CNN Gets New Data-Driven Strategy; Algorithmic Pricing Wars

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Old News

Turner Broadcasting hopes CNN can extract more value from its audience with a “new” data-driven strategy, reports Jessica Davies of Digiday. The service, which it’s calling Audience Insights Measurement, will enable more granular data on CNN readers to help marketers in their planning. CNN was late to the game with its branded content studio, and the same is true of its programmatic adoption. “It’s often forgotten that publishers also do well out of programmatic, not just the agencies,” says Robert Bradley, who will be building out Turner’s digital ad offering. More.

Reimagining Retail

Walmart and Amazon, ever the two great powers in the brick-and-mortar vs. ecommerce cold war, are advancing on new price strategies enabled by tech solutions. In this environment, even Walmart’s low price guarantee isn’t enough to compete with its dynamic digital rival, Kate Kaye reports for Ad Age. Consider: On Black Friday 16% of Amazon’s product prices fluctuated from the prior day, according to the data firm 360pi, while only 12% of Walmart prices fluctuated (and only 5% of Target’s prices did). 360pi VP Jenn Markey says she already “see(s) an increased level of algorithmic pricing,” as ecommerce players figure out how to bundle multi-product promo deals, manage supply chain margins and personalize in-cart prices. More.

Change Of Scenery

Social media is turning into private media, though nobody’s exactly sure what it means for users or advertisers. A Nieman Lab reporting team takes a look at the younger generation of social platform (think Snapchat, Slack, WeChat and Facebook Messenger) and finds users are more difficult to pin down. The social news feed/timeline model of search and digital may be in decline; Twitter’s US user base is stagnant and Facebook’s investments seem geared toward adjacent products like Facebook M, Notify and WhatsApp. Read it.

Xaxis Moves

Xaxis named a new CEO for North America. Matt Sweeney replaces Brian Gleason, who was promoted to run Xaxis globally after the WPP Group trading desk’s former CEO, Brian Lesser, took a broader role with GroupM (AdExchanger story). Sweeney is credited with boosting Xaxis’ direct-to-client business in the US and helped launch Light Reaction, a performance marketing agency. Press release.

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