Definition

A collection of successful ads, emails, landing pages, and marketing materials you save for inspiration, basically plagiarism with better intentions.

Example Usage

I found that competitor's email campaign in my swipe file from 2019—let's use all their ideas because imitation is flattery, right?

Origin

From copywriting and creative industry practice

Fun Fact

Every successful copywriter maintains a swipe file worth thousands of hours of 'creative inspiration'

Source: Copywriting and creative marketing practice

Related Terms

Beginner

cost per click

The amount you pay each time someone clicks your ad, turning every click into a tiny financial transaction and every misclick into a personal tragedy. It's performance-based pricing that makes you pray for high intent and curse fat-fingered mobile users.

📣 Marketing / Advertising
Intermediate

ladder strategy

A sequential content marketing approach where each piece builds on the previous, leading audiences from awareness to conversion. Like a choose-your-own-adventure book, but with more CTAs.

📣 Marketing / Advertising
Beginner

Creative Brief

The document telling creative teams exactly what to make and how it should communicate—basically a cage for creative people.

📣 Marketing / Advertising
Beginner

soft bounce

When your email gets temporarily rejected—maybe their inbox is full, their server is having a bad day, or Mercury is in retrograde. Unlike hard bounces, there's still hope for future delivery.

📣 Marketing / Advertising
Intermediate

Cost Per Mille (CPM)

The cost of reaching 1,000 people with an advertisement, where advertisers pay for impressions regardless of engagement. It's essentially paying people to see your ad and then ignore it.

📣 Marketing / Advertising
Beginner

influencer marketing

Paying people with large social media followings to promote your product, operating on the principle that strangers trust other strangers more than they trust brands. It's word-of-mouth marketing for the selfie generation.

📣 Marketing / Advertising

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