Here’s today’s AdExchanger.com news round-up… Want it by email? Sign up here.
Out Of The Frying Pan Into The Stream
Can broadcast-owned streaming services handle the heat?
Studios and programmers have just about had it with the Royal Rumble chaos of streaming subscription competition.
Warner Bros. Discovery, for one, keeps slashing HBO Max productions to curb profit losses while it aims to attract new viewers with low or promotional subscription prices and relatively high marketing budgets.
WBD has “created so much ill will toward [TV] creatives by canceling things mid-production,” one showrunner tells Insider following some of its more recent cuts. The DC movie “Batgirl” made headlines over the summer when it was dropped for promo and distribution costs, despite having completed production.
On the one hand, studios trust old-school cable networks because those executives are “homegrown,” another TV agent tells Insider. But the tough part for those broadcasters is to prove to investors that they have a road to profitability – if they’re going to earmark billions of dollars for new content, that is.
Disney has also come under fire from investors because its streaming services are a loss center. For instance, it’s not impossible that we’ll eventually see Disney fold Hulu into Disney+.
If broadcasters can’t make streaming media work profitably, it’s going to be a huge advantage to Netflix, Amazon Prime and Apple TV+.
The Musk v. Cook Heavyweight Bout
Elon Musk, who’s been fast-forwarding through 12 years of Twitter product development, apparently just found out about the 30% App Store fee. And he is not happy.
In one tweet, Musk alleges that, without an explanation, Apple “threatened to withhold Twitter from the App Store.”
Apple likely didn’t threaten to drop Twitter, at least not yet. (Musk’s truth-to-tweet ratio is low.) But Musk is more than capable of escalating a fight with Apple and CEO Tim Cook. Apple’s other nemesis, Meta, is off licking its wounds after a relentless two-year beatdown by Apple.
In another tweet, Musk said that “if there is no other choice, I will make an alternative phone” to avoid the fee. Finally, a manufacturing use case where he can bring value to Twitter. (But again, that pesky truth-to-tweet ratio.)
Although Apple isn’t taking the bait, it did publish its annual App Store Awards, chosen by the Apple App Store editorial team. The 2022 iPhone App of the Year (the best in show award) goes to … drumroll … BeReal, the up-and-coming social network that eschews advertising.
Another Soured Apple
While Apple and Twitter own the headlines, the App Store is beset by very real problems caused by user-hostile and/or fraudulent developers that go unchecked by Apple.
David Barnard, an app developer and developer advocate for the mobile monetization tech provider RevenueCat, has a summary of 10 popular ways that developers game the App Store.
Some tactics are ostensibly against the rules but go unenforced, including buying fake ratings and reviews, prompting users to leave positive reviews, using a tricky subscription sign-up page to dupe people into rebilling or triggering a subscription randomly during a user session. (People instinctively hit the home button to exit or reset, but on Touch ID iPhones the home button thumbprint is an auto-purchase shortcut.)
Other cash grabs are tolerated (or even encouraged) but they’re terrible for user experience. Some of the worst sins include promoting other apps randomly upon launch, displaying full-page ads every 60 seconds and paying for Keyword Boost campaigns, an Apple ad product that elevates an app’s organic standing by associating it with specific keywords.
“By employing these tactics, apps are far more profitable and can afford to pay more to acquire users,” Barnard writes. “Which makes it really tough for apps not employing these tactics to compete in acquiring users.”
But Wait, There’s More!
Amazon unveils supply-chain tools and cloud services drawing on its retail arm [Reuters] and AWS launches a data clean room. [TechCrunch]
How Google is trying to help advertisers and publishers link their data. [Marketing Brew]
Yahoo eyes retail stock trading in a major growth push. [Axios]
How marketers are shifting their in-housing habits. [Digiday]
You’re Hired!
Coke names a new marketing leader in North America as part of a broader business reorg. [AdAge]
VideoAmp promotes Stephanie Doennecke to VP of marketing communications. [Linkedin]
Triton Digital appoints Josh Yamuder as director of partnerships for programmatic marketplace. [release]
Attention metrics startup Lumen Research hires Scott Linzer as GM, North America, and Josh Barnett as head of sales, EMEA. [release]
