“How did they live their lives without posting about it? How did they know they liked something if the thing they thought they liked hadn’t already gotten any likes?”

These are questions a young girl asks in a Pinterest anthem film released last month, against a backdrop of retro home movies and archival footage from Pinterest employees. So far, the film has more than 54 million views on YouTube and is currently running in select cinemas alongside branded “silence your cell phone” messaging.

The anthem is part of the platform’s annual brand campaign, and it aims to encourage people to get off their phones and differentiate Pinterest from other social media platforms that incentivize endless scrolling, Sara Pollack, VP and global head of consumer marketing, told us.

The latest video from Pinterest’s campaign builds on this ethos, showing a college student finding inspiration on the Pinterest app—and then closing it to go dancing. As Google and Meta platforms increasingly focus on short-form video consumption, Pinterest is looking to be seen as a place for “helping [people] find inspiration online so that they can go and live offline,” Pollack said.

The campaign taps into a growing consumer concern about the long-term effects of excessive phone use, which is manifesting in ways like the rise of “dumb phones,” offline social clubs, and IRL experiences. Pinterest CEO Bill Ready has vocally supported social media bans for children under 16 in contrast with other social media execs, some of whom are defending young people’s use of their platforms in court.

Last week, Pinterest reported an 18% YoY revenue increase, surpassing $1 billion for the fourth time, as well as an 11% YoY increase in global monthly active users, reaching a record 631 million users. While it may seem counterintuitive for a social media company to encourage people to ditch their phones, Pollack told us that Pinterest is confident it can continue on a growth trajectory while still essentially telling users to touch grass.

Keep reading here.—KH

How do you market a sports team without any players?

It’s an age-old question for expansion teams, and one that Kimberly Veale, SVP of marketing and communications for the WNBA’s Portland Fire, has had to answer twice in the past couple of years—she joined the Fire from 2025 expansion team the Golden State Valkyries.

This year’s expansion teams, the Fire and Toronto Tempo, had to wait even longer than usual to fill out their rosters. While the Valkyries were able to draft their first players for the 2025 season in December of 2024, CBA negotiations dragged on for months during the offseason this year, pushing the 2026 expansion draft to April.

But the Fire weren’t going to wait that long to start marketing the brand.

“There’s the brand-build piece of this that we had to navigate with the Valkyries, and then also navigate with the Fire,” Veale told Marketing Brew. “[Portland] was excited about who’s going to be on the roster, and everything that was going on in this unique scenario was completely outside of our control. For us, it was really about establishing the brand, who we were, and who we wanted to be from a community perspective.”

While Veale and her team waited to welcome their players, they leveraged other assets, like their jerseys and game schedule, early in the year to fuel the fandom into the spring. Now, with a full roster on the court, they’re leveraging player personalities, a tried-and-true team marketing tactic, to further grow brand equity in a city that’s growing into a strong women’s sports hub.

Keep reading here.—AM

The world’s biggest AI brands are spending serious advertising dollars as they look to shape public opinion on AI and boost adoption. A number of the top brands in the AI race have already poured tens of millions into linear TV ads through April 20 of this year, according to iSpot data compiled for Marketing Brew. Some of those brands have nearly exceeded linear TV ad spend for all of 2025.

The spending surge comes as the companies continue to face increased business pressure: OpenAI recently missed user and revenue growth targets, the Wall Street Journal reported, and the sector is under pressure to reach profitability amid ballooning costs. Meanwhile, even as adoption of AI tools grows, consumer sentiment about the tools remains divided.

“Really starting this year, our OpenAIs and Anthropics, and even Google and Microsoft, are coming out in this race [with a] full-on ad blitz to build trust. That’s really important, because at the end of the day, we know they’re facing an uphill battle,” Nicole Greene, VP and analyst, business and technology insights at Gartner, said. “As consumers learn more about AI, they have more mixed feelings about it. They don’t think AI will benefit them or society. Trust in AI companies and building that trust is going to be really important for them because they need users to collect their data, to control the customer and agent experience, and to monetize that.”

Do the math: Several AI brands are on pace to exceed their national linear TV ad spend in 2026 from 2025, according to iSpot data.

• This year through April 20, OpenAI has spent about $64.9 million on linear TV ads, nearly reaching the $65.5 million it spent on that channel in the entirety of 2025.
• Microsoft and Google aren’t far behind; Microsoft doled out $34.4 million on linear TV ads from January 1 to April 20 this year compared to $61.1 million throughout 2025.

Keep reading here.—JS

We made it through the 2026 upfront presentations, perhaps more confused than ever. Who are the upfronts really even for? Does anyone besides Big Tech have a chance at nabbing those ad dollars? And exactly how are creators slotting into this landscape? We parse the presentations in this week’s episode of Marketing Brew Weekly.

From Pope Hat Night to “Fourth Wing” Night, the White Sox are upping the ante
to get fans to Rate Field. Marketing Brew spoke to Mike Downey, the team’s senior director of marketing and promotions, about how it all comes together.