Cannes in Color: From Networking to C-Suite Activism, true[X} Christian Borges explains

CANNES – Started three years ago on the true[X] yacht as a networking event for people of color at the festival, the program Cannes in Color has morphed into a major industry diversity movement called the I.D.E.A. Initiative. This year, it grabbed the spotlight at Cannes Lions with hundreds of attendees gathered at the Spotify […]

 
 

What’s Driving Media M&A: EY’s Media & Entertainment Lead Janet Balis explains both Vertical and Horizontal Plays

Whether it is AT&T buying Time Warner, Comcast and Disney bidding for 21st Century Fox, or the earlier roll-up of Verizon, Yahoo and AOL, one thing is clear – US media and technology consolidation is in full-swing. One more thing that’s in full-swing? The arrival of consulting firms to the advertising and marketing party. For […]

 
 

A Shorter Cannes: Fewer Agency Execs, More Brands And Consultancies

CANNES – Shortened by one day this year, the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity attracted fewer agency people. But there was a 30% increase in attendance by brand marketers and a 20% rise in the number of consulting firms, according to MediaLink Vice Chairman Wenda Harris Millard. So the Festival is still a “very […]

 
 

Kimberly-Clark Wants To Clean Up Media with Blockchain

The worlds of crypto-currency and toilet paper may seem to have little in common – but the technology that underpins Bitcoin may soon help one of the world’s largest personal hygiene product makers clean up its media business. Kimberly-Clark, whose – brands include Andrex, Corronelle and Huggies – was one of the companies announced by […]

 
 

TV Ad Load Reduction Could Cause ‘Short-Term Up And Down Pain’: MediaLink’s Spiegel

CANNES – At gatherings like the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity, audience segmentation strategies have been been front and center for the past few years. “I think now that a lot of learning discussions have come out we’ve come back to if you do that type of targeting, what are you going to say […]

 
 

L’Oreal To TV Networks: We Want A Seat At The Ad Formats Table

CANNES – While L’Oreal USA’s Nadine Karp McHugh is happy to hear lots of conversations by television networks about how to improve the viewer advertising experience, she’d like to hear more marketer voices giving their input. “I think that’s really important to solve for. But they should start with not only the consumers but also […]

 
 

Go Beyond 15 & 30: Hulu’s Naylor Advocates Interactive Ads

CANNES — It was the subject of a thousand interactive TV dreams in the nineties – the ability to buy products straight from ads seen on the TV screen. Now Hulu has enabled it, and its ad chief thinks the future has finally arrived. The new ad unit, called T-Commerce, was launched with interactive firm […]

 
 

Twitter’s Prince On What’s Happening At The World Cup

When Twitter unveiled its mid-June feature update, focusing the company on a message of serving “What’s Happening“, it seemed strange. Twitter first embraced “What’s happening?“, the prompt to create new tweets, back in 2009. But, this time, the company was making some product changes, to better emphasise its role at the heart of global user […]

 
 

On The Heels Of Cannes, true[X] Strikes A Deal With Essence

CANNES – Two highlights at the 2018 Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity for true[X] President Pooja Midha are some “very promising conversations” about the company’s engagement ad formats and positive response to measuring brand lift. “People really appreciate that the engagement ad format, which is the core of our business, has the power and […]

 
 

GDPR Was Just The Start: MediaMath’s Rothkopf

One month after Europe’s new privacy legislation came in to effect, the world did not cease to exist – but a good proportion of ad inventory did. Still, one ad-tech exec believes consumers have every right to expect a rebalancing of their relationship with publishers and advertisers, which the new GDPR law sought to usher […]

 
 

Unilever’s Blockchain Goals: Clearer Ecosystem, Better Business Decisions

CANNES – Rob Master is excited about the promise of transparency, visibility and measurement for Unilever as it helps to pioneer a blockchain consortium with IBM and Mediaocean. To him, it’s all about prioritizing dollars. “The digital ecosystem is fraught I think, as we’ve all seen with a host of challenges,” says the VP of […]

 
 

Next Up For Nielsen: Measuring Podcasts

CANNES — If you believe the hype, podcasts right now are one of the fastest-growing media in the market. Edison Research’s The Podcast Consumer, the most oft-cited proofpoint, now suggests weekly podcast listening has grown to 17% of Americans aged 12 or over, with a balanced gender split. More and more publishers are falling over […]

 
 

Digital And Linear No Longer Two Separate Worlds: Wavemaker’s Richman

CANNES – Like many industry executives, Amanda Richman applauds the “shared sense of purpose” among parties looking to advance measurement capabilities and experiment with new ad formats instead of “letting those conversations sit at a committee level.” When she eyes the video landscape, Richman sees it evolving toward the opportunity for more precision targeting without […]

 
 

Mars’ Jane Wakely: Accountability Means Growth

CANNES – Big brands are far from dead, according to the Chief Marketing Officer of Mars Pet Nutrition. But they need to winnow out “fake news” about their supposed widespread demise and establish an evidence-based philosophy and operating model for driving growth, says Jane Wakely. “Accountability in marketing to me means growth. Ultimately, I think […]

 
 

ROI Measurement Proves ‘We’re An Investment, Not A Cost’: AT&T’s Carter

CANNES – While bigger can imply better when it comes to media scale, it doesn’t shield you from challenges like audience fragmentation and the “murkiness” of the digital advertising ecosystem. So while AT&T recently upped its vertical integration game with the acquisition of Time Warner, it’s as enthusiastic as smaller companies to see various industry […]

 
 

Dentsu Aegis Group’s Seiler Ponders Real-Time Creative, Evolving Technologies

CANNES – There was no shortage of talk about data at the recent Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity. But beyond the purpose of targeting people who are actually relevant to particular brands, “when you get to the right people, what happens?” asks Dentsu Aegis Network’s Matt Seiler. In this interview with Beet.TV at the […]

 
 

IBM Watson’s Seifer On How Agencies Can Embrace Blockchain

CANNES — After transparency, back-handers and disintermediation by platforms, next on the list of challenges facing media agencies is blockchain. Or, is it? A blockchain is a public, distributed, anonymised ledger of transactions that is supremely trackable and traceable. It is the technology that underpins digital currencies like Bitcoin – but, in theory, those “transactions” don’t have to […]

 
 

Mediaocean’s Sampath Explains The Role Of Blockchain In Media Transactions

CANNES — Even before digital media came along, it was a chore to reconcile buys across radio, print, television and other media while monitoring discrepancies and make-goods. Throw in the dizzying complexity of digital media transactions and it’s no wonder that marketers like Unilever are embracing blockchain technology. “What blockchain does is create a single […]

 
 

Video Needs More Consumer-Relevant Ad Formats: Nissan’s Witherspoon

CANNES — Why broadly advertise convertibles to everyone in Russia when you can now target potential buyers by vehicle segment? “The thing that’s really exciting me right now is actually being able to create more relevant one-to-one communications with consumers,” says Allyson Witherspoon, Nissan Motor Corp.’s GM, Global Brand Engagement. “We have so much available […]

 
 

In A Cross-Platform World, You Need A Host Of Partners: NBCU’s Colella

CANNES – In the modern-day television business, you can’t have too many partners to meet the growing demands of both viewers and advertisers. This is particularly true in the attribution space. “We understand that brands are going to demand their own special measurement. It’s not our place to determine exactly who they should use,” says […]

 
1 2 3 4