Hi! You won't catch me posting dancing videos on TikTok (I'm 45, after all), but it's my favorite testing platform. Instagram is too saturated. If you post too much, the algorithm suppresses reach. You upload three videos per week, wait another week to see how they perform, then try a variation. And three weeks have gone by. It's an expensive testing ground.. On TikTok you can post 25 shorts per day and it won't kill your reach. Each video gets a fair shot at the algorithm. So I started using it as a testing lab. What I do: - I take one concept, like "nursing homes are losing staff faster than they can hire" and I create 10-15 variations. Different hooks, different story structures, different CTAs. I post them all on TikTok within 24 hours. - Within 48 hours, I know what works. The hook that gets more views wins the Hunger Games. - I take the winner to YouTube Shorts: if it performs there too (and it usually does), I move it to paid ads. Now I know that the ads I'm paying money on already work organically. One video about our documentary, People Worth Caring About, featuring nursing home caregivers got 180k views on TikTok in 3 days. It made 95k views on YouTube Shorts. Ran it as a paid ad targeting healthcare associations, and generated 14 inquiries for documentary work in 10 days. Total ad spend: 340 dollars. I also discovered that short hooks (4-6 words) were a hit on TikTok. On Instagram it's the opposite, people prefer longer hooks. This helps me create content that speaks to the users of different platforms. Content testing is cost-sensitive and time sensitive. This way I get the most out of my work: high volume, fast feedback, fast editing. TikTok lets me do that in a way Instagram never could. Happy to chat more about this!
Digital marketing is a large field these days, with a lot of strategies for better results. Normal social media channels and Google, etc., work, but they have a downside too. We experienced this during our marketing campaigns. Anyhow, we discovered an unconventional marketing strategy during this scenario, and it gave us outsized results. We started publishing decision-stage content and started distributing it through non-traditional channels. We worked our way through Reddit threads, niche Slack groups, and founder communities. It worked better than Google and normal social feeds. One of our clients is service-based, so we shared a practical cost comparison guide for him. And we did it directly inside his relevant community discussions, where customers were already active and discussing recommendations. This single strategy drove our asset conversions to a plus 22% within 6 weeks. And it produced leads with a higher closure rate than normal paid campaigns. The main idea behind this was to meet our customers at their mid decision-making process and not on top of the funnel. This is the reason I now recommend community-based distribution as a conversion technique. Because it is not an awareness strategy these days.
A few yeras ago, I applied the "Negative Anchor" strategy to a high-end corporate security firm that was struggling to differentiate itself from cheaper, observe-and-report competitors. Research showed that the industry standard in the niche was to market "peace of mind" or "seamless Integration". So, (at least for me) it's nothing but logical (and fun) to try the opposite approach. And through some company analysis I realized their actual value wasn't convenience. It was rigor. So, paring rigor with the Negative Anchor strategy, we decided to run a full, multi-media, -platform, and -modal campaign with the headline: "We are going to slow you down." (paraphrased for non-disclosure resasons). The copy continued (also paraphrased): "If you want a security guard who smiles and waves you through because he recognizes your face, don't hire us. We check the ID every single time. We are annoying. We are thorough. We are the reason you are actually safe, not just insured." By Labeling the friction upfront, the client's internal reality was validated: true security is inconvenient. This negative framing instantly disqualified the low-budget leads who just wanted a scarecrow playing Candy Crush behind the desk in the lobby and attracted the high-value clients (data centers, banks, and R&D labs) who valued protocol over politeness. The campaign targeted those who KNEW that security is inconvenient. It spoke to those who didn't want and "invisible guard", but rather wanted the exact opposite. So we framed something that is often seen as a negative ...as a benefit. The result was an over 3x increase in QUALIFIED inquiries from enterprise-level accounts who finally felt someone took security as seriously as they did. Overall, the lead generation rate decreased, however. Since that campaign I often suggest Negative Anchor campaigns to my clients. Sadly, most are hesitant and prefer not to be "edgy" in their marketing. But marketing is like skiing: if those edges aren't sharp, you're going to miss the gate and drop out of the race eventually.
Among the non-standard actions that proved successful was the release of operational transparency as opposed to fancy marketing information. Publicity of actual turnaround times, error rates, and process walks throughs drew in more qualified conversations compared to all advertising campaigns. The interest level increased since the readers could identify themselves in the details. The conversion rates were enhanced since expectations have been predetermined, prior to the first contact. During a rollout, form submissions went up by 38 percent within sixty days as unqualified leads fell drastically and saved hours per week. The reason that strategy is successful is that it establishes a level of trust prior to the sales conversation. It is an indication of how A-S Medication Solutions builds long-term relationships with its partners based on the reliable medication services, documented procedures, and predictable delivery instead of superficial messages. Clarity in individuals is a reaction to controlled or stakes situations. The key stays simple. Demonstrate the way work is done. Stock options, time limitations and guarded rights. The audience is filtered by the transparency. It becomes easier to engage as the content will seem more grounded, and the number of conversions will increase since buyers will already know the kind of value they will receive. This is counterintuitive until there were fewer tire-kickers and more serious buyers that were prepared to take action.
I think one of the biggest differentiators for us is owning your market, which isn't very common in my space. Working with home service businesses, the most common model is that people buy leads repeatedly from vendors. Many call that performance marketing, but in reality, it often doesn't produce sustainable growth. I think it's much more valuable to build a scalable system in partnership with the business, where we're both working hard toward the same goal: growing and scaling the company. For us, that means focusing heavily on intent-driven marketing through Google Ads. While everyone else is pushing Meta, and while Meta can work, I think there's still a lot of untapped potential in search marketing. I wouldn't call it necessarily unconventional, but we also use a suite of AI tools that dramatically boost our clients' speed-to-lead and ensure they never miss a call. On top of that, we use tools to capture website visitors anonymously, even if they don't fill out a form, while remaining fully compliant. Another big challenge right now is bots. Bots on Meta have been crazy, and even search traffic has been affected. Implementing bot protection is, in my opinion, one of the smartest ways to save money while maintaining lead quality. All of these strategies together have significantly improved engagement and conversions for our clients. They lead to more booked appointments, higher-quality leads, and less wasted spend — which is why I recommend this approach to others.
We launched a brand visibility campaign in Q4 2025 with the goal of generating more leads from AI search platforms like ChatGPT, Claude, and Perplexity. At the core of the campaign was optimizing all of our external web assets (i.e. social profiles, directory listings), adding structured data to our website, and curating brand mentions on platform like Reddit and Quora. We grew from zero leads from AI search platforms in Q1-Q3 2025, to 3 closed leads in Q4. Our overall referrals from AI search platforms jumped 825% from Q4 2024 to Q4 2025.
The unconventional approach of actively publishing 'uncomfortable' content about real-life failures was very successful for us. In addition to publishing 'uncomfortable' content, we also referenced and highlighted some of our own failed projects. We reveal an authentic side to our approach, showing what went wrong and explaining how these situations can be avoided. After we started posting 'uncomfortable' content, our engagement level increased immediately. An increase of time spent on page, an influx of replies and inbound leads and, ultimately, a 25% - 30% uptick in the conversion of those specific pages from lead to customer. The primary function of 'uncomfortable' content is to allow users to see that we understand their challenges. Users will have more interaction with marketing that is realistic and genuine, instead of polished perfection. The honesty conveyed through our 'uncomfortable' content has generated a level of trust that we have not yet achieved with any of our gated assets.
Our Facebook giveaway through KingSumo proved to be an effective unorthodox marketing approach which we used once per year. The hotel promotion of two free hotel nights created such high demand that it became difficult to manage all the interested guests. Real hotel stays serve as the preferred reward choice for people instead of coupon or discount options. Each contest brings in about 25 percent of our email subscribers for the year and leads to around three direct bookings almost every time. The basic execution of the campaign resulted in $2,000 worth of sales. The tool enables us to obtain immediate user interaction results while it helps us build new subscribers and keep our brand visible throughout time so I recommend its application often.
I first entered the world of digital marketing in 2020, during the height of the coronavirus pandemic. All businesses were on hold, and I was home alone. It was then that I decided to create a website. I launched my first website on Blogger, using a domain name purchased from Google Domains. I primarily focused on subtopics within finance that had little to no significant traffic. After this, I learned about search engine optimization (SEO) and began conducting keyword research on my website. I quickly began mastering off-page and on-page SEO. I also leveraged local SEO, creating a business profile page for my website on Google and adding backlinks from there to rank it. Within no time, my website appeared on the first page of Google, and so much traffic started coming to the website that the website itself slowed down. A friend of mine told me about WordPress, and I shifted my website to WordPress, after which I also got information about plugins. WordPress didn't just allow me to create articles, but also provided options like Highlights. I then contacted another website via their email address to create quality backlinks. In return, they asked me for articles for their website. As a small website, it wasn't natural for them to ask for money. However, I wrote excellent articles for them, which then started bringing quality traffic to my website. Today, my website is running on a good hosting plan. During my MBA, my digital marketing mentor told me that many people go to other Facebook pages and post links to their websites to attract customer visits, but that's the wrong approach. Bringing that traffic to your website is pointless. Because you need customers, you can generate quality traffic to your website, and this can be done using local SEO.