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Remembering Oath’s Jay Seideman: ‘He Was The Type Of Guy Many Of Us Strive To Be’ Nielsen’s Q2 Audience Benchmark Shows How Connected Devices Are Reshaping Media Tim Castree Named CEO Of GroupM North America Does WPP’s New Strategy Signify The Recoupling Of Creative And Media? WPP To Slash 3,500 Jobs And Consolidate More Agencies In Massive Restructure Agencies Laud Unilever's Retiring CMO Keith Weed Tencent: WeChat Is More Than A Product, It’s ‘An Ecosystem’ Multimillion-Dollar Oops! Google Will Pay Publishers For ‘The Night Of The Yellow Ad’ Advertisers Will Spend More Than Ever On Third-Party Data, Despite Privacy Concerns

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Why Ad Tech Exits Fail

by AdExchanger // Posted on Thursday, December 13th, 2018 at 12:05 am.

“Data-Driven Thinking” is written by members of the media community and contains fresh ideas on the digital revolution in media.

Today’s column is written by Corey Ferengul, board member at Hyde Park Angels.

Welcome to 2019. Every ad tech company seems to be for sale and, unfortunately, most efforts will fail.

While ad tech has gotten a good deal of bad press and isn’t viewed as a sexy investment, much of the failure is actually self-inflicted.

Over the past five years, I was CEO of two ad tech companies – Undertone and Magnetic – and successfully sold both. I’ve also led the acquisition of companies in the space, seen pitches for dozens of others and advised many more, either on an exit or strategy.

Based on my experience, I can point to three of the biggest reasons for a failure to exit.

No differentiation

The biggest problem, by far, is very clear and pervasive across the space: a lack of clear, defensible differentiation.

Majority of Twitch Esports Viewers Use Platform Every Day, Nielsen Report Shows

by Rae Paoletta // Posted on Thursday, December 13th, 2018 at 12:05 am.

A Nielsen survey released Thursday suggests esports watchers are a prime target for advertisers, but old strategies won’t work on them.

The 2018 Nielsen Esports Fan Insights report includes behavior data from hundreds of esports gamers collected over the last year. These fans watched and participated in games like “League of Legends,” “Overwatch League,” “Fortnite” and more.

The report is designed to help advertisers better understand how to allocate their dollars on Twitch, and explain why the esports community is such a valuable demographic to target.

Among the more surprising findings: Over 60% of Twitch users view gaming personalities live streaming on Twitch daily, and 70% say they spend more time engaging with esports than traditional ones.

TV: The Biggest Opportunity For DTC Brands’ Continued Growth

by AdExchanger // Posted on Thursday, December 13th, 2018 at 12:04 am.

"On TV And Video" is a column exploring opportunities and challenges in advanced TV and video.

Today’s column is written by Terence Kawaja, founder and CEO at LUMA Partners.

Allbirds. Warby Parker. Brandless. Peloton. Dollar Shave Club.

Over the past several years, an explosion of relatively young startups has garnered significant market share from major brands, some of which had built up their brand equity over decades.

These direct-to-consumer brands – alternatively referred to as D2C or DTC – have done just what the name implies: cut out the middle man to go directly to the consumer. This phenomenon is well beyond a fad – DTC success has been demonstrated in a variety of verticals and the number of new brands has topped 400, according to our LUMAscape of direct-to-consumer brands.

These brands have grown up on digital, leveraging advanced marketing technology to own the customer relationship and utilizing first-party data to understand and target the consumer effectively. The marketing spend is primarily performance-oriented, with a focus on customer acquisition. They’ve also taken a fresh approach to product design, customer service and content marketing.

Accenture Interactive To Acquire Adaptly; Wider Adoption For IAB Measurement SDK

by AdExchanger // Posted on Thursday, December 13th, 2018 at 12:03 am.

Here’s today’s AdExchanger.com news round-up… Want it by email? Sign up here.

Adapting

Accenture Interactive will acquire Adaptly, an ad tech and programmatic services company. Terms of the deal were not disclosed, but Adaptly has 150 employees and has raised $13 million in funding. Adaptly should help Accenture Interactive “enable workflow, improve quality assurance and really just operate better and faster and more effectively for clients,” Scott Tieman, global head of programmatic services at Accenture Interactive, tells The Wall Street Journal. The consulting firm has steadily pushed into the creative agency business for years, but caught flak from agency execs when it launched a programmatic unit in May, which they say is in direct conflict with its media auditing business. More.

Yieldbot No More

Yieldbot’s struggles came to an end Wednesday, as the company shut its doors. Chief Data Scientist Soren Macbeth and co-founder and CTO Richard Shea each tweeted their goodbyes. “I’m incredibly proud of the people I got to work with and the technology that we built,” Macbeth wrote. “I don’t have a plan yet for what is next. Reach out if you know of something cool.” Shea echoed the sentiment. Yieldbot began in 2010 as a publisher analytics platform and started selling media two years later. But as budgets shifted from ad networks to programmatic, the company faced a series of challenges, including a header bidding wrapper that didn’t catch on. In 2017 it laid off a third of its employees, and co-founder and CEO Jonathan Mendez left. Yieldbot’s closing is now another example of the winnowing of ad tech companies.

Hulu Will Finally Open An Automated PMP – Is It Because It’s Growing Too Fast To Meet Demand?

by Rae Paoletta // Posted on Wednesday, December 12th, 2018 at 6:47 pm.

On Jan. 1, 2019, Hulu will release an automated private marketplace that will allow advertisers to bid on Hulu inventory without going through the additional steps of working with Hulu’s sales team. Instead, advertisers can use their own DSPs or trading desks to plug into the marketplace.

The PMP will initially house standard 30-second spots, and Hulu has not disclosed the amount advertisers will have to pay for access. The new marketplace is a departure from the programmatic buying platform Hulu released in 2015, since advertisers still had to work with Hulu's sales team to adjust any inventory deals they had in place. That said, an advertiser still has to receive an invite from Hulu's sales team in order to gain access to the biddable environment within the new PMP.

Agencies and ad tech companies welcome the change.

“Our company, The Trade Desk, and other companies have wanted Hulu to open up more private marketplace inventory over the last two to three years,” Mark Douglas, CEO of ad platform SteelHouse, told AdExchanger. “To see them start to really embrace it, I think everyone is going to be happy about that.”

Tim Castree Named CEO Of GroupM North America

by Alison Weissbrot // Posted on Wednesday, December 12th, 2018 at 5:15 pm.

GroupM said Wednesday that Wavemaker global CEO Tim Castree has been named CEO of GroupM North America. Castree does not yet have a successor and will stay on in an advisory role at Wavemaker until a replacement is named.

Castree’s big task will be to get GroupM back to growth in North America, its slowest growing market but the world’s largest advertising market. The media group suffered a number of account losses this year in North America including Ford and American Express.

Last quarter, parent WPP’s North American revenue dropped 10.6% to $1.7 billion.

“GroupM is not growing as fast as it wants and needs to in this part of the world,” Castree told AdExchanger.

Castree hopes to make the media buying unit easier for clients, staff and partners to navigate.

“We have far too many operational silos,” he said. “While in many cases we simplify around clients, it’s not always the case. And even when we do, we don’t simplify for our people.”

While details of simplification are still in the works, Castree confirmed GroupM won’t be merging any more of its media agencies, like it did last year with MEC and Maxus to create Wavemaker.

Integral Ad Science Brings On Yahoo Exec Lisa Utzschneider As CEO

by Sarah Sluis // Posted on Wednesday, December 12th, 2018 at 4:18 pm.

Integral Ad Science named Lisa Utzschneider as CEO Wednesday. She will start in January by performing a strategic analysis of the business and creating a growth plan for the verification company.

After mulling an IPO, Integral Ad Science went the private equity route this summer when Vista Equity Partners bought a majority stake in the company at an $820 million to $850 million valuation.

After the sale, the company needed someone to bring “fresh eyes and energy to the business,” said outgoing Integral Ad Science CEO Scott Knoll. He assisted with the search for the new CEO and will continue to serve as an adviser. The company originally considered board member Don Epperson for the role before landing on Utzschneider.

“There is a huge opportunity for Integral Ad Science. We need someone with experience in scaling a large organization,” Knoll said.

Utzschneider comes with expertise honed at Amazon, Microsoft and Yahoo, where she held top sales roles. She left Yahoo after Verizon acquired the business last year, and she spent time doing board work and exploring what to do next. That’s where IAS came in.

Vista Equity Partners is known for using a playbook to streamline the software companies it buys, and Integral Ad Science is no exception. Like all executives at Vista-owned companies, Utzschneider “absolutely” took the timed quiz to assess senior leadership, she said.

Does WPP’s New Strategy Signify The Recoupling Of Creative And Media?

by Alison Weissbrot // Posted on Wednesday, December 12th, 2018 at 10:33 am.

Even before WPP’s restructuring announcement Tuesday, the holding company had already merged digital agency VML with creative agency Young & Rubicam, and digital agency Wunderman with creative agency J. Walter Thompson.

It’s still unclear what that means for GroupM’s four large media agencies. WPP CEO Mark Read didn’t comment directly about the media buying arm, though changes are already afoot with Wavemaker chief Tim Castree being elevated Wednesday to GroupM North America CEO.

A GroupM spokesperson said that beyond the merger of MEC and Maxus last year, it does not plan on any more consolidation within the group. But that doesn’t preclude a media agency combining with a creative agency.

“GroupM could have a tighter integration with the creative side of the holding company,” said Jay Pattisall, principal analyst at Forrester. “That could look like GroupM agencies merged with a creative or digital agency, or it could be in the form of exclusive partnerships.”

If that transformation happens, clients will have to adjust their expectations. Media departments spun out of creative agencies to create a new profit center and avoid brand conflicts. Integrations are expensive, and those fees will likely find their way back to the very brands currently trying to cut costs.

“If marketers are looking for integration, they’re going to have to pay for it appropriately,” Pattisall said. “And they’re going to have to be much more forgiving about conflicts.”

How Programmatic Is Reshaping J&J’s Shopper Marketing – Even For Non-Ecom Brands

by James Hercher // Posted on Wednesday, December 12th, 2018 at 12:32 am.

Data and analytics are breaking down the walls between Johnson & Johnson’s shopper marketing and national marketing plans.

Danielle Price manages shopper marketing and consumer promotions for J&J’s Aveeno brand after working as a J&J shopper marketing rep to Walmart. Her new job spans shopper marketing and national promotions, which used to be two roles, but analytics now helps bridge the worlds of shopper marketers, who must move inventory off specific retail shelves, with national marketers, who are concerned about media and audiences.

“At Walmart I had every number you could ever need, and I came to this role and realized shopper marketers weren’t getting the metrics they need,” Price said.

It’s easy to measure coupons and deals promoted in a grocery store aisle because they’re redeemed at a cash register, but they don’t connect to media metrics or the brand’s audience.

Are coupons bringing new customers to the brand or just teaching loyalists to load up on deals? Do customers buy across the Aveeno portfolio of skin, hair and beauty products or is their interest product-specific?

Those are the kinds of questions shopper marketers haven’t been able to answer but are figuring out by incorporating more data-driven channels into their marketing mix, Price said.

Aveeno products are sold almost entirely in stores – its website doesn’t even support direct ecommerce – but investing more online helps to better understand its brick-and-mortar customers, Price said.

For instance, Aveeno has worked with the ecommerce marketing company Quotient to distribute deals on its coupons.com property, but in the past year it began testing Quotient’s media buying and analytics to connect coupon redeemers to online audiences.

The Real Impact Of Data Breaches

by AdExchanger // Posted on Wednesday, December 12th, 2018 at 12:05 am.

“Data-Driven Thinking” is written by members of the media community and contains fresh ideas on the digital revolution in media.

Today’s column is written by Maja Milicevic, co-founder and principal at Sparrow Advisers.

Seemingly every few weeks news breaks of a new hacking scandal or high profile data breach. No industry is immune: Among the recently breached are a global hotel chain, a Q&A platform, fitness apps, global social platforms, big-box retailers and data companies that routinely handle vast amounts of sensitive, personal informationdata. There are likely many more that have yet to be uncovered.

Lukewarm responses to the breaches have also become quite common. It’s often difficult to quantify real-life impact and damage, especially since the types of data types compromised can vary. The legal and regulatory frameworks to ensure some accountability and punishment severely lag behind the complexity and prevalence of routine data collection and retention practices – and not just in marketing. With no enforcement, companies have little incentive to devote real resources to preemptive and ongoing data protection.

It’s not just limited to nefarious actors. Today’s data economy is generally opaque and doesn’t allow for visibility nor structured input and control from consumers. Data innocuously collected by a publisher today – while a reader researches a health condition, for example – can be repackaged, resold and surface years later as input into an important decision, such as whether to grant someone life insurance. This may sound like a nightmare scenario but it is unfortunately similar to what is already happening today.

There are several steps that marketing and advertising industry professionals can take to ensure we’re better custodians of our customers’ data.