Platforms

Pinterest filing its S-1 late last week makes it the last of the social media walled gardens to go public. The OG Facebook might still be in a class of its own, but Pinterest bears comparison to Snap, which filed its S-1 in 2017, and Twitter, which filed a lifetime ago in 2013. Notably, while […]

LinkedIn is rolling out lookalike audiences following a beta testing period that began late last year, the company said Wednesday. Advertisers could already create matched audiences – basically, LinkedIn’s answer to custom audiences – built from a list of target contacts or accounts. The addition of lookalike audiences is a good look for a platform […]

Although Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and Twitter are getting more expensive, they remain the go-to places for brand-building campaigns. That’s the approach being taken by Skullcandy, the maker of headphones and audio devices, as it looks to grow from its action sports roots to a broader audience, according to CMO Jessica Klodnicki, who was hired in […]

How much ad revenue does Facebook lose out on when its platforms go on the fritz? More than you probably make in a year … or 50. On Thursday and Friday, Facebook experienced what was reportedly the longest partial global outage in the company’s history. For around 14 hours, some users had trouble accessing or […]

Google’s move to create unified, first-price auctions for publishers using Google Ad Manager doesn’t just change the auction type. It impacts pricing, header bidding, publisher floors and how publishers see AdWords demand. Under the new rules, all exchanges will bid for an impression at the same time, and Google will lose the “last look” it […]

Mark Zuckerberg penned a lengthy post last week laying out Facebook’s vision for a “privacy-focused” future – but it’s not going to change Facebook’s business model. Although Zuckerberg expends a lot of ink on the importance of data security and protecting messaging with end-to-end encryption, he doesn’t mention the interest and user-related data that powers Facebook’s […]

There are only around 2.5 million weddings in the United States every year – yet more than 30 million people are planning a wedding on Pinterest at any given time. “That means there’s a lot of planning being done long before a wedding ever happens,” said Jon Kaplan, who joined Pinterest in 2016 as global head […]

Big Tech can’t catch a break in DC … actually, scratch that. If Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-MA, is elected to the White House in 2020, she’s got a plan to break up Amazon, Google, Facebook and Apple. And her proposal specifically targets Google’s ad platform business. On Friday, the Democratic presidential candidate laid out how her […]

Branded content is a priority for Instagram in 2019 – but measurement is seriously lacking. “That’s one of the things I wish you guys would work on,” said Edlynne Laryea, director for global Neutrogena digital transformation and sustainability, speaking at an Instagram media event Tuesday. Although Instagram claims that 68% of its users choose to interact […]

On Monday, Pinterest introed a tool to help retailers automatically ingest their online product catalogs as pins, including up-to-date pricing and stock info. Advertisers can then take the additional step to promote their product pins as targeted shopping ads, which are now available via self-serve after a prolonged beta that started last year. Similar functionality […]

Marketers are reacting differently to YouTube’s latest brand safety flare-up compared to 2017, when scores of global brands suspended YouTube campaigns over ads monetizing violent or offensive videos. There’s certainly some déjà vu, with Disney, Nestlé’s and McDonald’s halting YouTube spending after YouTube creator Matt Watson showed them advertising on a video that had a […]

US digital ad spend in 2019 will surpass all traditional advertising for the first time, growing to $129.3 billion this year, according to eMarketer’s latest forecast. Digital advertising is being driven by mobile, which is now more than two-thirds of the digital category, and by TV dollars moving to streaming and online video. Oh, and […]

Here’s today’s AdExchanger.com news round-up… Want it by email? Sign up here. Apple Goes Shopping A regulatory filing revealed that Apple has acquired DataTiger, a digital marketing company specializing in customer journey tracking. Apple has assembled an interesting portfolio of tech companies in recent years, including the audio recognition app Shazam and Texture, a digital magazine […]

Video ad platform Ooyala is slowly being disassembled and sold piece by piece. On Thursday, Ooyala revealed it had sold its online video platform to Brightcove for $15 million. The deal is expected to close in mid-2019. Brightcove, founded in 2004, provides a similar cloud-based video distribution solution as Ooyala. Its clients include Acorn TV, […]

Facebook CFO David Wehner recently told investors that even if the economy falters, Facebook’s ability to measure advertising returns is its saving grace. Will the same hold true for small- to mid-sized marketers? AdExchanger called on several analysts and senior marketers to get their take. On the whole, they agreed SMBs will continue to buy […]

The amount of online media with audience data attached is shrinking, thanks to Apple, which now blocks third-party cookies in Safari, and GDPR, which requires user consent to show personalized ads. But when advertising cookies are missing, marketers have limited, costly alternatives. Some demand-side platforms (DSPs) don’t offer any contextual buying. Or buyers must pay […]

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

Twitter’s got a new metric for Wall Street to chew on – monetizable daily active users (MDAU) – and something to hide: the fact that monthly active user growth is on the decline. Starting this quarter, Twitter will report the number of logged-in users it’s actually able to make money on rather than what CFO Ned Segal […]

Supply-path optimization (SPO) lets buyers find the best way to access the inventory they want. But the next stage of SPO is emerging, where buyers will negotiate with exchanges to create their own low-fee paths to supply. In that spirit, the agency Goodway Group and the exchange PubMatic inked a deal Wednesday where PubMatic will […]

Spotify said Wednesday in a blog post it would acquire podcast production network Gimlet Media and podcast creation, distribution and sponsorship platform Anchor. Terms of the deal were not disclosed, but sources pegged the price at roughly $230 million. If that estimate is correct, it’s the most high-value acquisition of a podcast network or platform […]

While Facebook’s earnings last Tuesday prove that marketers still spend, some wonder if consumer backlash against the platform could one day damage brands advertising on it. “The slow stream of press has caused more angst and questions,” said James Douglas, executive director and head of media at performance agency Reprise. “Every day it seems like […]

Snap is no longer losing users. For the third consecutive quarter, Snap managed to stave user decline. Its Q4 daily active users clocked in at 186 million, which was flat sequentially but a slight year-over-year dip from 187 million. And advertisers are still spending on the platform. Q4 revenue grew 36% to $390 million, while […]

Here’s today’s AdExchanger.com news round-up… Want it by email? Sign up here. Commerce + Ads Wayfair is expanding its paid media business, also known as “Wayfair Media Solutions,” Digiday reports. Like Amazon, Wayfair reports its sponsored products revenue under an “other” revenue category, which was a relatively tiny $13 million in Q3 2018 (Amazon’s “other” business […]

For many app publishers, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) was an opportunity to examine each of their many SDK integrations and ask, “Does it spark joy?” The answer, in many cases, was no: It sparks the potential for data leakage and compliance headaches. In 2018, the number of unused SDKs – those that a publisher […]

Here’s today’s AdExchanger.com news round-up… Want it by email? Sign up here. The New News News industry downsizing continued last week with layoffs at Vice and buyouts at McClatchy, close on the heels of similar painful cuts at BuzzFeed, Verizon Media and Gannett. “We are changing the size of the workforce to align with the revenue,” […]

Facebook is getting beaten up by a punishing news cycle – but, for its part, it’s beating the street. The stock surged more than 17% in after-hours trading on Wednesday. Revenue for the fourth quarter clocked in at $16.91 billion, a 30.4% year-over-year (YoY) increase. Nearly all of that – $16.64 billion – was thanks […]

Reddit is getting into the performance marketing game. On Wednesday, the self-described front page of the internet launched the ability for direct response advertisers to buy any of its inventory across desktop, mobile web and app on a cost-per-click (CPC) basis. Until now, advertisers could purchase ads on a CPM model – or cost per […]

Here’s today’s AdExchanger.com news round-up… Want it by email? Sign up here. Down, But Still Substantial Verizon’s media biz dropped 5.8% YoY in Q4 2018 – bringing it to “only” $2.1 billion in the quarter. Verizon Media (née Oath) has disappointed this year. “Certainly, when you see -6.9% revenue growth in 3Q and -5.8% in 4Q, […]

Apple actually mentioned the word “advertising” on its earnings call. Although hardware isn’t going anywhere, Apple’s services business, which includes search ads in the App Store, is becoming increasingly meaningful to the company’s bottom line. “Services are scaling quickly,” Apple CFO Luca Maestri told investors on Tuesday. Although iPhone sales were weak during the holiday […]

Facebook’s plan to integrate the backend infrastructure of its messaging platforms isn’t sitting well with privacy advocates, security experts, European regulators or US lawmakers. Alarm bells are ringing all over the place. The Irish Data Protection Authority says it’s going to be “very closely scrutinizing” the situation, particularly where it might involve the sharing and […]