Adobe Wants To Own Video; Tracking Discounts

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Adobe Wants To Own Video (Tech)

Watch out comScore, Chartbeat, FreeWheel, BrightCove and Salesforce — Adobe is coming for you! At least that’s what Bill Ingram, VP of Adobe Analytics and Adobe Social, told Adweek in a Q&A. “We’re really about digitizing the word … Helping advertisers get their stuff on the Web. We’re a content enabler,” Ingram said. Adobe isn’t interested in selling video ads. As Ingram put it: “We want to own the market for video tech.” Read more. Video “monetization platform” company Auditude was acquired by Adobe in 2011.

Tracking Discounts

Retailers, such as Kenneth Cole and Timberland, have been testing a location-based tracking platform for in-store customers and, according to Ad Age, it’s been successful. The program is powered by Swirl and uses sensors to track customers’ whereabouts in the store through an opt-in system. In a test that’s been running since May in New York and Boston Timberland stores, 72% of offer recipients checked out the offers and 35% redeemed them, according to Timberland commerce exec Ryan Shadrin. Read more.

Gifts Going Digital Only

Just shy of a year, Facebook is shutting down the physical side of its Gifts product and focusing instead on digital gifts, according to Fast Company. Lee Linden, head of the Gifts program, told AllThingsD only 20% of users sent physical gifts — the other 80% sent gift cards. The Facebook Card will still be available, which lets users preload a physical card for use at different retailers. Read more.

Big Budgets

A study conducted by Warc for the Mobile Marketing Association found that 90% of mobile marketers predict a rise in mobile budgets, but less than 10% of budgets are being allocated to mobile. The study, the results of which were published in Destination CRM, was conducted in the Asia-Pacific region, where mobile growth is being driven by mobile payments, multiscreening and showrooming. Privacy and security is a major concern, along with insufficient skills and budgets. Read more.

Local Enemies

Yelp CEO Jeremy Stoppelman calls out Google’s competing local product and says he isn’t worried about the Zagat acquisition in an interview with Charlie Rose, reports AllThingsD. Stoppelman believes the constant motion at Google on the local front is a sign of trouble. He says, “It’s constant chaos over there. And if you’re winning, usually it’s calmer waters.” Read more.

“Pure” And Programmatic

Digiday editors poll publisher-side POVs about the sales org and programmatic media’s impact. Federated Media chief John Battelle takes a crack it, too: “Sales teams have to navigate a new terrain – the ad-tech ecosystem is complex, rife with short-term behaviors and roadblocks. Selling into this world requires business-development skills, a curious nature and a consultative nature. It’s not for everyone. ‘Pure’ salespeople who are great at selling one, set product suite are not going to thrive here.” Read more opinions. And read Doug Weaver’s follow-up, called “Whole Selling.”

New Holding Co.

A former Mindshare CEO, Antony Young, is leaving the agency giant for a smaller agency holding company of sorts called the Water Cooler Group. “We’re trying to be a challenge to the big-agency model,” Craig Woerz, a managing partner at the Water Cooler Group and Media Storm, told The New York Times. “What Mindshare and GroupM are doing is some of the best work in the marketplace,” Young said. “But there are clients — and, frankly, agency people — who are looking for something different, an alternative.” Read more.

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