WPP-owned Mindshare has a lot of love for its digital ad partners, but it’s tough love — especially on the first date. For one client, new ad networks, data providers, and other platforms must prove their worth within a week of testing. “Every test partner for this client has seven days to perform, and if […]
Internet advertising is growing everywhere – even in economically bedraggled countries like Greece and Spain. So says GroupM in its new global report looking at measured media spend in 70 countries. The surge comes amid lower than expected growth in overall measured ad spend, both globally and in the U.S. Futures director Adam Smith spoke […]
Japan-based, agency holding company giant Dentsu has agreed to buy UK holding company competitor giant, Aegis, in a transaction valued at $4.9 billion (£3.2bn). The Guardian writes: “The importance of the deal to Dentsu can be seen in the sale multiple, which at 12 times earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation is more akin […]
As AKQA’s media team stares into the maw of WPP and its Xaxis audience buying unit, what does it see there? Scott Symonds, Managing Director of AKQA Media, is certainly aware of Xaxis’s reputation as the most controlling of the holding company trading desks – an entity that has been known to force its solution […]
For agencies and marketers, there’s a pervasive lack of synthesis among available consumer data. It would seem particularly frustrating for Steve Plimsoll, chief technology officer, Mindshare Worldwide, but he sounds much too excited about the next eight years, when he believes that problem will be solved. Plimsoll is taking steps to position his media shop […]
The U.K. is rapidly catching up to the U.S. in programmatic media, with DSPs servicing about 30 percent of GroupM’s display ad spend this year compared with 20 percent in 2011. WPP’s global media arm issued its measured ad spending report for the country this week (press release), and while the overall picture is stagnant, […]
Social Customer Relationship Management – or Social CRM – has been increasingly on the minds of many marketers, their agents and ad tech companies as the use of social media proliferates and acquisitions of Vitrue by Oracle and Buddy Media by Salesforce signal a changing media landscape. Consumers are spending a large part of their […]
Nick Pahade is a veteran of digital agencies and ad startups, having founded or led Beyond Interactive, Denuo (Publicis), GSI Commerce, and Traffiq. Two months ago, he was named North America CEO for global media planner Initiative, which is owned by Interpublic Group. This week at the Cannes Lions ad festival, he spoke with AdExchanger […]
WPP Group just scored a win at the intersection of social and programmatic display. Facebook has confirmed to AdExchanger that it added the holding company’s Xaxis audience buying unit to its list of approved real-time bidding partners for the new Facebook Exchange. Xaxis is the only one of Facebook’s RTB partners to hail from within […]
The acquisition of AKQA, the largest remaining independent interactive agency, by WPP sent waves through the ad sector today. Read: the French Riviera was buzzin’. Numerous senior agency people attending the Cannes Lions global ad festival have either worked for AKQA or competed with it dating back to its founding in 2001. The deal was […]
WPP Group has added digital agency AKQA to its holding company corral as the digital, pure play agency remains a highly-sought-after prize. Read the release. It was rumored that AKQA would be acquired by Dentsu for $600 million in 2010. Though today’s acquisition did not include terms of the deal, and considering time has passed […]
Last week, media communications agency Starcom USA announced that former Hill-Holliday executive Phil Geyskens has been hired as EVP/analytics & development director. He will join Starcom’s Managing Board and report to CEO Lisa Donohue. According to the press release, Geyskens’ new role is “to find and tell data stories, which includes inventing new interfaces, visualizations, […]
In 2006, Planning Group International partners Patrick MacDougall and Gaston Legorburu sold their agency to Sapient for $36 million. Today PGI’s core technology offering, the 12-year-old online marketing platform BridgeTrack, is still at the heart of the parent company’s ad optimization regime. Both MacDougall and Legorburu are still with the company – Legorburu as global […]
Looking inside today’s digital advertising ecosystem, you could say that the banner ad has helped spawn a new offshoot in today’s display business. Known colloquially as “native advertising,” advertisers, publishers and technology companies are looking for better ways to engage with the consumer beyond a 728×90 ad unit, for example. Companies like Facebook, Twitter and […]
Among the first wave of digital agencies launched in the early to mid ’90s, Razorfish may be the strongest survivor. Through several acquisitions that ultimately placed it in the stewardship of Microsoft, then Publicis Groupe, the agency retained a distinct identity while continuing to innovate and expand globally. Last week it grew its China headcount […]
Bret Leece knows analytics. He got his start in 1995 creating econometric time series models to track and predict Sprint’s call center activity, before moving on to CRM and database marketing roles including at MarketShare. Currently Initiative’s EVP of performance analytics, he has a long view of where advertising performance has been and where it’s […]
“Ad Agents” is a column written by the agency-side of the digital media community. Chris Tuleya, vp of Direct Response at Underscore Marketing, a boutique, digital marketing agency Who am I to criticize a multi-billion dollar company? On the other hand, criticism is the back-bone of the internet, specifically Facebook, so why not… Facebook has […]
It’s early days for audience-based media buying in China, but e-commerce spending is already huge and has the potential to outstrip the U.S. by 2015, per Forrester (paid report). To prepare for this future Publicis Groupe has acquired 12-year-old digital marketer Longtuo (release). The Beijing-based firm serves the e-retail needs of marketers like 360buy, Kohler, […]
Our series continues as AdExchanger reached out to several executives from the agency side of the ecosystem and asked the following question: “Given the increasing complexity of ad technology needed to service clients – particularly in digital media buying -, and ad tech companies need to build a service layer to activate its tech, where […]
Our series continues as AdExchanger reached out to several executives from the agency side of the ecosystem and asked the following question: “Given the increasing complexity of ad technology needed to service clients – particularly in digital media buying -, and ad tech companies need to build a service layer to activate its tech, where […]
Building digital consumer products for clients – in contrast to marketing campaigns – is a growing discipline for agencies, but they have to get the data right. That means embracing analytics and A/B testing from the outset; tapping customer databases; and using targeted ads to spread awareness among both existing customers and prospects. “Clients are […]
In spite of the automation that technology continues to bring to media, the services layer remains as valuable as ever – maybe more so – as talented people put the technology over the proverbial finish line. For some ad tech companies with complex offerings, a robust service layer has been the natural outcome of selling […]
Both the following are true: It’s a brave new world for holding companies. New competitors, fee structures, and technology requirements are forcing change to the old service models. The fundamentals of agency groups are as strong as they were before the digital disruption. Tech fragmentation is helping rather than hurting. At the Association of National […]
Mike Cassidy is CEO of Undertone, an advertising technology and services company. Cassidy recently spoke to AdExchanger about his company and industry trends. Click below or scroll for more: Is Undertone An Ad Network? The Agency Client and Blurring Lines Programmatic Buying’s Effect On Building “The Stack” Momentum and Milestones AdExchanger.com: People think of Undertone […]
Last week, JWT announced it would rebrand its Minneapolis office to become part of Digitaria’s growing network. The Minneapolis outpost is a dedicated digital operation with clients including UnitedHealth Group. San Diego-based Digitaria was founded as a digital design firm in 1997 but has extended to website development, search, analytics, and even digital product invention […]
Miami-based Media 8 is one of a growing number of indie digital shops to dabble in programmatic ad buying. Since mid-2011 the Hispanic and travel-focused agency has brought exchange-traded display media to clients including General Mills and Dish Latino. It has done so courtesy of a relationship with trading desk partner Accordant Media, which provides a […]
“Ad Agents” is a column written by the agency-side of the digital media community. Alastair Cole, Head of Creative Services of Essence Digital, a global digital marketing agency based in London and New York. Do you like to be challenged? You should: problem-solving is human nature and our brains have evolved to reward us when […]
Depending who you ask, momentum for an online GRP measurement standard is either the best answer the online video business has to unlocking billions of TV ad dollars or it’s a menacing hand from the past come to smother web video metrics in the cradle. The latest major player, and first publisher of size, to […]
Vivaki’s Nerve Center may have been the brainchild of Curt Hecht, but Kurt Unkel has done as much as anyone to help make it a reality. Unkel, who has worked for Hecht for more than a decade, will now run Publicis’s automated media buying unit as president in the wake of his boss’s departure for […]
“Ad Agents” is a column written by the agency-side of the digital media community. Chris Tuleya, vp of Direct Response at Underscore Marketing, a boutique, digital marketing agency. Everyone who works in our industry has been in this situation before; you get a call from the client/agency/boss that they want your big ideas. And let […]
AppLovin is growing at a blistering pace, but Wall Street investors remain cautious about the business.
High-end ad blockers mimic some of the same behavior as bot traffic. So WiseGuyGaming repurposed the tools it was already using to identify bots to reveal its ad-blocking audience as well.
Criteo has weathered considerable storms in its day, including a painful moment in March 2020 when its market cap bottomed out below $500 million. Can it pull off yet another turnaround?
Disaffection and outright anger toward US sports institutions run deeper than logo-cluttered fields. Leagues and teams are sacrificing player safety and fan enjoyment for marketing dollars.
People Inc.’s referral traffic from Google search is down 70% over the past two years, and by 26% in Q3 alone. But its digital revenue is still growing, albeit slowly.
On Tuesday, Chord, a six-year-old commerce tech startup, acquired Zenlytic, an AI startup with an anthropomorphized data analyst agent named “Zoë,” for $5 million.
