📡 I had a dream; a very unusual one. 🎧
Welcome to the first Pulse from an out-of-the-EU Manchester!
And that’s about all the Brexity stuff you’ll read here. Hope you’ve had a great week.
So, Elon Musk just dropped an EDM track on SoundCloud. It’s called ’Don’t Doubt ur Vibe’ - and it’s pretty decent if you’re into that kinda stuff.
Now, scroll away, but do it carefully and slowly. Today’s insight section is pretty different… and I’d appreciate your feedback - like always.
- 𝕭𝖊𝖓 𝔣𝔯𝔬𝔪 [ 𝖕𝖊𝖗𝖘𝖕𝖊𝖈𝖙𝖎𝖛𝖊 𝖎𝖝 ]
🗞 NEWS
Documents reveal that Avast antivirus has sold its users’ internet browsing data, through a subsidiary called Jumpshot, to clients like Pepsi, Google, and Microsoft [Vice] - but would you rather have a virus or your data sold!?
The EU overwhelmingly passes measure pushing for adoption of a common charging standard for mobile devices; Apple said it would stifle innovation [AppleInsider].
You can now download 150,000 copyright-free art works from Paris’ museums [TNW] - so the internet just got over 150,000 high-definition images of historic art to turn into memes! Here on ParisMusees.
The Guardian newspaper said it would stop accepting advertisements from oil and gas companies, making it the latest institution to limit financial ties to fossil fuel businesses [NYTimes].
German munitions experts had to defuse seven unexploded WWII bombs at the site where Tesla wants to build its new Gigafactory [CNBC].
Managing social media for the UK Embassy: the Insider’s View [Socialbakers] - it’s a different experience than managing social media for brands and businesses.
💰 EARNINGS CALLS
Apple reports Q1 revenue of $91.8B, up 9% YoY, of which $79.1B came from products, $12.7B from services, and net income of $22.2B; $63B-$67B Q2 revenue expected [TechCrunch] - better than expected results.
Facebook reports Q4 revenue of $21.1B, up 25% YoY, and net income of $7.4B, up 7% YoY; DAUs rose 9% YoY to 1.66B, MAUs rose 8% YoY to 2.5B [Facebook].
Microsoft FY Q2: revenue of $36.9B, up 14% YoY, net income of $11.6B, up 38% YoY; Commercial Cloud revenue up 39% YoY to $12.5B; Office 365 Consumer subs hit 37.2M [Microsoft].
Amazon Q4: $87.4B revenue, up 21% YoY, net income of $3.3B, up from $3B in Q4 2018, AWS revenue of $9.9B, up from $7.4B in Q4 2018; stock up 11%+ after hours [Amazon].
After earnings, Amazon joins the $1T club as Alphabet dips out [TechCrunch]
🧠 INSIGHTS
i had a dream, and it wasn't caught! - Credit: Dyaa Eldin on Unsplash
but it was a usual type of dream. i wrote about it here, in a personal space it triggered me to create.
have you had a similar type of dream!?
📊 STATISTICS
Robinhood is stealing from the rich - Credit: Apptopia
Robinhood is stealing from the rich
Combining the monthly active users (MAU) of the top legacy providers in personal investment space and pitting them against Robinhood’s MAU makes for an interesting story. The legacy providers consist of E*TRADE, TD Ameritrade (comprised of TD Ameritrade, Scottrade and Schwab), Fidelity and Edward Jones. The above graph depicting MAU market share shows Robinhood has grown to the point where it’s crossed the 50% mark.
Do these legacy players have more users on web? Maybe. But in terms of mobile real estate, an individual’s most personal device, Robinhood is winning. According to Apptopia’s estimated U.S. demographic data, 40% of Robinhood’s active users are between the ages of 19 and 34. For E*TRADE, 36% of its active users are between the ages of 19 and 34, and this is the highest of any legacy provider.
Read more on Apptopia.
Some E-Commerce Traffic Source & Conversion Rate Stats - Credit: MarketingCharts
Some E-Commerce Traffic Source and Conversion Rate Stats
Despite ebbing and flowing throughout the year, search is still one of the main drivers to e-commerce sites. Indeed, per a report from Episerver, over 2018 and 2019, organic search was consistently the largest source of traffic, accounting for 19% to 27% of traffic in any given month, while paid search brought in between 14% and 18% of visitors.
Although search continues to bring in the most traffic to the 160 retail sites used in the analysis, email appears to have lost out to social over the same two-year period. Email-referred traffic appears to have declined, while by October last year social’s share of referral traffic was double what it had been in January 2018. D2C brands in particular seem to be generating plenty of customers from their social media efforts.
Read more on MarketingCharts.
SensorTower's Store Intelligence Data Digest - Credit: SensorTower
SensorTower’s Store Intelligence Data Digest
for Q4 2019 is out. Here’s some interesting stats:
Worldwide app downloads totalled 28.7 billion in 4Q19, a 4.7% year-over-year increase. 2019 full year downloads grew 9.1% to 114.9B, including 30.6B on the App Store and 84.3 from Google Play.
The biggest story of Q4 2019 was the launch of Disney+, which quickly became the top downloaded app in the U.S. It had more than 30 million U.S. downloads in the quarter.
For the first time in more than five years, Google passed Facebook to become the top mobile publisher by worldwide downloads. It had 841M first-time downloads in 4Q19, up 27.6% Y/Y.
TikTok ended the year as the No. 2 app by global downloads behind WhatsApp. India was responsible for nearly 45% of TikTok’s first-time downloads in 2019.
You can read the whole report (67 pages) in PDF format here.
📱 TOOLS & APPS
StoopInbox: Like a podcast app but for newsletters; keep your inbox clean [iOS | Android]
YourStack: A new community for sharing the products you use and ❤️
It’s like the Toolbox page on my website, but social - and better! 🙄
Off-Facebook Activity: See which apps & sites are handing data about you back to Facebook.
🎧 AUDIO STIMULATION
Emotional Currency - Hidden Brain
What’s the point of money? The answer might seem obvious: we need it to get paid for our work, and to buy the things we need. But there’s also a deeper way to look at the role of money in our lives. This episode of Hidden Brain explores an anthropologist’s take on the origin story of money.
What if the cash and coins we carry are not just tools for transactions, but manifestations of human relationships?
🐦 TWEETS of the WEEK
The more up-to-date the marketing advice, the sooner it will be out of date
People ignore sponsored tweets.
People skip Youtube ads.
People don’t notice Google ads.
Like viruses, we grew resistant.
The new marketing is based on trust.
And it takes years to build trust.
Apple Card, 6 months of swipes later https://t.co/hXhZa8wlol
😂 FUN STUFF
Viktor's secret. https://t.co/o4D3ANJfoe
Better than your OSMO Mobile 👇
Hawk's head stabilization https://t.co/ABgV0LU9Tt
That's all for this week...
But next Sunday will come before you know it! See you then!
Meanwhile, if you wanna get in touch about a story or just wanna talk, you can reply to this email or reach out to me on Twitter. You can find me @perspectiveix - obviously - and/or @pulsenewsletter.
Ciao