Here’s today’s AdExchanger.com news round-up… Want it by email? Sign up here.
Trading Up
“Investors had gotten away from an industry they used to love, but the fundamentals are still there when you consider what percent of global ad spend is bought programmatically today versus what will be programmatic five or 10 years from now.”
That was Brian Stempeck, then-chief client officer, on the morning of The Trade Desk’s Nasdaq IPO in 2016.
Today, almost seven years later, The Trade Desk officially joins The Nasdaq-100 index.
TTD is getting called up to the bigs, funnily enough, with an assist from Microsoft, which had acquired TTD founder and CEO Jeff Green’s previous ad tech startup, AdECN, in 2007. (Microsoft also now owns the one-time AppNexus, TTD’s early foil in the DSP category.)
Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision Blizzard, which survived an FTC antitrust opposition, opened up a spot for The Trade Desk on the Nasdaq-100.
TrueView (Or FalseView?)
Google is pushing back on the recent report by Adalytics claiming 80% of YouTube TrueView ads served on third-party sites through the Google Video Partners (GVP) program failed to meet contractual viewability and audibility standards.
In a blog post, Google says audits by IAS and DoubleVerify dispute Adalytics’ findings. Both IAS and DV say 93% of GVP inventory is viewable. DV says 78% of GVP inventory plays with the volume on.
IAS has been tracking impressions served to YouTube and GVP inventory since 2016.
But an Adalytics blog post citing the MRC’s SVP of digital research and standards, Ron Pinelli Jr., clarifies that no third parties, including Moat, IAS or DV, are certified for content served off YouTube, which was the focus of the Adalytics report. So the higher viewability standards confirmed by IAS or DV aren’t a like-for-like comparison with Adalytics’ TrueView campaign research.
Google also says the report’s methodology is off. To name one telling example, Google identifies invalid traffic, and when it does, doesn’t bill the advertiser, which Adalytics’ report wouldn’t take into account. (Although, YouTube still serves the ad, which is the bigger problem than the cost per impression from a brand safety perspective.)
New Checks For Blue Checks
Twitter dropped a thunderbolt out of the blue (sorry) last week when creators were paid out for an ad rev-share program, which was floated six months ago but showed no signs of life.
Many accounts were paid thousands or tens of thousands of dollars.
The program shares revenue from ads served within a feed of replies to a tweet. Creators must subscribe to Twitter Blue and use Stripe for payment. Twitter’s payouts span the past six months, so some accounts have hundreds of millions of impressions.
But even if the per-impression values were fractions of a cent, the total payouts were large by social platform standards.
The flip side is that the Twitter rev-share program isn’t open – it requires human review, and there is no active review. The current participants joined early or were invited.
As Taylor Lorenz reports at The Washington Post, the first wave of Twitter payouts were posted by conservative media accounts.
If Twitter can maintain those payout levels on a real cadence – there is no structure or transparency into who gets paid what – and if the program is opened to other accounts (major “ifs”), it would flip the script on the value of a Blue subscription.
But Wait, There’s More!
After amassing 100 million users in five days, Meta Threads’ DAUs are down 20% and time spent has halved. [NBC] Still, advertisers are ready to ante up if and when Meta opens Threads to ads. [Big Technology]
Netflix’s next big bet is video games – and why not, with screen actors and writers on strike. [The Ringer]
Bankers say merger conversations and potential deals are picking up. [The Information]
You’re Hired!
Omnicom agency Critical Mass adds Ara Kurnit as chief innovation officer. [MediaPost]
