Adweek’s TV Upfronts and NewFronts 2022 Calendar

After two consecutive years of holding upfront events during the pandemic, media companies are preparing for the most normal season since 2019, including the return of an in-person upfront week in May. In 2020, nearly all in-person presentations were canceled, and events were either held virtually later in the year or scrapped entirely. Last year…

Michaels Crafts a Retail Media Network

Arts and crafts retailer Michaels has officially jumped on the retail media network bandwagon. In partnership with advertising company Criteo, Michaels’ network will offer sponsored products and display ads on Michaels.com, as well as off-site advertising. According to the company, the end result will be a better customer experience with “increased discovery of relevant products…

Inside KFC’s Marketing Strategy With a New CMO, Creative and Media Agencies

In a single six-month period, KFC has upended its bucket of marketing, with a total overhaul of its agency relationships, strategy and leadership. Nick Chavez took the reins as KFC’s new CMO last November, selecting MullenLowe and Spark Foundry as its new creative and media agencies. Despite the turnover, one constant remains: Chavez confirmed to…

Comcast Is the Latest TV Data Provider to Join VideoAmps Hub

Comcast Advertising, the largest multichannel video distributor, announced today that it’s providing media measurement company VideoAmp a license to use its TV set-top box viewership data for its platform in a multiyear contract. This will improve the accuracy of the company’s tools for advertisers in identifying TV audiences as it has more data to cross-reference…

WarnerMedia-Discovery Merger Will ‘Probably’ Close Before the Upfront

Warner Bros. Discovery is becoming closer and closer to a reality, with the upcoming Discovery and WarnerMedia merger on track to close in early Q2–and “probably” ahead of the upfront–Discovery executives said Thursday morning during the company’s fourth quarter earnings call. “Hopefully, we’ll be closed before the upfront, it looks like that’ll probably be the…

Marketers Aren’t Waiting Around for Meta to Solve Its Apple Conversion Problem

After a torrent of bad news–most notably a disappointing earnings report that sent shares tumbling–Meta finally had something good to share with the advertising community last week: It had improved its underreporting of iOS web conversions to 8%, down from 15% in September. Advertisers were, for the most part, nonplussed. “We were adapting to this…