Senior Editor
James covers the intersection of commerce, media and advertising technology.
AUTHOR ARCHIVE FOR:
James Hercher
Articles By James
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Shopper Marketing Is Moving Online As Brands Open Data To Stores
Ad tech vendors are clicking “add to cart” on first-party retailer data. As brands and retailers grow more comfortable sharing first-party data, shopper marketing budgets – traditionally spent on last-leg marketing efforts like high-performing shelf space, in-store signage, coupon circulars and co-marketing (“Find us at your nearest…”) – are moving online. “Merchants are talking to me […]
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Online Advertising Puts Another Link In The Blockchain
The drumbeat of blockchain industry news continues this week with the launch of AdLedger Consortium, a blockchain-enabled online advertising group backed by MadHive, a blockchain ad tech startup, IBM, Integral Ad Science and Tegna’s OTT ad subsidiary Premion. As with other initiatives, like Comcast’s fledgling Blockchain Insights Platform, the AdLedger Consortium is still in the […]
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Adobe Doubles Down On Academia To Get Smart About AI And Algos
Adobe is looking to get schooled on AI and data science. While many technology giants foster relationships with academics by offering them lucrative part-time consultancy positions. Adobe is pursuing a different tack: dishing out $50,000 no-strings-attached grants to professors and doctoral students working on projects of joint interest. “What academia provides is more the advanced […]
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Major Amazon And Wal-Mart Acquisitions Could Mark A Retail Turning Point
The convergence of retail and ecommerce accelerated with a blockbuster Friday when it was announced that Amazon would buy Whole Foods for $13.7 billion and Wal-Mart is snapping up ecommerce men’s clothing company Bonobos for $310 million. The market response to the deals was clear, particularly to Amazon’s 11-digit investment in a brick-and-mortar footprint. The […]
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Sharethrough Bids Farewell To Top Execs Amid Shift To Programmatic
The native advertising technology platform Sharethrough parted ways with company president Patrick Keane and CRO Mike Gaffney last week as it focuses on its programmatic exchange. Christopher Schreiber, who had been Sharethrough’s VP of marketing and communications for the past five years, also left the company. The executive departures are not part of broader layoffs, […]
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When It Comes To Receipts, One Shopper’s Junk Is A Data Company’s Treasure
The slang phrase “I’ve got the receipts” has become a way to declare oneself the indisputable winner of an argument. Mobile shopping and analytics companies are learning to love the term as well. As image scanning and recognition software improves and the value of shopper data shoots up, a growing industry is devoted to accessing […]
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Verizon-Yahoo Closes; Here Are The Next Challenges
Verizon completed its $4.5 billion acquisition of Yahoo’s search, email and digital media assets on Tuesday, almost a year after announcing its intent to buy the first-wave internet giant. Marissa Mayer, Yahoo’s embattled CEO since 2012, is leaving the company. Just because Verizon has cleared the first and most fundamental hurdle in creating Oath, the […]
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Why Safari’s Desktop Tracker Blocking Matters (Even Though Safari Desktop Doesn’t)
Apple’s announcement on Monday that its Safari desktop browser would block third-party tracking information by default worries the ad tech industry – even though Safari represents less than 5% of paid search clicks, according to data from performance marketing agency Merkle. But not everyone is alarmed. The change is likely just another stepping stone in […]
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Political Media Struggles To Capitalize On Its Trump Bump
While political news drives traffic and engagement, many DC-focused publishers are taking a hit as ad budgets fail to materialize. “There’s a real seasonal cycle for political advertising,” said Jordan Lieberman, politics and public affairs lead at the ad targeting firm Audience Partners. “But the legislative calendar is so messed up, it’s not leaving time for […]
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How Electronic Arts Activates Its Videogame Data
The share price of Electronic Arts has nearly doubled in the past two years, as it reshapes around data and connectivity. The video game company’s focus on driving player engagement has led to major changes for EA’s advertising team. That team has media buying and attribution responsibilities brands typically delegate to agencies or vendors, and […]
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Amazon’s Mysterious Policies Keep Partners Guessing
As Amazon’s commerce and advertising revenues continue to skyrocket, the company’s enigmatic policies remain a core feature of the platform. While leading digital ad platforms like Google and Facebook churn out regular product updates and constantly brief media and customers on policy nuances, Amazon keeps even its closest partners in the dark, according to several […]
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Twitter Hires Ad Tech Vet Bruce Falck To Turn Its Revenue Team Around
Twitter has hired former Turn CEO Bruce Falck to lead its Revenue Product team, according to a tweet Thursday by company co-founder and CEO Jack Dorsey. Falck has earned a reputation as an ad tech turnaround artist, stepping in as COO at BrightRoll a year prior to its $640 million sale to Yahoo and then […]
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Can Local Media Players Survive A Facebook And Google Onslaught?
Major ad platforms like Facebook and Google are soaking up the local and small-business market at an eye-popping rate. And it’s taking business away from smaller platforms like Yelp, whose stock has dropped almost 30% after local advertisers moved spend to Facebook and Google. Facebook, for instance, announced March of last year that it had […]
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The Trade Desk CEO Jeff Green On Juggling Brands, Agencies And Investors
The Trade Desk first picked up steam in the market around five years ago positioning itself as a pure-play agency toolkit. It won business at the expense of earlier DSPs, such as Turn and TubeMogul, that had frosted their agency relationships by going directly to brands. Now the company is plotting its course as the DSP […]
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The Trade Desk Beats Earnings And Ups Revenue Forecast
The Trade Desk reported $53.4 million in total revenue during the first quarter of 2017, a 76% increase over the same period last year. The company is increasing its revenue guidance for 2017 from $270 million to at least $291 million. Shares jumped from just under $40 when the market closed to more than $47 […]
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For Health Care Brands, Getting To Doctors Is Good For What Ails Them
Every year competition goes up for the limited number of medical residencies in the United States. But that’s nothing compared to marketers’ intensifying race to reach those doctors in the field. While HIPAA’s data privacy regulations have slowed the adoption of programmatic and data-driven marketing around advertising to consumers, companies can still target medical professionals, […]
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Podium Raises $32 Million To Turn Product Reviews Into Conversion Opportunities
The customer review platform Podium on Tuesday announced it had raised a $32 million Series A round on Tuesday to support product development for emerging channels and new marketing applications of customer response data. The round for the Utah-based software-as-service startup was led by Accel Partners and includes Google Ventures, Summit Partners and Y Combinator. […]
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Consorting With The Frenemy: Ad Tech Players Partner For Shared Identity Matching
Seven independent ad tech companies debuted a programmatic consortium on Thursday that pools their supply- and demand-side cookie IDs into one shared identity asset. The consortium is helmed by AppNexus, MediaMath and LiveRamp, which provides the data matching. Other launch partners include Index Exchange, Rocket Fuel, LiveIntent and OpenX. And it’s a shot across the […]
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In An Ecommerce World, Retailers And CPGs Learn To Love Their Stores
America’s most data-driven retailers and product manufacturers increasingly use mobile channels to drive shoppers to a store. Take the big kahuna. Walmart two weeks ago began offering discounts for products selected online and then picked up at a store. Walmart clears the margin on those discounts because the retailer can push products through its stores […]
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At Oracle’s Marketing Cloud Show, The Data Cloud Takes Center Stage
Oracle Data Cloud has become a big business driver for Oracle’s CX Cloud Suite, which includes software for marketing, sales, commerce, social and customer service. In the past 18 months, Data Cloud has also become a big acquirer, with deals for Moat, Crosswise and AddThis. And it has a strong presence even in announcements about […]
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Zeta Global Raises $140 Million – And Is Ready To Go Shopping
Zeta Global, which provides cloud-based CRM, on Thursday revealed a $140 million funding round that it will use to acquire other marketing tech companies. The round was led by GPI Capital and Blackstone’s GSO Capital Partners. The funding is earmarked explicitly for an acquisition, though the company or category are yet to be determined, said […]
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The Ad Tech Rumor Mill Churns News Of A Chrome Ad-Block Addition
Rumors that Google is considering adding a built-in ad-blocking feature to its Chrome browser elicited a mix of shouts and shrugs across the digital advertising landscape. The potential Chrome ad-blocking extension, first reported Wednesday by The Wall Street Journal, would block ad formats deemed unacceptable by the Coalition for Better Ads (CFBA), a cross-industry trade […]
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After Moat Deal, New York City Ad Tech Pats Itself On The Back
Many New York City-based ad tech leaders saw Tuesday’s acquisition of Moat by the Silicon Valley titan Oracle as a testament to the city’s distinct startup ecosystem. The Moat deal was a victory for the city and “a validation of the tech scene here,” said DataXu CEO Mike Baker, a prolific ad tech angel investor, […]
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Investors From Ad Tech And Politics Contribute To SafeGraph's $16M Series A
The startup data management platform SafeGraph will emerge from an extended beta period Wednesday with a $16 million Series A investment and its first product, which tracks and analyzes human movement in public places. SafeGraph isn’t disclosing any initial partners or clients, but CEO Auren Hoffman told AdExchanger the company’s business development plans include advertising […]
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Bazaarvoice Spins Its Product Review Network Into A Data Play
CPG brands are among the highest-spending advertisers, but are at the mercy of e-commerce and retail companies that own the data. Bazaarvoice, a hosted platform for ecommerce ratings and reviews, is now ramping up a data collection business to provide those insights-impoverished CPG brands with new ways to measure and target consumers. Bazaarvoice doesn’t sell […]
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Media Companies Bring Programmatic Concepts To Sponsor Deals
Publishers are learning to love influencer marketing as a way to grow broader advertising and sponsorship deals. “An advertiser might come with a traditional sponsorship package, and to complement that, they want a programmatic component,” said Rachel Parkin, SVP of strategy and sales at digital media company CafeMedia. CafeMedia owns a network of women’s interest […]
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Digital Out-Of-Home Media Courts Exchanges With DPAA Programmatic Standards
The Digital Place Based Advertising Association (DPAA), an industry trade group spanning out-of-home media and advertising technology, on Monday released its first programmatic standards for digital out-of-home (DOOH) campaigns. The DPAA hopes these standards, which are like existing openRTB guidelines from the IAB, will facilitate digital out-of-home buys. The DPAA’s standards outline video ad formats […]
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The Rise Of The Ad Tech ‘Investorpreneur’
With early-stage ad tech venture capital (VC) dwindling in recent years, some ad tech entrepreneurs stepped in to fill that funding gap, forming an angel investor ecosystem. While institutional investors are disenchanted with ad tech, insiders are more optimistic. AppNexus founder and CEO Brian O’Kelley said he hopes to invest “in a space I understand […]
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Quarterly M&A Reports: Digital Media Companies Capitalize On Growing Exit Opportunities
M&A reports released in the past week show digital media and ad tech acquisitions continuing at a healthy clip. The trend is driven by increasing exit opportunities. Internet giants, commerce and retail businesses, media companies, agencies, enterprise clouds, private equity firms and telcos are all active M&A parties for data-driven digital startups, said John Prunier, […]
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Modi Media Vets Stake Out Addressable TV Firm For Multi-MVPD Buys
Michael Bologna and Jamie Power – both leaders from GroupM’s advanced television-buying unit Modi Media – have left the media agency and founded an addressable TV media-buying startup called one2one Media. One2one is owned by Cross MediaWorks, a consortium of media and advertising companies. One2one matches advertiser first- and third-party data to multichannel video programming […]