Subscribe to AdExchanger Talks on iTunes, Google Play, Spotify, Stitcher, SoundCloud or wherever you listen to podcasts. In its early days, programmatic buying was mostly used by ad networks. These companies packaged media supply for agency buyers as a line item on their plans, offering more efficient access to publisher audiences. Later, those agency buyers […]
The digital media industry is mourning Curt Hecht. Hecht passed away this week at the age of 47, ending a brilliant 26-year career at Publicis Groupe and The Weather Company. His death has come as a shock to many, not only because of Hecht’s intellectual and physical vigor but also because he chose to keep […]
The first half of 2014 was sobering, to put it mildly, for Publicis Groupe and its CEO, Maurice Levy. In the wake of the holding company’s failed megamerger with Omnicom Group and its weak second-quarter earnings report, Levy needs to show digital strength. Some structural changes announced Tuesday may help it do that. Among the […]
Amazon’s enterprise self-serve ads platform, designed for agencies and brands, is intended as a programmatic complement rather than a replacement for direct-sold inventory. Publicis agency VivaKi is the first and only agency Amazon Media Group is working with at present for the self-serve platform rollout. Over the last three years, Amazon has spoken with agency […]
Stephan Beringer is in for a ride. Earlier this week Beringer was named president of Publicis Groupe’s VivaKi Audience On Demand (AOD) trading desk. He succeeds Kurt Unkel, a respected agency leader and progenitor of the trading desk idea, who will exit at the end of February for a hometown job as chief digital officer […]
Kurt Unkel is stepping down from VivaKi Audience On Demand (AOD), where he has for the past five years been a key figure in evolving Publicis Groupe’s entry in the trading desk space. Adweek’s Noreen O’Leary first reported the news earlier today, noting Unkel has accepted the chief digital officer role at WPP’s Ford agency, […]
The big problem advertisers have assessing the value of video viewability is that the metric means something different every time it’s used. Publicis Groupe digital buying hub VivaKi hopes it can promise clients across its media-agency siblings a single definition for viewability by using video ad server Vindico’s verification tool, AdTricity, for all video ad […]
Facebook’s barricade against Google held up a long time, but the wall had to fall: Google wanted the audience, marketers wanted the interoperability and Facebook wanted the demand. As we reported Friday, after giving Google the cold shoulder for more than a year, Facebook has decided to let DoubleClick Bid Manager bring its buying clout […]
Automation Is Coming. In panel after panel at New York’s Advertising Week, publishers and agencies heaped hate on ad selling inefficiencies and delivered eulogies for their mutual adversary, the insertion order. The big questions: Which players will be first to seize the automation grail? And how long will it take? The holding company trading desks […]
Here’s a far out option for Publicis and Omnicom as they attempt to fit their trading desk units together: Allow the smaller of the two, Omnicom’s Accuen, to continue as a standalone unit to manage clients that are competitive with Publicis’s Vivaki AOD. It would be the programmatic equivalent of a “conflict shop.” Last week, […]
As more advertising dollars pour into digital — and into agency trading desks — the exchange model’s momentum is likely to continue, no matter what level of integration comes from the merger of Publicis Groupe and Omnicom. Several executives who have served with the trading-desk side of the agency business and moved on said that […]
A merger of Omnicom Group and Publicis Groupe, the announcement of which is expected tomorrow, would result in a sprawling array of media agencies — and digital agencies that buy media — under one corporate roof. Omnicom’s big media agency brands are PHD, OMD, and Resolution Media. The Publicis side is sprawl-ier, consisting of Starcom […]
Last week in Cannes, global leaders from the five biggest holding company trading desks convened for a panel discussion hosted by the Rubicon Project. The event took place on a rooftop against the backdrop of the Mediterranean Sea, while on the sidewalk below creatives scurried between beach parties and celeb-packed sessions at the Palais des […]
WPP Group’s trading desk Xaxis is known for its proprietary approach to technology. The GroupM unit has incubated numerous ad platforms, a legacy of WPP’s 2007 acquisition of 24/7 Media. It offers these products to clients as an alternative to licensing from vendors. By contrast, trading desk rivals VivaKi AOD (Publicis), Cadreon (IPG), and Accuen (Omnicom) are […]
Top dogs from the four dominant agency trading desks took the stage at the BB King Blues Club this morning. They hit on a bunch of topics new and old, including “education” fatigue, incursions made by DSPs, and making audience trading part of the “fabric” of all agencies. We’ll present this one lick-by-lick in honor […]
