SMG

CANNES — Since the value that addressable TV delivers is widely understood, what’s hampering its adoption?  Investment banker and CEO of LUMA Partners Terence Kawaja asks these panelists in a session taped aboard the AT&T AdWorks yacht. The mindset of big brands accustomed to the notion that they can buy a massive audience of adults […]

CANNES — We have heard a lot this year about how SMG’s VivaKi has moved much of the functionality of its distinct Audience On Demand programmatic division out in to sibling agencies. That has been the internal reorganization story. But what do clients think? “MediaVest has completely rethought staffing on our business. For the most part, it’s been […]

CANNES — For businesses that have often preached the dangers of operating in “silos”, it’s ironic how siloed ad agencies’ programmatic ad tech operations have been within their own companies. But that is now changing, with a couple of big agency initiatives to reboot how their dedicated programmatic divisions operate in their wider groups. Publicis’ VivaKi unit […]

CHICAGO — SMG is expanding the content platform it launched early last year to encompass video and native distribution channels. Designed to help SMG clients with their content marketing efforts, Content@Scale gives quick access to licensed content produced by more than 36 publishers and 135 content contributors, including CBSi, Kiplinger, Mode, Popsugar and AOL, as well […]

CHICAGO — Roughly 45% of display ads in the U.S. are now bought programmatically, and that’s much too big for programmatic buying to be considered a specialization anymore. For that reason, VivaKi’s AOD trading desk has been moving programmatic specialists over to client teams at Publicis Groupe’s media agencies. “It makes sense that we would […]

CHICAGO — What are the biggest and most exciting trends affecting advertising and communication today? Mobile, quicker time to sale, and the fusion of creative advertising by customer data, according to the boss of one of the world’s biggest ad agencies. Speaking with Beet.TV in this interview ahead of her visit to the upcoming Cannes Lions […]

CHICAGO – As programmatic buying has matured, agencies are pulling it from separate departments and integrating programmatic buying more closely into core operations, says Lisa Weinstein, President, Global Digital, Data and Analytics at Starcom MediaVest Group, in this interview with Beet.TV. The evolution of programmatic buying inside agencies is similar to the growth of digital departments, […]

CHICAGO — The amount of money SMG advertisers are spending on so-called “addressable TV”, which helps buyers target unique consumers via cable and satellite boxes, with Internet precision, is on course to double this year. “We sized the addressable market for 2014 at about $300 million,” says Tracey Scheppach, EVP of Precision Video at Starcom MediaVest Group, in this […]

One of the major themes of 2015 is viewability, says Erin Kienest, SVP, innovation and activation director at SMG. “We talk about making our dollars work harder and work smarter, and viewability really is brought to the forefront,” she says. Marketers not only want their ads delivered to the right audience but also want to […]

LONDON — Back in January, media agency SMG announced NextTECHnow, a program to get closer to UK tech startups that can help bring innovations to brand campaigns. Since then, the programme has been kept somewhat under the radar. But the man who runs it now opens up on the rationale and its early progress. “In the […]

LONDON — Thanks to the rise of advertising technology, the “Mad Men” of ad agencies have been joined by the so-called “Maths Men” of tech vendors. But these two camps need not be perceived as coming from different disciplines, says one agency boss. Pippa Glucklish, UK co-CEO of SMG, tells Beet.TV the “tension between data […]

LONDON — Back when SMG’s Pippa Glucklich was a university student writing her dissertation about women in advertising, just 14% of senior executives in the ad industry in the UK were women. Now, two decades later, the percentage has increased, but only to 25%. “Our industry in the UK is absolutely split 50/50 at entry […]

LONDON — By the time Steve Parker gets to Cannes, he will have earned a glass or wine or two on a yacht. The UK joint CEO of media agency Starcom MediaVest will have completed a 500km, multi-day bicycle ride from the center of France, across a series of mountains and down to the Cote D’Azur. It’s a […]

Ad group Publicis’ VivaKi digital division may be moving its programmatic experts out around the group, but that doesn’t mean VivaKi is dead. “VivaKi still lives on,” says SMG programmatic SVP Mac Delaney in this video interview. “It operates the SkyScraper platform, the database for all of the group’s campaign reporting. You still have VivaKi employees dedicated to the AOD operating […]

Publicis’ VivaKi unit is rethinking the way it delivers programmatic services, moving from a centralized offering to threading the discipline throughout sibling agency departments. In this video interview, SMG programmatic SVP Mac Delaney tells Beet.TV the move mirrors the way digital has always been centralized first, distributed later. “My team is rolling into the individual […]

Audience buying does not signal the end of premium publishing, but it is ushering in changing ways of doing business, says Mac Delaney, SVP of Programmatic at SMG Global, at the recent Beet.TV executive retreat.  Efficiencies, pricing, yield and CPMs are radically morphing, but publishers are still creating content and that content will still be […]

FORT LAUDERDALE — Recent reorganisations within Publicis’ Vivaki unit see digital expertise built up over the latter group’s existence moved from its Audience On Demand division to other agencies within the sister SMG group. The Drum reports on the changes here. “The largest group within AOD – the client services group … those individuals are […]

FORT LAUDERDALE — The industry talks a good game about using data from addressable TV sets to target TV ads at household level. But Tracey Scheppach has been knocking at that door for the last 13 years. Scheppach, EVP, who leads innovation at Starcom MediaVest Group and who leads VivaKi’s The Pool initiative, says TV operators […]

FORT LAUDERDALE  — Two decades in to the era of the TV set-top box, ad agencies are still not finding it easy to get access to good audience targeting data from viewers’ homes, says a marketing veteran. “There’s a lack of data,” says Tracey Scheppach, EVP, who leads innovation at Starcom MediaVest Group and who leads […]

CHICAGO — Mobile attracts different consumers in a different mindset than traditional digital media. So how can agencies get out of the “shovelware” mindset and give mobile users something more likely to yield results? A Beet.TV panel discussion heard executives’ answers: Maxus strategic planning director Jill Langan: “There are opportunities to use mobile as a […]