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BMD research and guest essays, newest first.
The £800 Campaign That Sold Four Times
A campaign brought in 15,000 visitors but only four orders, prompting a better way to evaluate marketing performance. Lilach Bullock shares a simple monthly review and two client fixes that improved what existing visitors did next.
Lilach BullockAI implementation consultant and fractional CMOSEO Is Changing, but Businesses Are Still Measuring the Wrong Things
Rankings, traffic, and backlinks can make a report look impressive without showing whether a business benefited. Felix Kirsch argues for measuring the path from relevant visibility to qualified enquiries, customers, and revenue.
Why Marketing Automation Fails Without a Growth Strategy
Automation can improve follow-up and customer experiences, but it cannot repair unclear ownership or a broken growth system. Hava Maloku outlines how to connect customer journeys, marketing, sales, and revenue before scaling with technology.
How Local Community Marketing Can Help Small Businesses Grow Without Large Advertising Budgets
Local community marketing can create relevant attention, useful customer insight, and trust without the cost of broad advertising. Julian Frincu shares a practical framework for testing demand, measuring enquiries, and turning community feedback into growth.
Hyperlocal Ad Spend Runs on Location Data That Often Isn’t Real
Hyperlocal advertising promises precision, but location data can be inaccurate, incomplete, or fraudulent. Callum Gracie explains why marketers should favour owned signals and geo-experiments over unverified dashboard estimates.
How the BMD Marketing Library works
When a brief lands, what do we actually open: a folder of ads we like, or a job the ad has to do? This is a working version of the library write-up. The catalog, templates, and analysis coverage will keep changing.
Redha Alayesh
Emirates' 9-Year Lesson: A Valuation Models the Revenue, It Never Prices the Marketing
A companion piece to Episode 24 of the BMD marketing case-study series, the one that closes Season 1 and the ninth of the Gulf run. The headline is that Emirates is the most valuable airline brand outside North America, worth 10.6 billion dollars. The same consultancy called it the most valuable airline brand in the world in 2016, at 7.7 billion. The number went up. The position went down. Both moves have the same cause, and it is not the advertising.
Nice One's 139x Lesson: An Order Book Measures the Float, It Never Measures the Brand
A companion piece to Episode 23 of the BMD marketing case-study series, the eighth episode of the Gulf run and the first one whose subject is a listed company, which means the scoreboard is audited and it keeps updating after the story ends. The headline is that a Saudi beauty platform's offering was 139 times covered and the shares hit their limit on day one. The same offering carried a second multiple, on the same shares in the same week, and it was 7.9.
stc pay's 15 Percent Lesson: Distribution Buys the Install, It Never Buys the Habit
A companion piece to Episode 22 of the BMD marketing case-study series, the seventh episode of the Gulf run and the first one whose parent is a listed operator rather than a fund. The headline is that a telecom's wallet became Saudi Arabia's first unicorn on a 200 million dollar cheque from Western Union. The lesson everybody took from it is that owned distribution is the cheapest growth there is, and the man who ran that wallet has since spent two years disproving it in public.
Visit Saudi's 6 Percent Lesson: A Target Counts Everybody, It Never Counts the Persuaded
A companion piece to Episode 21 of the BMD marketing case-study series, the sixth episode of the Gulf run and the second nation-branding subject in a row. The headline is 122 million visitors a year, hit six years ahead of a target nobody expected to reach. The part of that number a global tourism campaign could plausibly have caused is about six per cent of it, and that six per cent did not grow last year.
Ronaldo's 3 Percent Lesson: A Star Fills His Own Seats, He Never Fills the League
A companion piece to Episode 20 of the BMD marketing case-study series, the fifth episode of the Gulf run. The four episodes before it took apart prices. This one takes apart an audience, which is harder, because an audience number feels like evidence in a way a valuation does not. Two economists ran the experiment properly and published the answer, and the answer is smaller than the story by an order of magnitude.
noon's 10 Billion Lesson: Localisation Buys the Entry, It Never Buys the Market
A companion piece to Episode 19 of the BMD marketing case-study series, the fourth episode of the Gulf run. Episode 18 took apart a price that was actually paid. This one takes apart a price that never was: ten billion dollars, quoted in the present tense about a company whose newest funding round closed without printing a number. The company is real, the scale is real, and the story everybody tells about why it exists runs backwards.
Careem's 3.1 Billion Lesson: An Exit Prices the Buyer's Urgency, It Never Scores the Asset
A companion piece to Episode 18 of the BMD marketing case-study series, the third episode of the Gulf run. Episode 17 took apart a valuation nobody had retested. This one takes apart a price that was actually paid, which is rarer and more useful: 3.1 billion dollars, the largest technology exit the Middle East has produced. The exit is real and the company was real. The price was set by the buyer's calendar, and the buyer wrote down what it actually paid.
Ninja's 3 Year Lesson: Speed Proves the Operator, It Never Proves the Model
A companion piece to Episode 17 of the BMD marketing case-study series, the second episode of the Gulf run. Episode 16 took apart a funding scoreboard belonging to two companies. This one takes apart the number everybody repeats about a single company: three years from founding to a 1.5 billion dollar valuation, the fastest unicorn the Kingdom has produced. The three years is accurate. It is also measuring the company rather than the person who built it, and the difference between those two things is the whole episode.
Tabby and Tamara's 45 Million Lesson: A Round Prices the Company, It Never Scores the Marketing
A companion piece to Episode 16 of the BMD marketing case-study series, and the episode that opens the Gulf run. The fifteen before it took apart campaigns. This one takes apart a scoreboard, because the Saudi startup story is told almost entirely in funding numbers and every one of those numbers measures money going in rather than a customer coming back. Tabby says 25 million registered users. Tamara says 20 million customers. Their markets hold about 54 million people in total, and that arithmetic is the whole episode.
Nike's 3 Day Lesson: A Stand Confirms Your Base, It Never Converts One
A companion piece to Episode 15 of the BMD marketing case-study series, and the last of the brand-versus-growth half. Episode 14 was about a campaign that announced a promise for twenty years without ever being bound by it. This one is the opposite case and the harder one, because the campaign worked: Nike put the most divisive man in American sport at the centre of its thirtieth anniversary, took three per cent off its own share price in a day, and set a record high nine days later. This is the full autopsy of the four numbers that story is told with, none of which Nike has ever published.
Dove's 20 Year Lesson: A Campaign Can Announce a Promise, It Never Keeps One
A companion piece to Episode 14 of the BMD marketing case-study series. Episode 13 was about a video credited with building a company that something else built. This one is about the opposite problem: a campaign that really did run for twenty years, really is the most admired brand platform in modern marketing, and is credited with a number that has two different windows, two different starting points and no primary source at all. This is the full autopsy: what the famous doubling counts, what Unilever has actually published about Dove, and what was running in the next office the whole time.
Dollar Shave Club's 4,500 Dollar Lesson: A Video Buys the First Order, It Never Buys the Second One
A companion piece to Episode 13 of the BMD marketing case-study series. Episode 12 was about a campaign credited with a job it structurally cannot do. This one is about a video credited with building a company that something else built. The video tells the story in minutes. This is the full autopsy: what 12,000 orders in 48 hours is a count of, what was already in the bank on the morning it went up, and what the billion dollars actually bought the company that paid it.
Spotify's 30 Song Lesson: Wrapped Rewards a Year You Already Spent, It Never Buys a New One
A companion piece to Episode 12 of the BMD marketing case-study series. Episode 11 was about a company that already owned its market before it did the thing everybody remembers. This one is about a campaign everybody remembers for a job it cannot do. The video tells the story in minutes. This is the full autopsy: what Spotify is counting when it says 200 million people engaged, why a person who downloads the app in December cannot have a Wrapped at all, and what happened in the year the numbers went up and the mood went down.
Red Bull's 4 Minute Lesson: A Stunt Amplifies a Machine, It Never Builds One
A companion piece to Episode 11 of the BMD marketing case-study series. Episode 10 was about a company that sold meaning and still could not sell margin. This one is about a company that already had the margin, the shelf and the market share years before it did the thing everybody remembers. The video tells the story in minutes. This is the full autopsy: what the famous 8 million number actually counts, what the jump cost and what anyone can show it returned, and why the year after the most quoted marketing stunt ever run is the number nobody quotes.
Liquid Death's 1,500 Dollar Lesson: Meaning Opens the Door, It Never Pays the Rent
A companion piece to Episode 10 of the BMD marketing case-study series. Episode 9 was about a company that had lost trust and stopped arguing about it. This one is about a company with nothing to argue about in the first place, because it sells water. The video tells the story in minutes. This is the full autopsy: what the 1,500 dollar video actually bought, who Liquid Death sold equity to in order to reach a shelf, and why the 1.4 billion dollar number in every retelling is older than the people quoting it seem to know.
Cadbury's 90 Second Lesson: Feeling Restores Meaning, It Never Fixes the Fault
A companion piece to Episode 9 of the BMD marketing case-study series. Episode 8 was about a company that changed who it was talking to. This one is about a company that had stopped being trusted, and decided to stop arguing about it. The video tells the story in minutes. This is the full autopsy: what Cadbury had already closed before the famous ad ran, what else was running beside it that autumn, and why one campaign carries at least four different sales figures.
Old Spice's 125 Percent Lesson: Target the Buyer, Not the User
A companion piece to Episode 8 of the BMD marketing case-study series. Episode 7 was about a company that cut its budget and found out what it already owned. This one is about a company that changed who it was talking to. The video tells the story in minutes. This is the full autopsy: what Old Spice actually decided, why the viral moment everybody credits arrived two months after the sales lift had started, and how to find out who really buys from you.
Airbnb's 662 Million Dollar Lesson: A Cut Reveals an Asset, It Never Builds One
A companion piece to Episode 7 of the BMD marketing case-study series. Episode 6 closed the failures. This one opens the other half, what to do. The video tells the story in minutes. This is the full autopsy: what Airbnb actually cut, what the famous 95 percent number does not say, and the order to follow before you touch your own marketing budget.
Peloton's 13-Month Lesson: A Wave Lifts You, It Never Carries You
A companion piece to Episode 6 of the BMD marketing case-study series. The video tells the story in minutes. This is the full autopsy: what actually happened, why the popular Christmas-ad story is the wrong lesson, and the order smart companies use before they turn a temporary spike into a permanent cost.
Lead Generation in Saudi Arabia: Build the Follow-Up First
How to build a lead generation machine for a Saudi company of 50 to 250 people: what a lead is worth, the magnet, the ad, the follow-up and the lead bank.
Redha Alayesh
Emotional Marketing: Name the Exact Feeling, Not the Pain Point
Pain point is too blunt a brief. Frustration and resignation both hurt, and they need opposite messages. What the evidence on emotion in marketing and B2B buying actually shows, where the ethical line is, and a free map of 24 emotions.
Redha Alayesh
Pepsi's 24-Hour Lesson: Don't Borrow a Moment You Haven't Earned
A companion piece to Episode 5 of the BMD marketing case-study series. The video tells the story in minutes. This is the full autopsy: what actually happened, why the popular cost-and-celebrity story is the wrong lesson, and the order smart companies use before they borrow a cultural moment.
Founder Personal Brand: Optional If Buyers Can Test First
Founder visibility is optional when customers can test the product first. When they must trust a person, what they recognise and the thinking they have seen decide who gets considered. The evidence, where it stops, and how to be known without dependency.
Redha Alayesh
Gap's 6-Day Lesson: Don't Touch an Icon Without Bringing People Along
A companion piece to Episode 4 of the BMD marketing case-study series. The video tells the story in minutes. This is the full autopsy: what actually happened, why the popular $100 million story is the wrong lesson, and the order smart companies use before they touch an icon.
New Coke's 79-Day Lesson: People Don't Buy Taste, They Buy Meaning
What actually happened, why the numbers were right while the decision was wrong, and the questions smart companies ask before they touch any core asset of their brand.
Quibi's $1.75 Billion Lesson: Why Marketing Can't Buy Product-Market Fit
What actually happened, why the popular explanation is wrong, and the order smart companies follow before they scale their spend.
Redha Alayesh
Bud Light's $1.4 Billion Lesson: Know Who Pays Before You Pick a Side
What actually happened, why the popular $1.4 billion story is the wrong lesson, and the order smart companies follow before they pick a side.
Redha Alayesh
97% have a content strategy. 12% hit their goals.
A piece of content moves through nine stages, and most teams run four. The four they skip, why each one compounds, and every framework attributed to its source.
Redha Alayesh
The words Saudi Arabia actually types
More than 100 keywords pulled in Arabic and English, and 13 search pages taken apart. What this market searches for when it wants marketing, and what the gaps mean.
Redha Alayesh
Marketing strategy: the four choices that turn spend into growth
Most Saudi companies run a calendar and call it a marketing strategy. We define the four choices, what it costs in riyals, and include a one-page marketing strategy template you can fill in one sitting.
Redha Alayesh
How to structure a marketing team in Saudi Arabia: who to hire first
The org chart, the roles, and the order to hire them, with 2026 salary bands in riyals, the 60% Saudization rule, and who to hire first.
Redha Alayesh
The marketing department: a system, not a headcount
Most companies have marketers, not a marketing department. The four properties that separate the two, real Saudi costs, and the sequence that builds it.
Redha Alayesh
Digital marketing agency or in-house team in Saudi Arabia?
Looking for a digital marketing agency in Saudi Arabia? We map real 2026 costs, when to hire vs build, and the hybrid model mid-size Saudi companies actually need.
Redha Alayesh
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