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- Your ATTN Please || Tuesday, 7 October
Your ATTN Please || Tuesday, 7 October
It’s officially pumpkin spice season, and you know what that means:
Tacky witches brooms propped up outside stores. “Spooky” deals and “BOO-tiful” products. Add in some plastic severed hands and…that’s pretty much Halloween marketing done. Meanwhile, culture has moved on. Because once upon a time, Halloween was about mystery. Fantasy. Transformation. And those happen to be 3 things Gen Z is kinda obsessed with. Which means it’s time to put down the skeletons and elevate your Halloween marketing, too.
- Charlotte Ellis, Editor ♡
WHAT’S HAPPENING IN MARKETING TODAY?
Claude stars in new Anthropic ad, Kim launches NikeSkims & Jude Law collabs with Uber Eats
Goated move by Anthropic. The AI company’s new 90-second spot encourages users to “Think Deeper” with Claude, positioning the chatbot as an “AI collaborator and companion” as opposed to a transactional shortcut. The ad starts with a world full of problems—all things Claude can help you solve.
But according to Anthropic, Claude isn’t trying to do the thinking for you. Instead, it sits at the table with you as a sparring partner, which is what this campaign aims to highlight. The AI model has apparently been shaped to question and sometimes even push back, making it not only better at problem-solving, but safer for humanity. Check out the spot here.
Kim Kardashian introduces NikeSkims.
Say what you want about her IDC, she is a marketing and business god, and you cannot change my mind. In a recent interview with Vogue, Kim speaks on her love for fitness and how it inspired the NikeSkims partnership dedicated entirely to athleticwear. Launched on September 26th on both the Nike and Skims websites, the collection features some of the most stunning body sculpting performance pieces I’ve ever seen.
It's also a major lever in Nike’s turnaround push as revenue in Q1 dipped 10%. New CEO Elliot Hill has been on a mission to get the brand back on track – and it seems he’s making all the right moves, particularly with this collaboration. Now I just need to source a cute $500 to build myself a set from the DREAMY matte collection, for which the bra alone starts at $105.
Jude Law is tired of being a romantic in new Uber Eats spot.
The concept of Jude Law actually being a raging Misophilist and being forced to play all of these roles while he cusses out the script in his trailer is so funny to me. It's also completely made up in my head, but it really makes you think about the roles we permanently assign to actors.
This spot continues Uber's “When You’ve Done Enough” UK brand platform, the first of which featured an evil Javier Bardem who was exhausted by always being the bad guy. Here, Uber Eats plays off Law’s reputation as a rom-com heartthrob, and how absolutely over it he is, as he tries desperately to avoid romantic moments that threaten to unfold throughout London. A clever platform for the brand. 10/10, no notes.
-Sophie Randell, Writer
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DEEP DIVE
How brands can do Halloween the right way (because we’re so over fake cobwebs & pumpkins!)
It’s officially October, which means it’s my season.
And unfortunately, I’m not talking about pumpkin spice and your “perfect fall lip shade,” (southern hemisphere, sorry darling). I won’t be offering any Autumnal strategies. I’m talking about the only season that truly matters: spooky season.
Listen, Halloween is my Roman Empire. There is nothing I love more than this holiday.
But while I live for cobwebs and candlelight, there’s one thing I can’t get behind, and it’s the way brands insist on flattening Halloween into Spirit Halloween clichés. Plastic gravestones. Polyester witches’ capes. Jack-o’-lantern emojis slapped onto anything that moves. Why do we resort to this every year? It’s tacky and it’s time to move on.
I believe Halloween doesn’t have to be so horrifically cheapened. It’s one of the few holidays that already sits at the intersection of myth, ritual, and transformation, themes that audiences (especially Gen Z) are obsessed with right now.
People now more than ever crave meaning, storytelling, and aesthetics that actually feel intentional, not like something ripped right off Pinterest and slapped on a campaign bs.
I’ve already seen some of my favourite creators, like Magdelene Fawn and Wilder Fleur, reimagine Halloween through an esoteric and elevated lens. Think fashion editorials with a witchy undertone. Modern Persephone energy. Costume as couture.
So why are brands still defaulting to rubber spiders when they could be conjuring mood and mystery instead?
This basically means Halloween is an untapped brand playground.
Why? Because dark and evil aside, Halloween is about play. Transformation. Experimentation. Fear, desire, and fantasy all tangled together. It’s camp, sure. But it’s also ritualistic and deeply human. Every culture has some version of a festival of the dead, of seasonal transition, of flirting with the unknown.
That’s a pretty rich creative territory to play in, if you look past the bargain-bin props.
So, how can brands and creators elevate Halloween?
Lean into ritual.
Instead of pumpkin spice everything, think tarot spreads, astrology tie-ins, moonlit beauty rituals. A skincare brand could drop a “ritual kit” that feels mystical instead of gimmicky. A bar could host a cocktail night themed around the four elements. Give people an experience that feels more like modern folklore.
Costume, but couture.
Girl, put downnnn the polyester catsuit. You’re better than that. As I said earlier, creators are already proving this with content that elevates Halloween dressing into something editorial. Brands could partner with stylists, makeup artists and creators to produce inspiration that feels aspirational, not ironic. Less Harley Quinn, more Harley Quinn-meets-Vivienne Westwood. And oooo I think I just gave myself an idea.
Tell deeper stories.
Halloween isn’t just American suburbia with candy corn. It’s Samhain, Día de los Muertos, Obon, All Hallows’ Eve. There are rich cultural traditions around death, rebirth, and ritual that brands can highlight respectfully, showing audiences that Halloween isn’t just about jump scares but about connection and continuity.
Build mood-driven experiences.
Skip the neon cobwebs and go full sensory. Candlelit pop-ups, velvet-draped launch parties, immersive gothic playlists. Even a simple October rebrand into a more gothic aesthetic: smoke, candlelight, shadows and deep reds would be a mood-shift away from cartoon pumpkins.
Sustainable, not disposable.
This is a huge one for me. Halloween is notorious for waste (cheap costumes worn once, endless plastic). A smart brand could flip that narrative: offer upcycled costume ideas, heirloom-quality décor, or timeless “spooky chic” staples people want to keep year after year. Imagine a thrift store curating costumes with their pieces. That’s the vibe.
Please, for the love of god, let go of the tacky tropes.
Halloween can and should be timeless, mysterious, romantic, even a little philosophical. For brands and creators who are brave enough to look beyond the costume aisle, Halloween is an excuse to experiment, enchant, and anchor themselves in something far richer than jump scares.
To be tacky and temporary, or eternally elevated? The choice is yours.
-Sophie Randell, Writer
TREND PLUG
We are literally a week behind
Like death and taxes, delays are an inevitable part of life. There's no fighting them and they're so ubiquitous, the only thing you can really do is... shrug, I guess?
It's a universal experience that's inspired a booming TikTok trend starring Beyoncé. In some behind-the-scenes footage, the singer sassily tells the camera:
"We are literally a week behind. We—we're 2 weeks behind. But what else is new?"
We've all been there, Queen Bey: to be human is to know endless delays that leave you feeling numb and indifferent. From being behind on your weight loss goals to being behind in... well, everything... we all know what it's like to be trudging towards our goals with barely enough energy to complain about it all.
How you can jump on this trend:
Grab this sound, put the camera on yourself and lip-sync with Beyoncé (not like you don't already do it in the mirror). Then, add some on-screen text setting the scene for the delays you're passively annoyed about. For extra impact, try using some sass in your video by rolling your eyes, waving your hands - whatever you think physically embodies the phrase "here we go again..."
A few ideas to get you started:
"Trying to do anything for your client who only texts back once a week"
"Walking into work Monday morning after feeling on top of everything on Friday"
"When you map out all of your tasks for the week, then get asked to do a 3-hour job by tomorrow"
- Devin Pike, Copywriter
FOR THE GROUP CHAT
😂 Yap’s funniest home videos: Puppy does BIG jump
✨Daily inspo: Give it your all
🎧Soooo tingly: Microphone Unbox Therapy
🍝What you should make for dinner tonight: LOADED POTATO SOUP?!?! 🤤
ASK THE EDITOR
How does the Instagram algorithm actually work? -Robbie
Hey Robbie!
What it boils down to is this: the IG algo is driven by user behaviour. That's why it's funny when people say they hate the algorithm—as if someone else has trained it! When people like, comment, and share content, the algorithm learns what type of content those users enjoy and begins pushing similar content to similar audiences.
So when it comes to creating content, the platform doesn't care how much effort you put into a piece of content. It only cares about whether it earns people's attention. And whether it will do that comes down to 3 things: relatability, story structure, and whether it has a human truth. So instead of worrying about the algorithm, put your focus into getting those elements right in your content.
- Charlotte Ellis, Editor ♡
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