BuzzFeed Finds Programmatic Religion; Tech Talent Wars Rage On

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Banners Unbanned

BuzzFeed has embraced programmatic and will begin selling display ads, a format the company long denigrated as a “terrible” fixture of online media. “Tactically, programmatic has improved in terms of loading times, mobile experience, and ad quality and opens up another way for us to monetize our huge audience,” CEO Jonah Peretti tells Business Insider. Peretti adds that exchange-based selling will help in international markets where BuzzFeed has an audience but no sales force. Demand will be sourced through Facebook Audience Network and the Google DoubleClick Ad Exchange, for starters. More.

Boots On The Ground

Competition for marketing software talent has never been more heated. Amazon has already assembled an ad platform engineering force to rival the Google and Facebook legions. And top SIlicon Valley product talent is starting to see the kind of contract buyouts and salaries normally reserved for international soccer stars. The B2B giants are ramping up as well, with Oracle on Monday promising 5,000 new engineers for its cloud software group as Salesforce pads its own ranks. Some independent ad tech players are hungry too. In The Trade Desk’s earnings report earlier this month, the company said it will spend more on product talent.

Nothing But The Truth

Facebook is cracking down on fake news by banning publishers that repeatedly share false articles from advertising on its platform. It’s a severe penalty for perpetrators of fake news. “We’ve found instances of Pages using Facebook ads to build their audiences in order to distribute false news more broadly,” Facebook product managers Satwik Shukla and Tessa Lyons wrote in a blog post. “This update will help to reduce the distribution of false news which will keep Pages that spread false news from making money. Read it.

World Domination

Broadcast networks are biting their nails in anticipation of Google, Facebook and Amazon’s next moves in television. Major UK broadcasters including the BBC, Sky and ITV could lose a combined 1 billion pounds per year to the US tech giants if they become major players in the space, The Guardian reports. According to a survey by consulting firm OC&C Strategy consultants, 40% of UK consumers are confused about how many options are available for accessing TV content. That confusion makes room “for a super-aggregator service that provides a universal access point to content,” said OC&C partner Mostyn Goodwin. “In other industries we have seen how powerful these aggregators can become.” More.

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