Has this ever happened to you? You’re the head of a rising ad tech powerhouse one day that’s just signed an incredible linear ad deal with Disney and AMC Networks, and then suddenly… you’re out. Flown the CEO coop.
Yup, that was Brian Lesser last week who suddenly absconded from one of the most powerful positions in ad tech as the CEO of Xandr (an AT&T company), leaving industry veteran and Chief Business Officer Kirk McDonald to take the reins on an interim basis. Ad tech gossip mill is all a-flutter about why, but AdMonsters is more interested in what’s next—and there the speculators are placing their bets that Xandr will be folded into WarnerMedia (also an AT&T company!), according to Digiday.
WE WERE RIGHT! Or it’s looking that way at least. When AT&T announced it would acquire AppNexus following the approval of its Time Warner merger, we saw the foundations for a new walled garden being laid—especially as whispers of a Trade Desk acquisition made the rounds at Cannes (though that never appeared). Even without The Trade Desk (AppNexus always offered a DSP), AT&T is putting to market a highly attractive end-to-end solution for advertisers powered by a ludicrous first-party data stash.
And this solution is centered on the area where advertisers most want in but (understandably) don’t trust a lot of the targeting and reporting they’re seeing: connected TV. In AT&T you’ve got a trusted media brand with hot properties, a well-regarded exchange, and oodles of first-party user data to target against and leverage in reporting.
The CTV implications are enormous, especially as Roku and Amazon appear to be laying their own walled-garden stakes. If the current chaos of CTV coalesces around these burgeoning gardens (plus Google cash cow YouTube and potentially Comcast with NBC Universal and FreeWheel), independent plays in CTV could quickly dry up. The open CTV advertising ecosystem might be over before it even truly began.
But wait, what about media giant and growing CTV powerhouse Disney? Well, there’s only so much being said about the company’s plans with its inherited platform True[X]...
Indecent Traffic on the Rise?
When crises strike, people turn to things that comfort them most. The PornHub network of adult entertainment sites has been studying its traffic and noticed a 5.7% increase in traffic last Wednesday above its average 120 million daily users. Intriguingly, across timezones, PornHub noticed large traffic spikes during what most would consider working hours. In Italy, the network has seen double-digit traffic growth in the last week.
All right, we included this one as a bit of an end-run to talk about brand safety. As we noted at the Publisher Forum, Coronavirus has brought a decline in reserved inventory as advertisers are practicing extra caution. However, digital publishers are likely to see traffic spikes over this time period, which means opportunities to make up for that lost direct revenue with indirect (i.e., programmatic).
Well, enter a new problem a lot of news publishers are finding they have in common with PornHub—advertisers don’t want to be associated with their content. Advertisers are listing Coronavirus-related terms on their “do not serve” list. Hence why you’re seeing so many banners with innocuous clouds on news sites as you scramble for Coronavirus updates: programmatic bids are being blocked at the last nanosecond by advertiser brand-safety protocols. Arguably, this is stealing revenue opportunities from publishers.
Certainly, some advertisers don’t want any association with Coronavirus (a certain beer brand comes to mind), but many are losing out on qualified, engaged audiences. Brand safety practices have long been due for serious revision, and maybe this moment will make it happen. For one thing, brands should realize pre-bid if the target content is “unsafe.”
Local News Situation Turns Grim
Unsung heroes in the Coronavirus saga have been local news outlets, which have been able to keep regions informed of the latest infection numbers, best precautionary steps, and up-to-date state, county, and city government actions. However, independent local news sources—especially newspapers—have long been in revenue freefall during the digital age.
We’ve gotten to the point that Joshua Benton, Director of the Nieman Journalism Lab at Harvard University and a longtime researcher of local news decline, declared 2020 will be the worst year on record for U.S. local news media: “We’ll see cities lose their last daily newspapers at a scale far beyond anything this country has seen.
Local news resources are incredibly valuable for reasons such as exposing local corruption, but especially critical in times of crisis. But their revenue fortunes have fallen on hard times, with online classifieds usurping newspapers’ best revenue streams and local advertisers heading to Facebook and Google for sophisticated targeting. Even large publisher networks of local news outlets like Gannett and Tribune have struggled to turn the revenue tide; the Nucleus Marketing Group confederation of local inventory collapsed last year. And local TV news is not immune as consumers spend increasing amounts of time on streaming video.
While many digital dailies have struggled to stay alive, publications like The New York Times and Washington Post have made digital subscriptions their bread-and-butter. So when COVID-19 started taking center stage in our daily lives, it was great to see them investing in social good by partway opening up their gates to provide people with free access to the latest virus news. Meanwhile, Gannet, which owns about 100 dailies across the US, has decided to keep their paywalls locked tight.
With all of the fake news and misinformation sweeping across social media, the public is hungry for reliable information that can help them make better-informed decisions.
A social good strategy can boost your bottom line while helping out the world-at-large. It builds trust between a business and its audience. That's exactly what these news outlets are tapping into—it's the old freemium model operating at its best. They're giving people something they really want and need with the hope they'll like their offerings enough to shell out money to consume even more of it.
But some pundits disagree with the practice of paywalls altogether, lambasting the elitist nature by which they create an information and digital divide. "The issue and need for ad-supported media is clearer than ever right as ad budgets get cut and ad tech is shaky," recently tweeted Jonathan Mendez, partner at Arkle Advisors. He isn't wrong either, studies consistently show that consumers prefer ad-supported content over subscription-based, as long as the advertising is relevant and not interruptive.
Video Viewership Up, TV Advertising Down
Pornhub isn't the only video outlet realizing an increase in eyeballs during this pandemic. According to Nielsen, fear of Coronavirus will cause media consumption to rise nearly 60%, with CTV/OTT accounting for much of that boom as audiences remain on lockdown. Meanwhile, live TV viewership will continue to wane, especially as its lifeblood from major sporting events like the NBA and NFL stops running, costing networks billions in advertising dollars. And with networks canceling their upfront pitches to advertisers, they'll leave even more advertising dollars on the table for the ad-supported streamers and other publishers to pick up.
With more people in WFH mode, there exists a greater potential for advertisers to reach a more engaged audience across other dayparts besides the much-coveted primetime. As consumers continue to avoid densely populated public spaces, e-commerce is also expected to take off.
In times like these, consumers are looking to be both entertained and informed. This moment offers publishers—who aren't named Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime or Roku—an opportunity to bulk up on streaming content to capture more audience attention, as well as some of those unspent advertising dollars.
@BrendanCarrFCC
Mar 16 | "This tweet by someone with 4M followers is straight from the most dangerous depths of tin foil hat land.
COVID-19 is a virus spread by person-to-person contact, not radio waves.
FCC, FDA, EPA & others all clear on the false claim that 5G is unsafe: https://go.usa.gov/xdePE"
Reset: Political Ads Are on Streaming Apps Now Too
Mar 3 | Streaming services like Hulu and Roku are the newest platforms for political ads. WaPo's Tony Romm explains why regulation still hasn't caught up. Host: Allegra Frank
AdMonsters Ops | June 9-10, 2020
@{optoutfooterhtml}@
Like this article? You can get more stories with similar insight right in your inbox when you sign up for our weekly eletter.
Please visit this page to reset your account and continue browsing our exclusive content. You'll only need to do this the first time you sign into the new AdMonsters.com website. We apologize for any inconvenience, your privacy and your membership are important to us.
New Users: Become a member
Get access to exclusive content, event perks, and discounts.
