Measurement

After announcing via two blog posts on Wednesday that it will no longer collect the IDFA for iOS 14 devices, Facebook sent a follow-up message to its ad partners with more detail about what that will mean in practice. Here’s the full text: ******************** Today (August 26, 2020), we are providing details about our approach […]

The ad tech industry is innovative, resourceful, agile – and so full of BS that it’s become a meme. Ad tech vendors often boast about their scale, claim that their solutions have HAL 9000-level AI and gloss over the difference between correlation and causation. In some cases, they’re purposely trying to obfuscate and overcomplicate what they […]

Jerome Turnbull, director of media buying at AppLovin, shares his home office with his pet chinchilla, Speedie. That’s just the way people gotta roll in the WFH world. When Jerome, who joined AppLovin through its acquisition of Machine Zone in May, isn’t hanging out with Speedie or tending an aquarium populated by blue velvet shrimp […]

Facebook is preparing its partners for Apple’s IDFA restrictions – and there’s no sugar coating it. Considering the uncertainty of the situation, Facebook has decided not to collect the IDFA for any of its own apps on iOS 14 devices or to request the IDFA from apps in Audience Network, the company said in a pair […]

It’s the dog days of summer. The afternoons are sultry and the pace is slow. Ice cubes melt and tinkle in glasses, cats nap under porches … and it’s easy to forget that the earth is shifting and splitting under the ad industry’s feet. As managing editor Ryan Joe notes in this week’s episode, the […]

Here’s today’s AdExchanger.com news round-up… Want it by email? Sign up here. AVOD FTW? Subscription video-on-demand services dominate the headlines, but time spent with ad-supported video is responsible for a significant slice of viewing. Year-over-year growth in minutes watched in Q2 among players aside from Netflix, Hulu, YouTube, Amazon Prime Video and Disney Plus was more […]

With iOS set to get a lot less measurable, developers are considering putting more of their performance budgets into Android. The impetus is Apple’s move to start requiring an opt-in for its proprietary advertising ID, the IDFA, beginning with iOS 14 in September. Without ready access to the IDFA, apps are limited in their ability […]

  Lack of measurement has long deterred brands from investing heavily in podcasts. Apple, which has dominated podcast listening in the United States for years, has a history of obscuring how many people actually heard an ad after downloading a podcast episode through its player. That left brand advertisers to negotiate for CPMs without knowing […]

Here’s today’s AdExchanger.com news round-up… Want it by email? Sign up here. If You Can’t Beat ’Em, Join ’Em Those that want to survive the streaming wars are making friends with the competition. Apple is bundling TV Plus content with CBS All Access and Showtime at a discounted price of $9.99 per month, Bloomberg reports. CBS […]

Apple has a tendency to ask for forgiveness, not permission. Scratch that. Apple doesn’t apologize. Known for unilateral decision making that can throw entire industry sectors into a tailspin (just ask the mobile ad ecosystem), many of Apple’s recent moves fit a pattern of behavior. Developers have long considered Apple’s App Store policies inscrutable and […]

Ad tech companies are starting to make their voices heard at the W3C as the clock ticks down on third-party cookies in Chrome. At an Aug. 6 meeting of the W3C’s Advisory Board – the closest thing the W3C has to a board of directors – a handful of ad tech companies, agencies and data […]

The Trade Desk’s stock was up nearly 5% in after-hour’s trading on Thursday, despite posting a 13% year-over-over dip in revenue in the second quarter. To what does TTD owe this optimism? Two words: connected TV. “We believe that the COVID pandemic has permanently accelerated the growth of CTV,” CEO Jeff Green told investors on […]

Did you hear the one about Microsoft maybe buying TikTok? No, really, there’s a potential deal in the works. Amid ongoing drama over TikTok’s Chinese ownership and threats from the Trump administration of a ban on the app in the United States, the technology company most associated with office software could become the owner of […]

Hypercasual dominated the mobile gaming charts even before the pandemic. Installs of hypercasual games, characterized by extremely lightweight, free-to-play mobile titles, more than doubled between December 2019 and March of this year, according to joint research from Adjust and Unity. Once lockdowns started, the growth accelerated, with play sessions up by 72% in March. But […]

Jam City is jamming, despite COVID-19. The LA-based casual mobile game studio plans to hire artists, producers, data analysts and people focused on creative strategy. Gaming is one of the few verticals that’s growing during the ongoing health crisis. People started playing more games when stay-at-home orders were announced in March, and the behavior has […]

Despite a healthy second quarter that shrugged off the economic downturn, Facebook CFO Dave Wehner warned investors on Thursday that Apple’s IDFA changes coming in iOS 14 could “prove to be a challenging headwind.” “We’re still trying to understand what these changes will look like and how they impact us and the rest of the […]

Gaming apps are getting better at beating install fraud. Just 3.8% of paid installs are fraudulent among gaming apps, according to research published by AppsFlyer on Tuesday, compared with 32% of non-organic installs for apps in other categories. Finance apps have the highest app install fraud rate at 48%, for example, followed by travel apps […]

Here’s today’s AdExchanger.com news round-up… Want it by email? Sign up here. Bot-And-Mouse Game The low-hanging fruit of ad fraud is mostly gone. But more sophisticated bad actors are still active. Protected Media identified an in-app bot fraud network, dubbed “Hydra,” that siphoned off an estimated $100 million, Business Insider reports. “It’s the most disciplined operation […]

Once Apple’s IDFA becomes opt-in for consumers, its utility to advertisers will be greatly limited. But what does this new policy mean for Facebook and its powerful, lucrative Audience Network? As one source told senior editor Allison Schiff, targeting on Audience Network is all but dead. But does that mean it’s the end? In this […]

Companies that rely on Apple’s proprietary ad ID are seeking solutions for a post-IDFA world. Although Apple didn’t actually kill it, the IDFA will become opt-in for consumers starting with iOS 14 in September. Without user permission, IDFA tracking will be zeroed out, just like when Limit Ad Tracking is enabled. Some are predicting opt-in […]

Nielsen plans to overhaul its digital measurement methodology to prepare for a future without cookies or mobile ad IDs. The first phase of the overhaul will happen in early 2021, with more stages to follow. Because its product is used as currency in some global markets, the measurement company is giving its customers a heads […]

“Data-Driven Thinking” is written by members of the media community and contains fresh ideas on the digital revolution in media. Today’s column is written by Danilo Tauro, global director of media, tech and data at Procter & Gamble. Is advertising waste being driven by lack of technology, incentives, capabilities or all of the above? To […]

Apple’s move to make its IDFA only available on an opt-in basis will either set Facebook’s hair on fire or further solidify Facebook’s dominant market position. Depends on who you ask. Those opposing opinions underscore the confusion consuming the mobile ad tech ecosystem as it grapples with the de facto loss of user-level tracking in […]

“Data-Driven Thinking” is written by members of the media community and contains fresh ideas on the digital revolution in media. Today’s column is written by Ari Paparo, CEO at Beeswax. It’s been a couple of weeks since the Apple WWDC conference, where we learned how the IDFA will become opt-in for consumers. Arguably this change […]

  Nielsen is caught in the middle of a dispute between TV buyers and sellers about whether to include out-of-home (OOH) viewing as part of its linear TV ratings stream this year. The measurement company initially planned to integrate viewing that takes place at bars, restaurants and other public establishments as part of its national […]

A weekly comic strip from AdExchanger that highlights the digital advertising ecosystem…

In January, Google Chrome said it would phase out third-party cookies over the next two years. No problem, right? The W3C, which creates common standards for web browsers, will figure out an alternative. Except, man, it’s certainly taking its sweet time. Two years might sound like ages but it’s not, when you consider how foundational […]

Media buying has gone far beyond age and gender – with agencies betting on their first-party data platforms as the new secret sauce to guide planning and activation. But the tools to plan campaigns using advanced segments across mediums like TV, digital and radio often involve slow, manual matching and lots of grunt work. To […]

Nielsen expects to lay off 3,500 people – roughly 8% of its global workforce – as part of a restructuring, the company said on Tuesday. Headcount was around 46,000 in 2019. The move – which Nielsen called “an optimization plan” – is more accurately described as a massive cost-cutting effort to support Nielsen’s upcoming split into two […]

After a nearly three-month-long standoff, video analytics and brand safety measurement company OpenSlate said on Tuesday that it’s back in the YouTube Measurement Program (YTMP). Google and OpenSlate were at loggerheads since April, which is when YouTube relaunched the program with a handful of new partners and an updated organizational structure. OpenSlate had been a […]