AI

🗺️ ChatGPT ads to compete with Google Maps.

🎨 An REI ad went viral for being AI slop. They blame Meta AI.

🎥 OpenAI prepares for image, video and conversational ads.

💬 Threads as live chat co-hosts.

MARKETING

🛒 Instacart goes full-funnel with a new in-app Immersive Feed.

📈 Google Trends adds previous time period comparison.

📊 Survey: What CFOs really want from CMOs.

BRANDING

✏️ Warner Bros Animation reveals a new logo to celebrate hand-drawn animation.

🍹 How Aperol is working to make the spritz a year-round drink.

🥤 How 7-Eleven is celebrating 60 years of Slurpees.

CULTURE
🏆 Here are all the 2026 Cannes Lions winners.

⚽ Levi’s, Beats and Heinz won the World Cup without paying FIFA.

🎤 How the BET Awards became a blueprint for cultural brand building.

❄️ Rick Owens and Adidas are back, and they brought air conditioning.

⚾ MLB hopes to capture a new generation with content creators.

Monday: ChatGPT doesn’t evaluate sources the same way Google does. Instead of ranking websites, it pulls information from multiple retrieval systems and selects the content that best supports each claim. That means being discoverable by AI depends less on search position and more on how easy your content is to understand, extract, and cite. Clear structure, authoritative pages, and trusted third-party mentions are becoming just as important as traditional SEO. Read the full breakdown to see how AI decides what makes the cut.

Tuesday: Despite all the buzz around AI search, Google says the fundamentals haven’t changed. AI Overviews and AI Mode rely on the same core ranking systems as traditional Search, meaning strong SEO remains the key to visibility. The advice is familiar: create content for people, showcase original expertise, keep your site fast and your information current, and focus on delivering unique value that only your brand can provide. See what Google says about succeeding in the AI search era.

Wednesday: Not every campaign should be judged by the same metrics. Success depends on where your audience is in the funnel: awareness campaigns should prioritize reach and engagement, consideration efforts should focus on deeper interactions, conversion campaigns should measure efficiency, and retention initiatives should track long-term customer value. Matching your KPIs to each stage leads to smarter optimization and more meaningful results. Explore the full framework and recommended metrics for every stage of the funnel. Learn how to match your measurement strategy to every stage of the funnel.

Thursday: “Sell benefits, not features” isn’t always the best advice. In crowded markets, broad promises like “save time” or “drive growth” often blend together, while specific features can provide the proof and differentiation buyers are looking for. The key isn’t choosing one over the other, but knowing when to lead with benefits, when to highlight features, and how to connect the two in a way that resonates with your audience. Read the full perspective on finding the right balance in your messaging.

Can you solve this puzzle? 🤝

This year’s Cannes Lions Titanium shortlist is stacked,  but we’re breaking down our five favorites that change the game and raise the bar:

• A radical decentralized communications campaign that preserved the democratic presidential vote in Venezuela.
• A new media framework that positions branded litter as negative media impressions, empowering brands to “buy back” bad ad placements.
• A campaign to repatriate and reintegrate deported Mexican citizens with scalable infrastructure.
• A multi-platform celebration of Philipstown’s wire car racing tradition with built-in channels to fund its growth.
• A coordinated effort to transform the symbolic Popemobile into a traveling pediatric clinic for the children of Gaza.

Winners are announced on Friday. Who are you rooting for?

🎙️ Don’t miss “Marketing as Infrastructure: Our Cannes Lions Titanium Picks” now streaming on:

• YouTube
• Spotify
• Amazon Music
• Apple Music

👽 Weigh in on The Daily Carnage Subreddit:

The Daily Carnage Show Ep 2.11 Discussion: “Whether or not it appears on a Cannes Lions shortlist… What work from 2025-2026 do you think raises the bar for marketers and brands? Drop your kudos and links here!”

🎙️ The Daily Carnage Show is growing!

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Miracle Recreation Equipment Company, 1974

Answer: The “T” in GPT comes from the Transformer architecture, introduced by researchers at Google in 2017 in the landmark paper Attention Is All You Need. That breakthrough became the foundation for modern AI models—including ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, and many others.