Here’s today’s AdExchanger.com news round-up… Want it by email? Sign up here.
Editor’s Note: Live at POSSIBLE
Everyone’s talking about agentic AI at the POSSIBLE conference in Miami. Specifically, they’re over the hype.
Marketers want to discuss what’s real for agentic tools. Not the grand ambitions or the just-out-of-reach magical AI applications that will solve all of programmatic advertising’s problems.
So what’s real? Plenty of agentic AI tools exist in the market. But, so far, they mainly just help agencies and sellers automate workflows or formerly manual campaign setups, Lara Koenig, VP of global strategy and partnerships at MiQ, told me during a one-on-one chat at the show. We’re still a ways from truly autonomous agentic buying, she said.
Many other POSSIBLE attendees agreed with this assessment in conversations with AdExchanger on the ground.
If such a reality is on the horizon, agents making deals with other agents to run campaigns from scratch won’t be happening before next year’s conference.
That being said, there are early examples of agent-to-agent deals, such as AI startups like Newton Research working with ad agencies like RPA on this idea. Although early activations of this tool have centered on direct-sold campaign automation rather than open-auction programmatic.
But companies like Newton are building toward an agent-to-agent future for programmatic, said its CEO, John Hoctor. And right now, they’re training their models on the wealth of institutional knowledge compiled by the IAB and other advertising trade groups – including from thought leadership, case studies and bits of programmatic-specific code.
So the groundwork for agentic advertising is there. As long as ingesting thought leadership reports, content marketing case studies and odd bits of code can get you there.
– Anthony Vargas, Senior Editor, AdExchanger
Near To Home
Brokerages and retail listings marketplaces have been in upheaval. Which is one reason why the real estate firm Re/Max is being acquired by Real Brokerage, a tech-focused rival, for $550 million, reports The Wall Street Journal.
As is often the case, advertising and data are behind the upheaval. For one thing, last year was Re/Max’s first with a retail media business. (Its off-site network runs atop Magnite.)
Consolidation is critical for real estate players, since control of inventory and data is so precious. Last month, Compass, which owns Sotheby’s International Realty, Century 21 and Coldwell Banker, dropped a lawsuit against Zillow over rules mandating that any listing advertised to the public must be on ZIllow’s platform within a day or be delisted.
The FTC, meanwhile, is suing Zillow and Redfin over an advertising deal from last year, in which the commission alleges Zillow paid Redfin to exit the rental ad business for multi-family properties, where it competed with Zillow, in exchange for $100 million.
Behind this industry consolidation and, to a degree, desperation, is Google’s maw. The big G precipitated category-wide stock plunges last December after reports of potential plans to test its real estate listings ads.
Snap Back
Snapchat has launched AI Sponsored Snaps, which push brand-owned AI agents into users’ direct messages tab and can chat about their businesses.
The sponsored snaps are a natural evolution of Snapchat’s own chatbot, My AI, which the company claims has been messaged by half a billion users since launching in 2023. (And can be easily jailbroken, per Cybernews.)
“Our community isn’t just open to AI in conversation, they’re already embracing it,” reads Snap’s blog post on the news.
Someone should tell Snap CEO Evan Spiegel, though. In a recent podcast with Lenny Rachitsky (called, appropriately, “Lenny’s Podcast”), Spiegel suggested that the tech industry isn’t equipped to handle the growing consumer backlash against AI products.
“I think technology leaders think that folks will just blindly adopt new technology as it comes out,” he said, adding that he expects to see a “huge amount of societal pushback” on changes that come from AI.
It probably doesn’t help matters that Snap recently eliminated about 1,000 jobs, or 16% of its global workforce, while touting the efficiency of its AI substitutions.
Snap’s own AI efforts further a soured public brand that associates AI with layoffs, suspicious marketing influence and easily manipulated chatbots.
But Wait! There’s More!
As holdcos sour on The Trade Desk, Stagwell goes all in. [Digiday]
WPP revenue fell 9% year over year, though investors are unruffled. [Adweek]
What it’s like to set up an OpenClaw agent. [New York Magazine]
Meanwhile, the FIDO Alliance is teaming up with Google and Mastercard to make sure giving AI agents your credit card won’t be a total disaster. [Wired]
SXSW used an AI-powered brand protection service called BrandShield (with seemingly no relation to the DoubleVerify product of the same name) to censor dissent about the event on Instagram. [404 Media]
FCC Chair Brendan Carr is planning an early review of Disney’s ABC TV licenses, in no doubt spurned by another beef between President Donald Trump and “Late Night” talk show host Jimmy Kimmel. [WSJ]
You’re Hired!
Chipotle hires ex-Burger King CMO Fernando Machado as its new chief brand officer. [Adweek]
