Marketers

From a $637 million PE acquisition of healthcare of a DSP to acquisitions of freshly minted startups, there’s been a flurry of ad tech deals this month. And they have one thing in common: AI.

For too long, marketers have been stuck in a false dilemma: Do you want reach, or do you want relevance? Mass exposure, or accurate targeting?

Concrete findings on how effective QR codes are at driving ad interactions are now available, and some industry best practices are emerging.

Morgan Stanley downgrades The Trade Desk; Warner Bros. Discovery and Nielsen announce a new deal; and brands aren’t sold on virtual influencers.

Incubeta announced its acquisition of RocketSource, a consultancy that helps advertisers understand what drives customer behavior using data science and predictive analytics.

GAM’s dinner with ad agencies sparked speculation that Google is preparing to spin off its bundled SSP and ad server as a remedy to its ad tech monopoly. But Google says it’s just part of the trend of SSPs going direct to buyers.

Google’s search antitrust trial ends with a whimper; the pitfalls of agency-owned SSPs; Perplexity axes its ads business; and brands are still building big-ticket metaverse experiences.

Panso, a CRM for restaurants, gives folks in the restaurant business a 360 view of their guests which can be used to send targeted and personalized email and SMS campaigns.

Peppa Pig is everywhere. Whether or not you have children, you likely know the little girl pig from the kid’s cartoon show. But the Peppa media franchise is just getting started.

Publishers like News Corp are walking a fine line—suing AI companies for scraping their work while cutting multimillion‑dollar licensing deals with others.

Straddling the line between content creator and content-conscious mother offers a fresh perspective on the importance of media literacy and advertisers’ role in the online ecosystem. 

In an era marked by generative AI, algorithmic optimization and an obsession with outcomes, cloud infrastructure has become a competitive differentiator.

Spotlight recently partnered with Cheil UK to help the agency give its clients better insights that they can use to stand out in AI search.

Bluefish helps advertisers track and optimize how they show up in an LLM’s search results. Its latest funding will expand its team and product suite.

Programmatic OOH and video ad platform Adomni wants to make DOOH approachable to more small and local businesses by simplifying the process and lowering the cost.

Protected by Mediaocean, Mediaocean’s ad verification division, is partnering with the Internet Watch Foundation to crack down on CSAM and ensure children’s online safety.

Television advertising has undergone a remarkable transformation in recent years, with connected TV (CTV) emerging as a powerful channel for marketers seeking the impact of traditional television with the precision of digital targeting.

The ad tech startup Vaudit, founded last year by Mike Hahn, aims to automate the process of campaign reconciliation atop major ad platforms.

New social media content moderation policies will enable connections with audiences that reflect a broader range of perspectives, expand inventory, and provide opportunities for contextual alignment.

In today’s digital advertising landscape, speed, scale and sophistication have become both a promise and a problem. Innovation has accelerated – but so too has fragmentation. Marketers are expected to drive performance across an ever-expanding universe of platforms, formats and data streams – often without the clarity or confidence they need to succeed.

Total revenue for the quarter was $9.8 billion, up only 1% year-over-year from the last Q2 quarter total of $9.7 billion – which is modest, but at least in line with company expectations.

After a recent expansion, Porter Airlines partnered with Samsung Ads Canada to reach new customers with timely and relatable ads.

PetSmart adopted Hightouch’s AI decisioning tool in 2023 to better reach its customers on a one-to-one basis through nuanced insights into campaign results.

CleanTap, an ad tech startup launched by the founder of Method Media Intelligence, wants to separate the wheat from the chaff in CTV by serving as a curation layer between DSPs and SSPs.

Agentio’s AI connects advertisers with relevant content creators through an automated bidding process, similar to the programmatic system.

Change can be bumpy. From The Trade Desk’s Solimar-to-Kokai transition to Nielsen’s transition to its Big Data + Panel offering, we go inside customers’ challenges with these two transforming platforms.

As marketing fails to speak the language of business outcomes due to an overemphasis on vanity metrics, it is increasingly losing its seat at the decision-making table.

Now that upfront negotiations are almost over, the industry appears to have settled back into its default position of being mad at Nielsen – which is likely good news for its currency competitors, but not so great for everyone else in the meantime.

DCG’s new tool analyzes the given moment – culturally, politically and economically – to understand how to best target its audience.

Ride-hailing app company Curb Mobility is bringing TikTok’s user-generated content to Taxi TV, its network of more than 15,000 in-taxi screens across 65 US markets.