What's New in Marketing This Week - May 13th

This post contains all the source links and expanded details from Edition #49 of our weekly Marketing Roundup newsletter.

We keep external links out of the emails to ensure it lands in your inbox (not spam). Here’s where you can dig deeper into each story.

This week we talked about:

Advertising Updates: Google will auto-link YouTube channels to Google Ads accounts on June 10, and TikTok just launched an ad-free subscription in the U.K.
Creator Economy & Social Updates: Instagram is testing per-slide captions in carousels.
SEO News: Google dropped FAQ rich results on May 7.
AI Advancements: Hermes Agent just overtook OpenClaw as the most-used open-source AI agent, and Adthena launched a competitive intelligence platform for ChatGPT ads.

Note: This is just the news and links.

For our full analysis, strategic insights, and implementation tips for each update, subscribe to the Marketing Roundup and get the complete newsletter delivered to your inbox every week.

TikTok Launches Ad-Free Subscription in the U.K.

TikTok Launches Ad-Free

Subscription in the U.K.

TikTok is rolling out a paid ad-free tier in the U.K. Subscribers will see no ads and can opt out of personal data tracking. Users who don’t subscribe keep the same free experience they have now.

Google Ads Will Auto-Link YouTube Channels

Google Ads Will Auto-Link

YouTube Channels

Google is automatically linking Google Ads accounts to associated YouTube channels on June 10, 2026. Advertisers will receive advance notice and can opt out if they choose. Once linked, you get access to organic video metrics inside Google Ads, the ability to build audience segments based on YouTube engagement, and earned actions like subscriptions as conversion signals.

Instagram Tests Per-Slide Captions in Carousels

Instagram Tests Per-Slide

Captions in Carousels

Instagram is testing a new option that lets users add a separate caption to each individual image or video within a carousel post (instead of one caption for the whole post).

Google Drops FAQ Rich Results

Google Drops FAQ

Rich Results

As of May 7, 2026, Google no longer shows FAQ rich results in search. This means the expanded accordion-style FAQ snippets that used to appear beneath some search results are gone. Google Search Console will stop reporting on FAQ structured data in June, and API support will be removed in August.

Hermes Agent Is now the Most-Used Open-Source

Hermes Agent

Is now the Most-Used

Open-Source

A new open-source AI agent called Hermes Agent has taken the top spot on OpenRouter’s global daily rankings (surpassing OpenClaw). The key difference between the two is that OpenClaw is built for reach (connecting to 50+ messaging platforms through a central routing layer). Hermes is built for depth (using a “do, learn, improve” loop that gets better at your workflows the longer you run it).

Adthena Launches ChatGPT Ads Intelligence Platform

Adthena Launches ChatGPT

Ads Intelligence Platform

Adthena just released a competitive intelligence platform specifically for ChatGPT ads. It monitors over 300,000 daily prompts, tracking which brands are advertising, where their ads appear, and what messaging they’re using. Advertisers get a cross-channel dashboard combining ChatGPT and Google Ads data, along with real-time optimization recommendations.

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