The whole thing started because Robin H. Swanson wanted to send flowers.

She was a Southern Californian who worked at an aerospace firm. Swanson was a wife, a mother to four kids in a blended family, and a secretary who enjoyed her job. She was living what most people would consider an ordinary life.

When her boss’s spouse got surgery in January 1986, that began to change.

Swanson ordered a standard bouquet from the closest florist she could find, a business called Floral Fantasies. The flowers plus delivery cost $23.95. Swanson used her Visa card. That was that.

Or so Swanson thought.

She realized a few weeks later she had been charged $601.11 for the order — the equivalent of ~$1.6k today.

“The bottom line is I got pissed,” Swanson told us. “I turned into an investigator.”

The coming months would take Swanson and her husband down a path that was anything but ordinary: phone calls with a charismatic young entrepreneur, a clandestine visit to a lavish gated community, a dust-up with hired goons.

Swanson was just trying to get her money, but she ended up doing far more. She helped set a foundation for the downfall of one of the biggest — and most bizarre — Ponzi schemes of the 1980s.

Value props = clear, concise pitches for buyers and stakeholders.

AKA the key branding language no business can afford to flub.

Before you get flustered on the framework, we’ve got you covered. Here are 15 clean-cut copy and design templates to help you tie it all together.

Create and brainstorm with these models:

• Value proposition writing
• Value proposition canvas
• Brand hierarchy
• Competitive analysis
• Mission and vision brainstorming

Keep those pitches pristine. Packaged by HubSpot. 🧡

“At first, I was like, ‘Is this really a 4-hour ad?’ Then I was like, ‘Damn, this beat is fire.’”

Most of us click “skip ad” as soon as we can, but Nissan found a clever way to keep viewers engaged — for 4 hours — without reaching for the “skip” button: an ad disguised as a lo-fi playlist.

The car company shared a 4-hour-long lo-fi playlist on YouTube featuring an animated character driving a Nissan Ariya. It clearly worked on the commenter quoted above…

… and then some: Since February, the video has racked up 18m+ views and 3.7k+ overwhelmingly positive comments.

What makes the ad so captivating?

The music, for starters. Lo-fi fans love YouTube, using it to discover new playlists to stream.

And Nissan, to its credit, put together a solid playlist.

• They took clear inspiration from Lofi Girl, a popular YouTube channel that streams 24/7 and has racked up ~1.6B (yes, B as in billion) views since it started live streaming in 2020.

Car marketing finally goes digital

Automotive marketing has long been ripe for innovation. For some time, car commercials had been formulaic and the industry slow to embrace online customers…

… until the pandemic forced their hand.

As travel restrictions, high interest rates, and supply chain issues brought major growth challenges, reliance on well-worn marketing tactics stopped cutting it.

In March 2020, 10% of car purchases moved online — up from 1% in 2018. With that figure expected to grow, automakers face pressure to move more of their marketing online.

Nissan has lo-fi covered, but as other companies hatch plans, might we suggest sponsoring some long nose dogs?

📨 On this day: In 1978, Digital Equipment Corp. marketing rep Gary Thuerk sent the first spam email to all 393 ARPANET email addresses on the West Coast. The message detailed a new computer model.

🦆Useful: A database of collective nouns for when you want to know what, say, a group of canaries is called. (It’s an opera.)

👀 Video: Are recruiters ignoring your resume? Use these hacks to get noticed.

🪲 That’s interesting: The late entomologist Justin Schmidt ranked insect bites by pain. Descriptions include “similar to getting your hand smashed in a revolving door” and “tiny blowtorches kiss[ing] your arms.”

🎽 Aww: And now, time to get dressed!