The polarization of the country has been in sharp focus for some time, especially the second half of the year. That polarization isn’t new: There’s been a brewing — some might say bubbling or even boiling — so-called culture war for years and it’s spewed far beyond the political realm to become a norm that marketers have to contend with for their brands. 

As consumers put brands’ advertising and marketing messages under a microscope, looking for any hint that a brand is making a statement one way or another in the culture war, in which everything is looked at through a political lens, marketers have to be keenly aware of how anything they put out in the world could be interpreted — or misinterpreted. It’s a consideration that marketers and agency execs are aware of with some more vigilant and more worried about potential backlash than others. Getting messaging right is more important than ever as consumers pay closer attention to brands and there is potential for backlash.

What do we mean by brands at the center of a culture war? Let’s recap some recent examples. Jaguar’s rebrand was dubbed “woke” by several publications and incurred ire from consumers that they were making a statement of some kind that their brand may not have intended. Volvo, meanwhile, was recently celebrated for what has been described as a “pro-family” ad with a spot that was typical bread-and-butter storytelling for the carmaker. Another ad from Apple was also dubbed as “pro-family” and celebrated. Again it was standard fare for advertisers.

Continue reading this article on digiday.com. Sign up for Digiday newsletters to get the latest on media, marketing and the future of TV.

As gaming takes a central role in the rise of transmedia content, a team of writers is using DC Comics superheroes to demonstrate the benefits of direct interplay between a TV series and a video game.

Last month, Digiday covered the launch of “DC Heroes United,” a cartoon series featuring classic DC characters such as Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman. The show, which kicked off on Nov. 20, allows fans to vote on the outcomes of the narrative by playing a parallel mobile game, which is itself part of the framing narrative of the series. It’s the most direct connection between a television series and video game yet — and thanks to the show’s use of popular DC characters, hundreds of thousands of viewers have already tuned in across streaming platforms such as Tubi and YouTube.

So far, five of the series’ 16 planned episodes have come out. After the release of the first two episodes, Digiday spoke to the creative team behind the series to learn more about how they factored gamers’ decisions and preferences into the series’ narrative in real time. This is the transmedia story of “DC Heroes United.”

Continue reading this article on digiday.com. Sign up for Digiday newsletters to get the latest on media, marketing and the future of TV.

With TikTok’s potential U.S. looming ban as early as January, creators and agencies are split: some see it as inevitable, while others are convinced it won’t stick.

The rift has simmered since TikTok’s future was first questioned but has only intensified as the stakes climb — highlighted by the Supreme Court’s decision this week (Dec. 19) to take up the app’s appeal against a U.S. law that could pull the plug next month. 

As organizations put contingency plans in place, some creators and marketers say they aren’t all that worried about TikTok getting pulled. 

Continue reading this article on digiday.com. Sign up for Digiday newsletters to get the latest on media, marketing and the future of TV.

Last month, Clip It, Roblox’s version of TikTok, launched its first official ad products. Now, Sia has become the first musician to activate inside Clip It — and it’s already sparked an unprecedented uptick of user activity within the experience.

Much like TikTok, Clip It is a short-form video service located entirely inside Roblox, with users able to create, share and scroll through videos of their in-game avatars dancing to music inside a variety of virtual settings. 

Sia’s Clip It integration, which launched on December 12 and runs through the end of 2024, gives users access to a free selection of holiday-themed songs, as well as a variety of settings, animations and virtual items based on Sia’s wardrobe and music videos. It’s the first time a prominent mainstream musical artist has placed their music and branding inside Clip It, although the experience also sells custom music and animation packs such as September’s Phonk Pack.

Continue reading this article on digiday.com. Sign up for Digiday newsletters to get the latest on media, marketing and the future of TV.

Modern marketers know that any new work they put out into the world in service of their brand might be encountered by many different audiences.

There’s the target consumer audience, with whom marketers hope their latest campaign or activation will land. There’s competitors, keeping an eye on their rival brands’ every move. There’s online culture warriors waiting to turn an advertiser’s misstep into a cause célèbre. And now there’s another constituency marketers must keep in mind — large language models, the foundational tech upon which generative AI chatbots and applications are based.

With AI platforms like ChatGPT and Perplexity gaining traction, tech firms are creating new ways to understand how large language models perceive their brands — and what AI answers say about them. One of the newest developments comes from Profound, an SEO startup focused on AI search platforms, which today is debuting a way to estimate conversation volume rather than just analyzing AI outputs.

Continue reading this article on digiday.com. Sign up for Digiday newsletters to get the latest on media, marketing and the future of TV.

Agencies aren’t platforms — and they never will be. Let’s not kid ourselves. 

At best, they’ve dabbled in platform cosplay; a pinch of data here, a smidge of recurring revenue there. 

But the idea that they’re about to shed their old-school holding company identity? Wishful thinking. Still, it’s a myth that just won’t die, enthusiastically recycled by holding company CEOs for years.

Continue reading this article on digiday.com. Sign up for Digiday newsletters to get the latest on media, marketing and the future of TV.

The crusade to make everything an ad network continues as yet another player enters the space: real estate media. 

On Wednesday, global real estate brokerage firm RE/MAX announced its own commerce media network, RE/MAX Media Network, a programmatic offering leveraging the real estate brand’s owned properties across its websites, email newsletters, and in-property digital displays.

The question is: Can media buyers be convinced to shell out on yet another retail media network (RMN) given so many of them already exist, like Zillow Group Media Manager, which could serve as direct competition to ReMax’s newly launched offering?

Continue reading this article on digiday.com. Sign up for Digiday newsletters to get the latest on media, marketing and the future of TV.

Few creators have been able to export their star power beyond the walled gardens of the social internet.

And although the influencer sector hasn’t wanted for commercial growth in recent times, the marketing benefits of a creator partnership or influencer campaign have been largely restricted to channels like Instagram and TikTok.

But this year, brands including personal care and household product maker Arm & Hammer, toy brand Miko and tech firm Snapdragon began experimenting with the use of influencer-made marketing content, in place of traditional creative assets, in programmatic ad inventory accessed via Amazon, The Trade Desk and Google’s DSPs.

Continue reading this article on digiday.com. Sign up for Digiday newsletters to get the latest on media, marketing and the future of TV.

Since the summer, Epic Games has invested in a marketing campaign promoting specific creator-made experiences inside Fortnite. So far, the effort has resulted in a serious traffic boost for the chosen experiences — but it’s also raised questions among some creators regarding how and why Epic decides to elevate certain games on the platform over others.

From at least June 2024 onward, Epic Games has selected specific creator-made Fortnite experiences developed by third-party studios — including “Lumberjack Heroes,” “Havoc Hotel” and “Mercenaries” — for a marketing campaign that has included trailers on the official PlayStation YouTube channel and paid promotions by TikTok creators and Twitch streamers, in addition to posts across Fortnite’s official social accounts on platforms such as YouTube and Instagram. Following the campaign, the concurrent user counts of all three experiences ballooned by the thousands.

“Fortnite creators have the ability to submit their islands for consideration across a variety of promotional opportunities, including the Epic’s Picks Discover row and through our social media channels,” an Epic spokesperson said.

Continue reading this article on digiday.com. Sign up for Digiday newsletters to get the latest on media, marketing and the future of TV.

For 2025, Uber Advertising is sticking with what works: scaling up markets, doubling down on programmatic and adding new formats, according to Paul Wright, its head of international advertising. No need to fix what isn’t broken — especially when the ride-hailing app turned ads business already humming along.

So much so that the business hit a 1 billion annual net revenue run rate earlier this summer.. That’s double its 2022 run rate of $500 million. An impressive milestone for an ad business that’s just two years old.

And the way things are going, more milestones are bound to fall in 2025.

Continue reading this article on digiday.com. Sign up for Digiday newsletters to get the latest on media, marketing and the future of TV.

LinkedIn may be chasing the deep pockets of mainstream brands these days, but it’s not neglecting the lifeblood of its ad business. B2B companies are still front and center of its latest market pitch. 

Specifically when it comes to its own AI-powered campaign tool Accelerate. Unlike the offerings from Google and Meta, this tool is designed with B2B marketers in mind.

As LinkedIn’s vp of product management, Abhishek Shrivastava, explained: “B2B marketers have to make do with how to fit their own needs into the existing B2C tools.”

Continue reading this article on digiday.com. Sign up for Digiday newsletters to get the latest on media, marketing and the future of TV.

Interested in sharing your perspectives on the media and marketing industries? Join the Digiday research panel.

The time to reflect on the year is upon us, and for marketers in particular, it looks like 2024 turned out to be a good one overall. Revenues were up for most, and many marketers even grew their staff this year.

This is a member-exclusive article from Digiday. Continue reading it on digiday.com and subscribe to continue reading content like this.

After an ambitious, but abortive, effort to diversify its business in 2023, the esports team 100 Thieves refocused on brand partnerships in 2024 – and was rewarded by a significant rise in sponsor interest.

100 Thieves’ renewed focus on sponsorships has already paid off. After signing 11 new sponsors and achieving a 50 percent sponsorship renewal rate in 2023, the org managed to bring on 23 new sponsors in 2024, including brands such as Crocs, Adidas and Google Play, with a renewal rate of 75 percent over the past twelve months, according to numbers shared with Digiday by 100 Thieves. Company reps declined to specify the specific dollar value of its sponsorship deals, which typically involve the brand paying the team a fee in exchange for a set number of deliverables, such as social media posts, content pieces and jersey logo slaps, as well as more bespoke custom activations. 

In spite of many esports companies’ attempts to escape the pain of brands’ shrinking marketing budgets, 100 Thieves’ evolution over the past year shows how the industry at large remains dependent on advertising to stay afloat, for better or worse.

Continue reading this article on digiday.com. Sign up for Digiday newsletters to get the latest on media, marketing and the future of TV.

The holidays have long been the time when American retailers look for a bit of extra help in their stores. Most of the short-term gigs are of the shelf-stocking and checkout nature. And that makes one recent ad that Macy's posted to ZipRecruiter a standout. Requirements? "Always maintain a cheerful, upbeat demeanor," "assist with crowd...

The aspirations around experiential events have exploded in recent years. Activations used to be confined to physical spaces, and now entire worlds can be built in digital realms like Fortnite. And even physical events have reached ambitious new heights. Now in its sixth year, ADWEEK's 2024 Experiential Award winners know how to dazzle with interactive...

2024 feels like a year that can be split in two: In the first half we saw some expected marketing trends panning out in expected and unexpected ways (Google’s cookie confusion, retail media obsession and generative AI). In the second half, however, it feels like marketers were in the midst of a recalibration of culture, and everyone was trying to understand how to show up and where to show up and they had to do so with stranger than usual change.

A good way to sum up 2024 might be this: It was a year in which marketers (and everyone else) had to get comfortable with expecting the unexpected.

This is a member-exclusive article from Digiday. Continue reading it on digiday.com and subscribe to continue reading content like this.

If you’ve worked in marketing or media in some capacity over the last 25 years, there’s a chance you’ve come across Kevin Wassong, who seemingly knows everyone in the business thanks to his long agency resumé. 

Since January, Wassong has been working with Greg McConnell, a longtime friend and fellow industry colleague with experience overseeing the Rolex business at WPP, among other roles, to develop what the pair are calling “the Bloomberg terminal for marketers,” a SaaS product called mktg.ai. 

The duo are just now rolling out mktg.ai, to the market, offering up a service that aims to be the be-all end-all service for marketers to track the vastly increased number of assets they use in their efforts — along with a simplified means of knowing what’s worked, when it worked and easy access to it all in one place. 

Continue reading this article on digiday.com. Sign up for Digiday newsletters to get the latest on media, marketing and the future of TV.

Havas is now officially an independent, publicly traded business following a successful spin-off from parent company Vivendi. On Monday (Dec. 16), the agency network debuted on the Euronext Amsterdam exchange with a valuation of $2.6 billion (EUR2.5 billion). Havas has been under Vivendi's management since its acquisition in 2017, operating alongside sister companies including French...

Originally published on Nov. 15, 2024, this article has been updated to include an explainer video featuring interviews with industry executives filmed during the Digiday Programmatic Marketing Summit in December 2024.

After several years of fits and starts, curation in ad tech is finally having its moment in the spotlight. 

And if you need a clear sign of its mainstream arrival, even Google is jumping on board.

Continue reading this article on digiday.com. Sign up for Digiday newsletters to get the latest on media, marketing and the future of TV.

Reddit’s sports fan communities grew rapidly in the last year.

Perhaps no great surprise, given 2024’s bumper sporting schedule, which saw the Olympic Games, Copa America and Euro 2024 tournaments catch the attention of audiences. The platform recorded a 35% year-on-year increase in engagement in over 1,000 sports-themed Subreddits, according to internal data that didn’t outline specific figures, shared with Digiday.

But that growth isn’t accidental. For the last year, Reddit has been working behind the scenes with the biggest organizations in American sports, including the National Football League (NFL), National Basketball Association (NBA), Major League Baseball (MLB), Professional Golfers’ Association of America (PGA) and NASCAR.

Continue reading this article on digiday.com. Sign up for Digiday newsletters to get the latest on media, marketing and the future of TV.