Robert Andrews

Back in 2015, Viacom was one of the first broadcast owners to sell ads based on data about advertisers’ audiences. The product it launched to do that was called Vantage, and is now also used by rivals like Fox. In this video interview with Beet.TV, the man who runs it explains the undertaking. “How do […]

Time flies, and it is now almost two years since GroupM, the world’s biggest ad-buying agency, reorganized its early programmatic ad buying initiatives in to [M]Platform, a new cross-agency unit. [M]Platform, the rationale went, would be a “suite” that comprises data analytics, audience insights, data scientists, technologists from across other GroupM divisions, including the Xaxis […]

If data really is the new oil, how do you know where to drill? And how do you extract and refine the black stuff, once found? Most marketers now understand the importance and the power of acquiring, segmenting and targeting against distinct audience data characteristics. But, as they jump in, many skip over the strategy […]

PHOENIX — Twenty-five years after the first web banner ad was supposedly sold, the digital advertising business has come a long way. It took just a couple of years, after HotWired sold the ad to AT&T manually, for software to be applied to ad sales. Now in what the DMP managing director of ad-tech vendor […]

Contextual mishaps always existed in the days before digital. Ads always got placed next to editorial their buyers wish had not been there. But it is the control, power and automation promised by digital that has made media placement faux pas harder to take. That is a takeaway from one digital agency exec currently undertaking […]

PHOENIX — The Washington Post’s in-house, self-built software line-up already numbers some products that lean on artificial intelligence. But the unit called Arc Publishing thinks the future is going to be orders of magnitude different – for better or for worse. In this video interview with Beet.TV, Shailesh Prakash, Washington Post CIO, outlines the evolution from […]

PHOENIX — News publishers need to come together to create a single method of storing user identities, according to News Corp’s programmatic ad sales chief. In the last two years, rival publishers in many several countries around the world have come together to form joint systems which aim to unify audience data in to holistic […]

Why is $300 million the new black? Because that is the amount that both Google and Facebook have each pledged to spend on initiatives for news publishers, both over three years. For one ad agency veteran who is now a board member at one of the world’s largest news organizations, that may not be enough. […]

PHOENIX — Two years after the world’s biggest advertiser lit a fire under a litany of digital advertising supply chain concerns, the world’s biggest ad buyer says things have improved. Now he hopes advertisers can pay a price that reflects the improvement. In this video interview with Beet.TV, John Montgomery, GroupM global brand safety EVP, […]

PHOENIX — In the ashes of the transparency outcry, more and more brands have decided to undertake marketing under their own steam. In fact, the number of US brands which have launched in-house agencies has reached 78% – up from 58% in 2013, according to the ANA’s In-House Agency Report. On the ground, however, chatter […]

PHOENIX — Even as subscription content services go on booming, people have been forecasting a plateau. As the likes of Netflix, Spotify, news publishers, grocery services and more attract monthly paying customers, they aren’t just causing brands to worry about a diminishing ad hole, they are also pushing some to fret about looming “subscription fatigue”. […]

Do advertisers have a moral duty to continue spending in news organizations? And what kind of effectiveness can they find there? Over the last year, concern has grown that some brands are opting out of a news environment where the level of political discourse has turned negative. Some media agency executives told Digiday they had blocked hundreds […]

The growth in subscription, ad-free media services like Netflix is forcing brands to look at alternative messaging formats in a land where, once, they enjoyed ad space between content. News has become an increasingly attractive environment. That is according to one agency content chief who helps the brands find the best way to meet their […]

PHOENIX — The ad world is ablaze with people keen to deliver ads in video formats. But, whilst the push toward connected TV is exciting, some advertisers may be leaving attention on the table. That’s according to one demand-side platform CEO. “On the buy side, there’s a lot of excitement around connected TV, the idea […]

PHOENIX — If you want to know the part that data is going to play in the future of cable TV ad sales, ask the chief data officer at the consortium owned by Comcast, Spectrum and Cox. NCC Media’s Bob Ivins says the industry is “at the beginning stages” of so-called household-level “addressable TV”, the […]

PHOENIX — What changes when “the most-quoted in advertising” goes in-house? Not much, says Brian Wieser. In seven years a Pivotal Research, a Wall Street equity analyst firm, Wieser carved out a reputation – as senior research analyst – for sharp insight in to the worlds of media and advertising. Now he has been hired […]

PHOENIX — Could podcasts finally be about to get their payday? So often trailed as “the next big thing” in media and marketing, the format remains challenged by measurement issues, but is growing in popularity and in corporate interest, according to Edison Research and Spotify’s recent acquisitions of Gimlet Media and Anchor. A leader of […]

PHOENIX — Since it started seven years ago, The Washington Post’s in-house, self-built software line-up has grown in size and in customer base. Now it is being used by a whole new industry – broadcast. Products under the Post’s “Arc Publishing” studio include many more than when Beet.TV last wrote about Arc two years ago: […]

PHOENIX — Advertisers want choice, control and freedom to buy using automated technology platforms – but that doesn’t mean Hulu is going to let just anyone purchase its ad space. The online TV provider last month announced it made $1.5 billion in ad revenue last year, a rise of 45%, increasing it advertiser base by 50%. In […]

When Digiday reported recently how Comcast-owned NBCUniversal was beginning to use FreeWheel, its ad-tech software stablemate, to schedule linear TV ads, it set industry tongues wagging. That sort of integration requires extensive infrastructure development. But bigger things are coming, says James Rooke, FreeWheel GM, publishers, who explains the workings in this video interview with Beet.TV. […]