Category: Data-Labor-Technology Stories

Vogue and Vice are gingerly moving ahead with their editorial partnership, even after Vice’s sexual harassment saga has been blown open. The Condé Nast publication finds itself in an awkward spot with its editorial collaboration with Vice, now the subject of one of media’s biggest sexual harassment stories.

I wonder what’s gonna happen to Vogue’s collaboration with Vice? I mean never forget — when Anna was chummy chum chums with Harvey and now she ditched him and don’t forget Bruce and Mario and now Vice…. https://t.co/3rI824SPkL

— bryanboy (@bryanboy) November 23, 2017

The partnership, announced in October, was tentatively named Project Vs. A dedicated team of editors from both companies was to oversee content including photos, videos and articles that would run on a new site over a 100-day period and be promoted by both companies. Condé Nast was leading the ad sales effort, working with Vice. It was supposed to launch early this year.

But then, just before Christmas, The New York Times published an exposé on Vice’s history of bad behavior toward women, which led to the suspension of top executives. Vice has also been hit with a lawsuit alleging pay discrimination against women.

Condé Nast, meanwhile, was confronting its own awkward associations. It ended its longtime relationship with fashion photographer Terry Richardson after allegations of sexual misconduct emerged against him. Condé Nast also ended relationships with star photographers Bruce Weber and Mario Testino after allegations surfaced that they harassed male models, and it created new guidelines to protect models.

Project Vs is set to launch at the end of February, Digiday has learned. The project has an advertising sponsor, although its name hasn’t been announced. One concept being worked on for launch week is a short doc called “Model Citizens” about young models from places like South Sudan who are trying to break into fashion but whose futures are now in peril due to legal and immigration changes.

Vogue provided a statement that read: “Vogue feels optimistic about Vice’s significant commitments to a respectful, inclusive and equal workplace and are encouraged by the collaborative efforts their editorial team has shown during the past several months. We look forward to sharing the content we’ve created together in the coming weeks.”

Vice also issued a statement: “This is a unique opportunity where Vice and Vogue are coming together under the shared mission of offering our audiences a new platform to consume genre-bending content — from short films and multimedia collages to photo stories and essays featuring today’s leading talent.”

Lots of media companies have sought to partner with Vice, resulting in content partnerships including HBO in 2015, the Guardian in 2016 and Airbnb in 2017. News that the legacy fashion glossy and edgy news startup would team up initially caused surprise because of the contrast between the two brands. But in light of #MeToo, the partnership drew special attention because Vogue, like other women’s magazines, is reckoning with the subject of sexual harassment by its own editorial staffers.

Is vogue sure they want to keep working with vice? https://t.co/Kji3vQCyOP

— Modupe Oloruntoba (@DrivingMsDupsie) January 11, 2018

Vice has committed to a series of reforms, including a pay-parity audit, gender balance in staffing and a board to ensure workplace diversity, pledges that Vogue will no doubt watch closely to make sure it follows through.

The post Vogue and Vice push ahead, awkwardly, with their editorial partnership appeared first on Digiday.

More brands are developing their own augmented reality experiences, as the expense and technical ability needed to produce them have decreased and the desire for mobile entertainment has grown. Oreo is the latest, building its own mobile gaming app called “The Great Oreo Cookie Quest,” which engages users with a virtual scavenger hunt.

Oreo’s game gives users clues to find virtual Oreos in the world around them. Using object-recognition technology, the app can detect whether an object is correct and reveal hidden Oreos. For example, a daily clue like, “What puts hands on your wrist?” will prompt users to scan their watch, revealing an Oreo on their phone’s screen. Each virtual cookie is assigned a point value based on how difficult the clue is, and in a leaderboard, users can see how they compare to their friends on Facebook or Twitter, as well as users around the world. Users can scan real Oreos to enter a sweepstakes to win a trip to either Google’s headquarters in California or a trip to Africa.

“The Great Oreo Cookie Quest” involves Oreo’s partnership with Google, which began in August 2016. Prizes are randomly attached to virtual Oreos, and many are Google-related. For instance, users can win Google Play points or Pixel phones. In Europe and Latin America, the game connects even more with Google. There, the game will be promoted with an image of the Google Android robot.

The game is similar to that of “Pokemon Go,” which launched in 2016 and was one of the first popular AR games, where users search for virtual Pokemon in their surroundings. Users can even store their Oreos in their “Cookiedex,” like the Pokedex in “Pokemon Go.”

“We learned a lot from looking at cases like ‘Pokemon Go’ in terms of best practices for keeping players engaged, sharing with friends and building a groundswell movement about it,” said Justin Parnell, director of brand marketing at Oreo.

The Martin Agency created the game, which took six months to produce. It launched on iOS and Android at the end of January in the U.K. and will roll out across Europe, Russia, Latin America and perhaps the U.S. depending on its performance.

“We wanted to create a proprietary property that allowed us to do exactly what we wanted with regards to object recognition, in an environment that was 100 percent Oreo,” said Andrew Watson, vp and creative director at The Martin Agency. To promote the game, The Martin Agency is rolling out one spot for TV and four for social.

While it’s Oreo’s first social AR game, it’s not the first time the brand has used object-recognition technology. In February 2017, Oreo worked with Google on the Oreo Dunk Challenge app. Users scanned Oreos in the app and then, with the help of Google Earth, launched them into the stratosphere before dunking them into a glass of milk in different locations around the world.

“People are spending more time on mobile than any other device, and they are using it more and more for entertainment,” said Parnell.

The post Oreo hopes to see ‘Pokemon Go’ success in its own scavenger hunt AR game appeared first on Digiday.

The Federal Communications Commission’s Inspector General is probing whether Chairman Ajit Pai acted improperly in advocating for recent changes to the media ownership rules that could benefit
Sinclair Broadcasting.

NBC’s Pyeongchang Olympics prime time ratings took a bit of a tumble on Wednesday night. Per Nielsen live-plus-same-day data and digital data from Adobe Analytics, NBC Olympics’ Wednesday prime-time coverage posted a Total Audience Delivery of 19.2 million viewers, of which 17.2 million watched on NBC only. That means there was a 12 percent lift…

Once upon a time, beacons–Bluetooth-powered devices that can push messages to smartphones–offered brands an opportunity to connect with consumers in physical retail locations and gather data about them. For brands, beacons promised an expanded and expansive conversation at the shelf. Companies spend a lot of money trying to get consumers to the store and in…

The Jamaican bobsled team has been a world-famous underdog since first appearing on the Olympic scene in 1988. The team’s unlikely path to the global stage was made famous in the 1993 movie Cool Runnings, but returning to the Olympics has been a challenge ever since, with financial support often in short supply. This year,…

By Jerrid Grimm, co-founder and ceo, Pressboard

Sponsored content is seeing a massive surge in popularity among advertisers, ad agencies, and PR teams alike — but just like any other growing industry, it can be a bit like the Wild West out there. I know from experience.

Before Pressboard, I worked at an ad agency, and it was clear that brands were falling in love with sponsored content, defined here as brand content that’s posted on publishers’ sites. However, the process of finding the right publishers, negotiating the deal, creating a story, and finally measuring the results was labor intensive and expensive.

That’s why we created this five-step guide based on our own experiences building a sponsored content platform. From ideation to execution, the information below will help take your sponsored content campaign from idea to reality.

1. Picking a publisher

Publishers have spent years building trust with their audience, and that influence and authenticity can be leveraged by advertisers.

To choose the right publisher, make sure they align with your goals — consider content fit, location, audience demographics and social following.

Diana Walters, group director for digital media at OMD Canada, told me that she starts with the publishers’ social following. “I don’t just look at their numbers either. What do their followers look like? Unfortunately, I often have to do it (gather information) manually. It’s a resource intensive, time-consuming process.”

You can use tools like ComScore and SimilarWeb to help with your research, or you can easily discover and compare publishers and their sponsored content packages using Pressboard.

2. Negotiating a rate

Sponsored content is about paying to align your brand with a publisher’s authority and audience. Since most audiences discover content on social media, we’ve found that the most effective sponsored content product is also the simplest: placement of your brand article or video on the publisher’s site along with a social share, all while disclosing your brand’s involvement.

Anna Fertel, associate director, The Media Kitchen explains, “You’re paying for the partnership and deserve to have maximum transparency around all elements of it — where/how your content will be distributed, how many people you can expect to see it, what metrics you’ll receive afterwards, etc. Know your dealbreakers — if the partnership isn’t right, don’t force it.”

3. Creating the content

There are two ways to create sponsored content: by repurposing existing brand content, or by starting from scratch.

If you’re repurposing, analyze your content’s engagement levels. Consider your owned content as a testing ground for which stories might work well as sponsored content.

If you’re starting from scratch, there are a lot of free resources that can help you along the way with things like coming up with a story idea, crafting a headline, or creating a video.

Finding a balance between your brand’s messaging and the publisher’s tone is a blend of art and science. Resist overselling your brand too early or frequently in the story, because data shows that it negatively affects engagement.

4. Promoting the content

Without a distribution plan, even the greatest sponsored content can languish unseen. It’s essential to understand the distribution options available and select what’s right for your content based on its format, your target audience, and your budget.

Distribution options fall under three categories: owned, earned and paid. Organic (owned) reach is dwindling with Facebook’s recently announced newsfeed changes, so you should always budget for paid promotion. While there are hundreds of display networks and recommendation widgets available, we’ve found that paid social distribution is by far the best way to get sponsored content in front of quality audiences.

5. Monitoring your content

Measuring the success of your sponsored content is the final piece of the puzzle, but make sure you’re tracking the right metrics. Advertising metrics focus on impressions and clicks, but good content metrics highlight what happens after the click. To do a proper comparison between sponsored content placed on different publishers, use a standardized analytics tool that also accurately measures content metrics like Active Reading Time.

Here are a few of the metrics we track on every piece of sponsored content.

• Active Reading Time
• Average Scrolled
• Completion Rate
• Conversions

Even distilled into these five short sections, buying sponsored content is not a simple job. It takes media buyers and content marketers years of experience to perfect the art. That said, once you complete this journey, your sponsored content can change how people feel and think about your brand.

The post The 5-minute guide to buying sponsored content from publishers appeared first on Digiday.

iProspect has named Belle Lenz its U.S. chief marketing officer and Joel Grossman its first-ever chief technology officer. Lenz was formerly communications director of the Americas for the global digital marketing agency’s parent, Dentsu Aegis Network. Grossman hails from Leapfrog Online, the performance shop iProspect acquired last year, where he served in the same role….

AdExchanger |

TripAdvisor said on its quarterly earnings call Thursday that it is part way through a significant reduction of its online marketing and has stabilized its advertiser auction platform after some buyer exits in the second half of last year cratered prices. TripAdvisor is overhauling its advertising investments due to improved data and attribution, CEO Steve… Continue reading »

The post TripAdvisor Shares Take Off On Revenue Beat, Improved Online Attribution appeared first on AdExchanger.

Some Nike commercials are as memorable for their camerawork, and the way they’re shot, as for their celebrity stars or message of inspiration. Guy Ritchie’s stunning 2008 spot “Take It to the Next Level” immediately comes to mind. A decade later, the brand’s newest effort from Wieden + Kennedy London, titled “Nothing Beats a Londoner,”…