions, I wish she had asked them earlier in the process," but after multiple back and forths and after it getting so convoluted, I got suspicious. A lot of the questions were hypocritical (for example: we should use broad targeting when they initially said super-specific targeting), and I figured out that, yeah, this is definitely ChatGPT.

In the end, we ended up firing her because she was wasting our time, we followed her/ChatGPT's recommendations, and the campaigns still didn't work.

How are y'all dealing with not-so-smart clients using LLMs to critique your work?

EDIT: I forgot to mention, despite her definitely ChatGPT'd emails, when we were on calls with her, she was nowhere as sophisticated, though I predict this is going to change with meeting recorders and real-time LLM feedback

Hey everyone, I'm building a SaaS product and haven't launched yet. Trying to get the SEO foundation right before I go live rather than scrambling after.

A few questions:

- Should I be doing anything SEO-related pre-launch, or is it too early?

- Where do most SaaS founders go wrong at the start?

- Any free/cheap tools worth using at this stage?

- What resources or courses do you recommend to actually learn SEO properly as a beginner?

Happy to share more about the product if it helps. Just don't want to launch into a void. Thanks 🙏

AI can create content fast, but human creativity, emotional storytelling, and understanding people still feel impossible to fully replace.

A lot of online marketing advice makes success look way faster and easier than it really is.

One thing I learned
understanding people and business matters more than just learning tools.

What is a hard truth about digital marketing you only learned through real experience?

People no longer think separately about websites, emails, or apps. They expect one connected experience that remembers context, understands behavior, and reacts in real time. And honestly, I think that is exactly why everyone suddenly started talking about AEP and AJO. Not because of AI hype, but because users already got used to a level of personalization that most enterprise brands still are not ready for. Curious if this is becoming the new standard for digital experience, or if we are still overestimating the personalization hype?

There are too many AI SEO tools right now and most reviews feel sponsored.

I’m looking for real recommendations from SEO professionals, freelancers, agency owners, or founders.

Main things I care about:

• Affordable monthly pricing
• Good for content optimization
• Keyword research
• AI-assisted writing
• Technical SEO help
• Works well for small businesses/agencies

What tools are you genuinely using daily and getting real results from?

I've landed a potential client — a private university in India — and need honest advice on pricing. Here's the full picture of what I'm dealing with and what my partner and I plan to deliver.

The current state of their website:

• Domain is ~18 years old (great DA potential, completely untapped)
• 90% of pages not indexed by Google
• 98% of traffic is branded (people searching the university name directly)
• Zero non-branded organic traffic
• No money pages indexed (courses, admissions, departments)
• URLs are a mess — no logical structure
• Most important content buried in PDFs, completely unindexable
• No schema markup whatsoever
• No proper XML sitemap or robots.txt
• No content strategy, no internal linking, no on-page SEO
• Outdated design, not mobile-optimised

What we're planning to deliver:

• Full technical SEO audit and fixes
• Complete website redesign (modern, mobile-first)
• New URL structure + 301 redirects + XML sitemap
• Convert key PDFs into properly indexed web pages
• Write 40–60 pages of SEO + AEO + GEO optimised content
• Content cluster architecture (pillar pages + hub-and-spoke model for topical authority)
• Schema markup (University, Course, FAQ, Breadcrumb, LocalBusiness, Article)
• AEO: FAQ schema, featured snippet targeting, People Also Ask optimisation
• GEO: entity-based content structured for visibility in ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Gemini AI Overviews
• CMS templates so their staff can independently keep adding SEO-ready content
• Google Search Console + Bing Webmaster Tools setup and indexing push

Our situation:

We're a two-person team based in India. Both of us are relatively new to freelancing (under 2 years each), but we're handling the entire project ourselves — strategy, design, content writing, and technical SEO. No subcontracting. Our estimated timeline is 6 months to 1 year for full delivery.

Our questions for experienced folks:

1. What would you charge for this scope in the Indian market — both at a beginner/small team rate and what an experienced agency would quote?
2. Is our scope missing anything critical for a project of this scale?
3. How would you structure payments across a 6–12 month timeline? Milestones? Retainer? Mix of both?
4. Would you pitch AEO and GEO as separate line items or bundle them under the SEO umbrella?
5. Any red flags to watch out for with university clients specifically — approvals, IT departments, scope creep?

Any input from people who've done education sector SEO or large-scale website rebuilds would be genuinely appreciated. Thanks in advance.

"We have been given free hands to do anything with the website"

Trying to work out if it’s worth doing a limited number of free strategies when pitching clients. Have just begun freelancing. I’ve got experience from university and two past communications jobs but no usable case studies, testimonials, or social proof.

I commonly see two trains of thought — one that pro bono work in exchange for testimonials/ case studies is good for starting out. The other is that free work is always a no-no due to limited perceived value, lack of client investment causing problems with timeliness and implementation, and that it can put clients off if they get pitched for free feeling like they’re being pitied.

Where do you sit on this? What would you recommend?

Consumers want relevant, personalized content, but where do you think the line between helpful and creepy starts getting crossed?

I recently ended a 1 year long social media client relationship peacefully and mutually. OR so I thought…

My client and I spoke over the course of the last few months and decided that his money was better spent elsewhere vs paying me to create content and post it.

A bit of background: this client was looking for digital marketing services to help with 2 things when they approached me last April.

1- brand awareness using short form, story driven video content 2- quality leads through similar video content and photo/graphic/story posts. I presented him with a package where I go out to his business every 6-8 weeks, film a bunch of content, take photos, etc. then I proceed to put out 1-2 posts per week with 2-3 quality videos each month, the idea was to show off the clients business and personality, great devices, etc. His max budget was $400/month and he also lived 1 hr away. He didn’t want to use paid ads as he had bad experiences with previous marketing teams.

This was basically my lowest monthly limit I would say yes to given the videography, editing, driving and overall management of his social media for 2 platforms.

Long story short. We created some great content together. Some videos did very well and some did ok. He even mentioned multiple times how he got a lot of positive reception from the content, we saw great engagement and all analytics pointed to good thing, the only issue was very little leads.

I knew the strategy needed work but with limited budget and limited posts per week, this client and I spoke on how he would be better off doing his own content daily and putting his money into paid ads, more focused higher end videos, etc.

I never once heard any feedback. Our monthly summary chat via text, audio and emails always gave room for feedback and I never heard a peep. Not anything.

So let’s fast forward to today. I noticed a lot of notifications coming from their social media channel the last week even though I’ve asked 1-2 times if they could remove me as an admin. (I couldn’t do it myself since they needed to add a new admin in order to delete me) anyways…I messaged his wife as he mentioned to me she would be taking over the content side. She absolutely ripped into me. I was polite and even complimented her on the new content she was creating. Come to find out, her and her husband hated everything I was doing and decided to not only NOT to tell me…but also keep paying me each month. This was especially frustrating, especially since it was a month to month contract. They could have stopped services or spoke with me at ANY point.

I take my work very personally and pride myself on trying to work for clients with limited budgets who have good intentions…and now I feel like shit. I am so tired of grown ass adults using me as a scapegoat for content that doesn’t bring waves of customers… when all they had to do was communicate.

How in the hell am I suppose to approach clients who don’t communicate? I even make it clear up front, to every client, how important constructive criticism and positive feedback go hand in hand in every successful collaboration.

Even including the realistic chat about how there is no guarantee when it comes to social media content. I’ve always been big on keeping things simple and creating story driven content, that solves the headache of the customer, while consistent and real content provides value, education and entertainment.

Especially with so much ai slop getting shoved down our throats. I see customers and businesses aching for human, raw, story, passion in the services and products they buy.

Do I need thicker skin? Am I in the wrong industry? Is social media just always a shit show? I would love to hear some advice and discussion on this topic. This is my 7th year doing this and I run a pretty successful small agency but I’m ready to never take a social media client ever again.

Maybe I’m just an asshole. Sorry for long winded post.

EDIT: thanks so much for all the comments and feedback. Sorry I can’t reply to everyone’s messages but it has been very helpful and enlightening. Thanks again everyone. Lots to learn and do better.

been testing cold email platforms for the last 3 months and i'm honestly torn. running a 12-person marketing agency and we do about 5k emails/week for ourselves plus client campaigns.

instantly has the best deliverability hands down. their warmup pool is massive and the inbox rotation works. but their UI feels like it was designed in 2015 and the reporting is basic. plus no native CRM integration.

smartlead's got better features - the multichannel stuff is solid and their API is clean. but it's pricier and i've had more technical issues. support takes forever to respond.

lemlist looks pretty and the personalization features are next level, but for volume sending it gets expensive fast. also their deliverability isn't as good as the other two.

right now i'm leaning toward instantly for pure cold email outreach but keeping smartlead for clients who need multichannel. anyone else running similar volumes? what's working for you?

also been testing prospeo for the lead enrichment side since all three of these tools need you to bring your own leads. their email finder hits way better than snov.io which is what we were using before.

Has anyone here worked on lead gen for people turning 65?

I’ve been testing different ways to find high-intent prospects in that space, and one interesting approach is using a tool called T65 Locator.

It lets you find people turning 65 years old based on location targeting, instead of relying only on bought lists or broad ad campaigns.

It’s actually pretty useful for narrowing down specific areas and building more targeted outreach lists.

Curious if anyone here has experience with age-based + geo-targeted lead generation and how you’re handling scaling + compliance.

I'll keep this short because I know everyone's tired of vague income posts. Real numbers, real timeline, nothing held back.

A few months ago I picked up a small pet blog from NicheBlogHub for $199. It had some content, a bit of existing traffic, nothing impressive. I almost passed on it, seemed too cheap to be real. Kept the existing content mostly as-is, and they replaced the Amazon affiliate tag with mine.

Here's where April landed:

• Amazon commissions: $647
• Creator Rewards bonus: $375
• April total: $1,022

First time I've crossed $1k in a calendar month. I genuinely didn't expect it to happen this fast.

The Creator Rewards seems to be calculated on shipping revenue from referred sales and I don't fully understand the formula. I fell just short of one of the milestones but still got $375. Not complaining.

Commissions were actually higher this month than last ($647 vs ~$550 in March). The bonus was lower, but the total crossed the threshold I'd been watching.

Running totals:

• Paid for the site: $199
• Earned to date: $1,500+
• Net so far: $1,300+

Bought a second site this week. Same niche, similar profile. Curious whether the results are repeatable or if April was a fluke. I'll post an update either way soon.

Affiliate is consistently the most cost-effective marketing channel available to SaaS companies. The brands that treat it that way grow their programs. The ones that treat it as a passive revenue experiment or a checkbox item wonder why nothing moves.

Here's what I actually see going wrong, from managing these programs day to day:

1. Affiliates are treated as a distribution channel, not a partner.

The mindset matters more than most founders realize. If the internal framing is "we pay people to send us customers," the program will reflect that: low effort onboarding, minimal communication, no support. Good affiliates have audiences that trust them. They're lending you that trust. Programs that don't respect that burn through partners fast and never figure out why.

2. Vanity metrics replace real ones.

A program with 500 signed-up affiliates and 8 active ones is not a successful program. Sign-up volume is meaningless. The only numbers that matter are activation rate (partners who have made at least one conversion) and revenue per active partner. Most programs optimize for the wrong thing because it feels better to report a big number.

3. The commission isn't competitive for the ask.

This is especially common in B2B SaaS where deals take longer to close and require real content investment from the affiliate. If a partner has to write a 2,000-word review, produce a comparison video, and manage a 60-day reader evaluation cycle to earn $15, they will deprioritize your program. Commission has to reflect the actual effort and sales cycle length, not just feel generous as a percentage.

4. Cookie windows don't account for slow consideration cycles.

In B2B SaaS, someone might click an affiliate's link, evaluate the product, discuss it internally, and come back to register weeks later. If your cookie window is shorter than that consideration period, the affiliate loses attribution for the signup entirely. The cookie only governs that initial click-to-registration window, but in B2B that window is often longer than the standard 30 days most programs default to. This kills trust fast, and affiliates talk to each other.

5. Fraud gets ignored until it's expensive.

Fake sign-ups, cookie stuffing, self-referrals. Most early-stage programs have no monitoring in place and discover the problem after paying out commissions they shouldn't have. By then the damage is done. Basic fraud hygiene from the start is not optional.

6. Partners don't have what they need to actually sell the product.

No positioning clarity, no swipe copy, no demo assets, no comparison angles. Partners are left to figure out how to explain the product to their audience themselves. The ones who bother do it inconsistently. Most don't bother. If you want affiliates to represent your product well, you have to make it easy.

7. There's no activation strategy.

Someone joins the program. They get a welcome email with their link. Then nothing. Most programs have zero structured follow-up for new partners who haven't converted yet. That gap between sign-up and first conversion is where the majority of affiliate relationships die, and almost no one addresses it intentionally.

The programs that work treat affiliate like a channel that requires the same investment as any other: clear positioning, proper tooling, ongoing communication, and someone actually responsible for it.

Happy to go deeper on any of these if you're building or fixing a program right now

It’s the possibility that Google turns websites into unpaid AI training/data sources while keeping users inside its own ecosystem.

If AI Mode answers everything directly, then what exactly are small publishers, bloggers and niche sites supposed to survive on long-term?

Hey everyone,

I used to do SEO years ago back when things were heavily focused on keyword stuffing, exact-match anchors, and blindly copying competitor backlink profiles. I ended up stepping away from the industry for a while.

Now, I’m looking to get back into it, but I know the game has completely changed. I want to completely unlearn my old, outdated habits and relearn SEO from scratch for the 2026 landscape (AI overviews, SGE, user intent, etc.).

If you were starting entirely fresh today, how would you approach learning SEO? What concepts matter most now, and what are the best modern resources (blogs, courses, creators) to look into?

Appreciate any advice on how to transition from the "old school" mindset to the current reality!

We talk a lot about what AI is amazing at now.
But I’m curious what still feels frustratingly unreliable or awkward in real daily use.

Not benchmark stuff.
Real workflow stuff.

For me:
maintaining long-term project context
keeping conversations organized
reliable multi-step execution
not losing useful outputs across chats/tools

AI got insanely good at generation.

But I still feel like “AI workspace / memory / continuity” is weirdly unfinished.

What still breaks for you?

Accessibility went on our roadmap ahead of the European Accessibility Act and we've shipped a solid chunk of WCAG 2.1 AA work since. Posting because most a11y advice online is either lawyer-speak or "install this overlay widget" (please don't - more on that below). 

Quick framing for anyone not deep in this: accessibility (a11y) means your site works for people who don't navigate it the way you do – screen reader users, keyboard-only, low vision, color blindness, motor or cognitive differences. WCAG is the spec. AA is the level every law in practice points to. AAA exists, you'll rarely see it as a target outside of government work because the constraints get really tight (e.g. content readable at lower-secondary reading level).

Stuff that surprised us:

There is no official accessibility certificate. A few vendors sell "certified accessible" badges and it is pure marketing. What actually exists is WCAG conformance, declared in an accessibility statement, optionally backed by a third-party audit (VPAT/ACR). If someone is selling you certification, walk.

Microenterprises (<10 employees, <€2M turnover) are technically EAA-exempt. We are one. We're doing the work anyway, partly because the SEO and conversion side of a11y is real – semantic HTML, contrast, focus management, alt text all make your site rank and convert better – and partly because you outgrow microenterprise status faster than you think.

The metrics that matter when you audit: contrast (4.5:1 body / 3:1 large), keyboard navigation (close your mouse, hit Tab through your own site, prepare to feel bad), screen reader pass (NVDA on Windows is free, VoiceOver on Mac is built in – try both, they behave differently), visible focus rings (stop removing them in CSS, I'm begging), form labels properly associated (placeholder-as-label is broken because the label disappears the moment someone types), alt text on meaningful images. Automated tools (Lighthouse, axe, WAVE) catch maybe a third of real issues. The rest is manual.

Now the awkward part. Third-party widgets – popups, chatbots, forms, review carousels – are where most accessible sites die. They inject DOM after page load, trap focus, break tab order, hijack screen reader announcements. We are one of those third-party widgets, so this is uncomfortable to admit. And those "AI accessibility overlay" badges you see ads for? Every major a11y advocate has come out against them. There are active class actions. They make things worse, not better.

Curious – anyone running into popup/chat/form vendors that actually take this seriously? Looking for examples to point to.