Commerce

Marketers debate whether to build or buy their tools; Meta is shutting down the VR version of Horizon Worlds; and influencer marketing strives for authenticity.

Publicis recommends some clients ditch The Trade Desk; ChatGPT reconsiders its “unlimited” enterprise subscription; and how NYC’s Washington Square Park became an influencer hub.

MyFitnessPal has just announced the launch of a data-driven advertising business that draws on its wealth of user-provided meal planning, fitness and nutrition data.

Heluva Good! gets heluva weird; OpenAI isn’t so sure about operating checkouts; and who AI fact checks the AI fact checker?

Jeff Green doubles down on OpenPath’s value; Amazon wants Perplexity to disable agentic shopping; and the creator economy takes on political fundraising.

Amazon’s Fire TV redesign is extra friendly for ads; Anthropic benefits from its newfound spine; and the children yearn for the malls.

The NHL develops new revenue streams; malware makes its way into the programmatic ecosystem; and Target plans to open 30 new locations this year, along with revamping existing ones.

Sallie, the major issuer of US education loans, is getting into the retail media network business.

Ad platforms are nixing credit card payments; LLMs are getting really good at unmasking online users; and McDonald’s offers a case study in how not to do organic social media.

The strategic value of commerce data continues to rise, as Infillion snaps up Catalina. Then, a court filing reveals where agencies spend clients’ money.

Buyers dig Netflix’s ad platform changes; OpenTable puts the “restaurant” in “RMN”; and Google and Amazon blame human error even when it’s AI’s fault.

The future of retail media depends on a shift away from siloed in-store and online metrics to a full-funnel approach that reflects how customers actually shop.

Infillion, an ad tech business built on M&A, is back with another acquisition. This time it’s Catalina, a century-old market research and shopper marketing company with roots in physical cash register machines.

The Winter Olympics show us how far streaming live sports has come – and how much linear viewership remains. Plus: CPGs are pulling back on ad spend, as they steer through economic challenges and the ripple effects of policy decisions.

Agentic commerce can’t stop, won’t stop; Perplexity is officially done with its ads business; and AppLovin may launch its own social media platform.

“Fully a third of our profit in the most recent quarter was related to advertising and membership income,” Walmart CFO John David Rainey told investors on Thursday.

A 2004 statute prevents owning enough TV stations to reach 39% of households. But without the scale afforded to other digital content companies, local TV is at a competitive disadvantage.

Companies like P&G, PepsiCo and Colgate-Palmolive are cutting marketing spend as the easiest and quickest way to protect profitability.

Why influencer marketing is all the rage; Target forays into ChatGPT ads; and Paramount Skydance’s difficult week.

Twitch gets into pause ads; CEOs would love to stop talking about AI agents; and so would brands and publishers, actually!

It’s official: ChatGPT has launched ads and the test will expand in the coming weeks. But don’t ask the LLM for details, unless you’re looking for misinformation.

Amazon opened up its Prebid adapter for beta testing on January 21. Publishers are preparing to test, and we spoke with Raptive and Unwind Media to learn how.

TikTok may be doubling down (again) on Shop; bots are scraping content they’re banned from; and Walmart is allegedly selling counterfeit products.

Criteo has an optimistic pitch for future growth, but Wall Street doesn’t see the money yet from LLMs, commerce agents and social shopping.

What people need is an independent agent that peers across retailer and is entirely focused on ecommerce services. At least that’s the conclusion driving Wizard Commerce, a personal shopping agent that emerged from beta on Wednesday.

Amazon teases an AI licensing marketplace for publishers; not every country is fine with targeted gambling ads; and YouTube’s ad revenue share isn’t enough for its entrepreneurial creators.

The OAAA’s new content taxonomy introduces new subcategories that OOH media owners can use to classify their inventory in OpenRTB bid requests.

“Performance CTV” oversimplifies how television actually drives value, and the focus on performance all but guarantees that campaign results will be misinterpreted.

Prebid is on a roll: It will take charge of a seller agent, part of AdCP, and Amazon’s integration with Prebid is in beta. But there’s one sticking point: Microsoft is not going to cache video ad creatives anymore that come through Prebid, leaving publishers scrambling for an alternative.

Big TV’s shift to programmatic brings in the performance brands; Meta rolls out premium subscriptions for Instagram, Facebook and WhatsApp; and Yahoo enters the crowded AI search market.