Here’s today’s AdExchanger.com news round-up… Want it by email? Sign-up here.
Not Lovin’ It
McDonald’s ongoing creative review bars agencies from turning a profit on base compensation, leaving them to operate at cost to achieve undefined targets, Adweek reports. That’s why WPP backed out of the review, which requires agencies to turn around their pitches in just 60 days. “An ad agency is a for-profit business,” said Tom Finneran, EVP of agency management services at the 4A’s. “A 60-day turnaround time would seem to favor the incumbents.” Brandon Cooke, global CMO of McGarryBowen, alluded to how squeezing agencies on profits feeds trust issues between them and their clients: “There’s a fine line between getting a fair deal for the business and squeezing so tight that they don’t get the performance they deserve.” More.
The Chinese media telco giant Tencent may expand its already considerable footprint in global online gaming with a $5B-plus takeover of SuperCell, a Finnish mobile studio with some of the world’s highest-grossing game apps. “A potential tie-up between Tencent and Supercell would alter the industry landscape by creating a dominant global games publisher,” writes The Wall Street Journal. Some ad tech players have heartily embraced mobile game ad serving, notably Rubicon Project.
Get Personal
Your commute may soon qualify as a deterministic truth set. Google is testing a way to allow any Android user to “eliminate passwords in favor of systems that take into account a combination of signals – like your typing patterns, your walking patterns, your current location and more,” reports Sarah Perez of TechCrunch. The Google initiative, known as “Project Abacus,” was set up a year ago to tackle the friction in the secure login process (not just email/password, but also two-step verification tied to a mobile phone). The head of Google’s advanced tech research unit said “several very large financial institutions” will test the service in June, which will help decide if it’s ready for market. More.
Social Takeover
Though still only a trickle, dollars moving from traditional TV to video advertising are a sign of media budgets to come, writes Debra Aho Williamson of eMarketer in an Ad Age column. This will only accelerate as social media platforms beef up their video (and video ad) infrastructure, siphoning younger demos and polishing off their measurement capabilities. “[Social video] doesn’t necessarily require an additional investment,” said Tina Mahal, VP of innovation at Frito-Lay. “It just requires making smarter choices so that the brand is where the consumer is.” More.
Blocked, Cont.
As ad blocking continues to grow, PageFair, Digital Content Next, The Financial Times and Mozilla are teaming up to help publishers navigate what they call “the blocked web,” The Drum reports. Stakeholders ranging from Google to the UK government have gathered at a series of roundtable talks to draw up rough guidelines for publishers. To survive in this environment, publishers should include tools for users to reject and complain about ads, restore premium ad spots in the blocked environment, ask users to volunteer data and set an industry standard for maximum page-load time. “The technology exists to display ads on the blocked web in a manner that ad blockers cannot circumvent,” said PageFair’s Johnny Ryan. More.
But Wait, There’s More!
- How Facebook Instant Articles Pulls From The Amazon Playbook – Re/code
- Google Home Vs. Amazon Echo. Let The Battle Begin. – NYT
- How Should Companies Handle Data From Employee Wearables? – WSJ
- Lotame Launches Data-Sharing Syndicate – release
- Video Ad Spend On Social Platforms Is Rising Fast – eMarketer
- Startups Look To Be ‘The App Store Of Bots’ – VentureBeat
- Hedge Funds Hate Apple But Love Facebook – CNN Money
- Programmatic Grows In Asia Pacific – Warc
- StickAds.tv Expands Guaranteed Programmatic TV – release
- What Are Progressive Web Apps? – Digiday
- Visual IQ Formalizes Key Media-Buying Partnerships – release
You’re Hired!
