There’s an Instagram advertising format I think more businesses should know about.

It’s called Reels Trending Ads and the idea is remarkably simple.

Someone creates a Reel. It starts trending. Rather than paying that creator to make something for your business, you can pay Meta to put your advert immediately after trending Reels.

Meta uses AI to identify the Reels that are trending and lets advertisers target either trending content generally or particular categories.

In other words, you can buy some of the attention that somebody else has already earned.

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There is a lot of pressure on businesses to use AI. Every piece of software suddenly has an AI button. Every conference has an AI panel. Every week somebody announces that another profession is about to disappear.

It creates a strange situation where businesses can feel behind without really knowing what they are supposed to be behind on. The reality is much less dramatic.

McKinsey found that 90% of marketing leaders are experimenting with AI, but fewer than 10% have scaled its use and captured meaningful value across their marketing work.

So instead of asking whether your business is using enough AI, there is a better question.

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There is a strange thing that happens in marketing meetings.

Everything seems to be going brilliantly.

Your reach is up 43%. Your latest video had 80,000 views. You gained 600 followers. Your website had its busiest month ever.

Then somebody asks how much business all of this generated.

Nobody is quite sure.

These numbers are often called vanity metrics. That is probably a little unfair. They can be genuinely useful.

The problem is when we confuse getting attention with getting results.

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Marketing changes constantly. Google changes how search works. Meta launches another product. TikTok finds somewhere new to put videos. Everyone adds AI to everything.

If you run a business, keeping up with all of it should not be your job. That is partly why you employ marketing people in the first place.

But you should know enough to ask the right questions. Here are five worth asking this month.

1. Are we actually measuring the right things?

Marketing reports can make almost anything sound successful.

Impressions increased. Followers increased. Website visits increased. A video got 50,000 views. All of those numbers can be useful. None of them automatically mean your marketing is working.

Google has been making changes to its own measurement tools and is increasingly encouraging advertisers to look at multiple sources of data when judging performance, rather than trusting one number to tell the whole story.

The important question is much simpler.

Ask your team: If we stopped reporting followers, impressions and clicks, which numbers would you use to show me that our marketing is working?

They should be able to answer that clearly.

2. What is AI actually doing to our Google Ads?

Google is giving AI more control over advertising. One of its big products is called AI Max. It can help decide which searches your adverts appear for and how those adverts are presented.

Google is also moving some older advertising features towards AI Max and giving advertisers ways to test it against their existing campaigns. That does not mean you should avoid it. It also does not mean you should use it simply because Google recommends it.

If you are spending thousands of pounds with Google every month, you should understand how much control Google now has over where that money is being spent.

Ask your team: Are we using AI Max, and if we are, have we tested whether it actually performs better for us?

3. Can people find us when they search using AI?

This has moved from something businesses should think about eventually to something they should think about now. Google says AI Overviews have more than 2.5 billion monthly users. AI Mode has passed one billion.

People are changing the way they search. Someone looking for an accountant, restaurant or new piece of software might no longer type a couple of words into Google and work through the results.

They might ask a detailed question and let AI recommend what to look at. That means businesses need to think about whether they appear in those answers.

Ask your team: What are we doing to make sure people can find us when they use AI to search for businesses like ours?

You do not need a complicated answer. You do need an answer.

4. Are we getting enough from the content we already make?

Most businesses are obsessed with making more content. Sometimes the better question is what happened to the content you already paid for.

TikTok recently expanded its Out of Phone programme across Europe, including the UK. It is taking TikTok content beyond the app and putting it onto screens in physical locations.

You probably do not need your latest TikTok playing in a shopping centre.

The interesting part is the thinking behind it. Good content does not need to have one life.

Ask your team: What were our five best pieces of content over the last three months, and what else did we do with them?

A good video might become an advert, an email, a LinkedIn post, a page on your website or the basis of several new pieces of content. Before making more, make sure you have used what already worked.

5. Are we paying for marketing software we no longer need?

Marketing software has a habit of quietly accumulating. A scheduling platform here. An analytics product there. Something somebody signed up for two years ago because it was going to transform the business.

Meta has recently launched Meta One, with paid business options that include things such as additional audience information, analytics exports, scheduling, team access and AI tools. Some businesses will find those features useful.

Others will realise Meta now offers something they are already paying another company to provide. Check your marketing stack, there may be savings to be made.

Ask your team: Can we go through every marketing tool we currently pay for and tell me what we actually use it for?

You might find something useful. You might also find £500 a month you do not need to be spending.

What should you do?

These are the five things we think are worth thinking about at the moment.

Take whichever are relevant into your next conversation with your marketing team or agency.

And if you need us, Say Thunder is here to help you have those conversations.

Who is this for: Any business that relies on people finding it through Google.

For a very long time, searching Google worked in roughly the same way. You typed in what you wanted. Google gave you a page of results. You clicked one.

That is changing.

Google now increasingly tries to answer the question itself using AI. Its AI Overviews have more than 2.5 billion monthly users, while AI Mode has passed one billion. Google says questions asked through AI Mode are nearly three times longer than traditional searches. That last bit is particularly interesting for businesses.

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