Advertising

  When Comcast’s ad sales division Spotlight revealed a partner deal with Rubicon Project earlier this month, it underscored the multiple system operator’s (MSO) push to power the TV buy through both programmatic and direct sales channels. It was a pivotal moment for Comcast. Digital advertisers for the first time could buy against 19 million Continue Reading →

There’s been some brouhaha about YouTube blocking a huge swathe of music videos before launching its paid Spotify rival. The truth, however, is a little more nuanced. Labels who haven’t signed up to the website’s new terms, the majority of which are independents like XL Recordings, will have their artist channels blocked in the next Continue Reading →

In 1980, retired Air Force Col. John Boyd walked into the Pentagon and pitched a concept that reshaped how the United States trains its pilots to win dogfights: the OODA loop. It stands for Observe-Orient-Decide-Act, and it’s a framework for decision-making that is used today by everyone from Olympic athletes to Wall Street traders. One Continue Reading →

When Pam Horan, President of the Online Publishers Association (OPA), wrote in December 2012 that “programmatic buying does not build brands”, few would have disagreed. Today, times have changed as big data, programmatic buying and real-time bidding have collectively paved the way for a new generation of brand opportunities online. Recognising the growing shift in Continue Reading →

Facebook is going to give advertisers that want to target its users even more ammunition. The social network will start letting advertisers take information about what Facebook’s users do on the site, mix it with data about the stuff they do on other websites and use it to hone their pitch. Facebook calls this “interest-based Continue Reading →

Microsoft constantly reminds us that Google scans email in order to sell ads. Now it’s adapting its policies to specifically state that it won’t engage in the same practices as its rival. Well, not all of them. In an effort to be more transparent and build trust, the company has updated its service agreement and Continue Reading →

If you have ever wondered why Facebook showed you that advertisement for a new iPhone game or a cheap flight to Bermuda, you will soon be able to find out. Facebook plans to announce on Thursday that it is going to give its users the ability to see the dossiers of likes and interests it Continue Reading →

TBWA/Media Arts Lab was presenting fresh work to its signature client when the Apple executive across the table stopped the proceedings and handed over another idea, saying simply, “We like this better.” The favored ad was created by a rival agency: Apple’s in-house shop. Recounted by a creative who has worked on the brand recently, Continue Reading →

Opera Software is making another acquisition to build out its mobile advertising business: It has either purchased or is close to purchasing mobile video advertising startup AdColony, according to sources with knowledge of the companies. We’ve contacted both companies asking for comment. Opera spokespeople in the U.S. and Europe have told us that the company Continue Reading →

It’s a tradition as revered as turkey on Thanksgiving and baseball in the summer: ad agencies dumping budget at the end of each quarter so they won’t lose it at the beginning of the next. “There’s an artificial market dynamic that resets every month in programmatic where at the end of every quarter, we see Continue Reading →