Month: March 2022

This weekend marks the latest Call of Duty League LAN event, the Minnesota RØKKR’s CDL Major II. Over the next few days, 12 professional Call of Duty teams will convene in the Mystic Lake Casino Hotel in Prior Lake, Minnesota, to play for keeps in the first-person shooter game. Playing on LAN reduces latency in the teams’ gameplay, increasing the competitive integrity of the tournament.

“In the esports industry, we’re fortunate to have been able to continue to compete online — but the best version of the product is a live event. The truest form of competition is on LAN, for a host of technical reasons,” said Brett Diamond, CEO of the RØKKR and its parent company, Version1. “From a fan experience standpoint, there’s really nothing like being in a venue that’s full of fans.”

To interested brands, the frenzied fan engagement generated by live events is valuable evidence of the increasing popularity of competitive gaming, more tangible than the viewership or engagement figures of digital events or activations, per Diamond and other CDL team representatives. For telecommunications firm Bell Canada, the presence of live events and an in-person gaming arena were encouraging reasons to partner with the CDL’s Toronto Ultra, according to Alyson Walker, Chief Commercial Officer of the team’s parent company OverActive Media. “Whether it’s live events at one of their retail locations in a mall or a live event as big as a CDL Major, all of those are different ways to engage fans in-person,” Walker said. “[Bell has] been amazing partners through the pandemic, but they’re certainly very excited to have in-person opportunities.”

While some experts agree the return of in-person events is a benefit to esports organizations and their brand partners, they cautioned live events are not inherently better than digital activations just because they take place in the real world. Rather, the advantage of an in-person event is that it gives esports companies more opportunities to flex their brand-activation muscles in creative ways, packing numerous bells and whistles into events that would’ve been relatively streamlined if held via livestream. This weekend’s Major II event will include extra features like an open “Challengers” tournament for attendees; in June, the Toronto Ultra plan to host a third Major event with extras including local food trucks and branded retail opportunities.

“These content events are where the future is, regardless of whether it’s live or not,” said Harry Tidswell, a senior partnerships manager for the social media and influencer marketing agency Fanbytes, which works with game developers such as Ubisoft and 2K. “But when you’re having something that’s live, you can increase the production value — you can make more of a moment from it.” 

The timing of the CDL’s return to live events is not entirely auspicious. With a brutal real-life conflict raging in Ukraine, the thought of appearing alongside simulated video game violence could give pause to some brands, though Diamond said none of the upcoming Major’s brand partners have reached out with specific concerns. COVID-19 continues to be a potential brand safety risk as well, though the presence of the vaccine makes it less likely that LAN tournaments could become superspreader events.

“We’re in discussions with game developers about getting content creators to make content for war games, and we’ve pulled the plug on that ourselves, as a duty of care to the creators we work with,” Tidswell said. “We don’t want to put them in a position where they’re going to get negative backlash.”

Going into the weekend, Diamond and the RØKKR anticipate that about 5,000 fans will circulate through the Mystic Lake Casino Hotel, with tickets for the weekend selling out in a matter of weeks.

“I think we probably could have sold double the number of tickets that we have, just given the fact that we were sold out for Saturday and Sunday a couple weeks ago,” Diamond said.

Walker feels similarly optimistic about the Ultra’s upcoming live event. “[Toronto’s] Mattamy Athletic Center has between 2,000 to 2,500 seats, depending on seat kills and how many chairs you put on the floor — so our goal would be to fill it all four days,” she said.

With a sold-out venue, Diamond hopes to use the weekend’s impressive turnout to inform potential brand partners about the scope and reach of the RØKKR’s fan base.

“We’ve invited a lot of brand contacts to the event, so they can see it first-hand,” he said. “Putting on these events is a great opportunity for us to demonstrate what esports is, and what an amazing fan experience it can offer.”

Origin trials are coming…

Vinay Goel, product director, Privacy Sandbox, Chrome, announced that origin trials — Google’s means of testing experimental technologies with outside entities — in the canary version of the web browser earlier this week.

As part of the beta program, Google will allow third-party developers to test code for the Topics API with further updates expected in due course. Participants can also test Google’s proposals for managing ad auctions within the Chrome browser for ad retargeting known as FLEDGE. Developers will also be able to trial the Attribution Reporting API.

However, before we go into further detail, it’s worth taking stock of feedback Digiday received over the latest Privacy Sandbox proposals in recent weeks. In short, multiple sources expressed concerns that FLEDGE still leaves Google with too much control over the ad auction, and that Topics still doesn’t offer users enough privacy.

Although, despite such concerns, Google maintains that everything is still on course.

Vulnerabilities of the Topics API?

Prior to the unveiling of the Topics API in late January, Google held a series of roundtables sounding publishers’ opinions on its proposals to target Chrome users via cohorts, as opposed to the status quo of one-to-one identification, after concerns were raised over FLoC’s vulnerabilities to fingerprinting.

Through Topics, Google proposes targeting ads to people based on the categories of content they check out online but unlike FLoC, it proposes a much more general level of categorization. Per the proposals, Chrome will select five topics per person, including randomized categories (this is to prevent third parties from gaming the system) to assign to that person for the week. That’s Google’s pitch, anyway.

Critics maintain Google’s external dialog over Privacy Sandbox is mere lip service given the regulatory scrutiny it faces in both the European Economic Area and the U.S. Albeit, the online advertising giant would, of course, beg to differ.  

Documentation from participants in the Private Advertising Technology Community Group — a body within the Worldwide Web Consortium that determines online technical standards (Google participates in this group) — details discussions over the Topics API.

At this level, discussions get incredibly technical but separate participants within the group, who requested anonymity given their employers’ PR policies, told Digiday the standard is meeting with similar levels of resistance to FLoCs.

The group is still debating how to incubate the Topics API with the widespread opinion within the community group concluding that “it’s not up to our usual standards,” one source told Digiday.

A separate source, employed at a prominent multinational publisher, told Digiday the Topics API would not pass muster given the impending privacy clampdown from governments across the globe — ironically, this is what’s prompting the Privacy Sandbox rollout. “Topics still relies on this idea of cross-domain targeting and I don’t think that’s something we should be doing anymore,” said the source, who similarly requested anonymity.

Premium publishers maintain that Topics’ proposed free flow of user data across different web properties (whether it’s aggregated or not) can have negative implications. “It can prop up misinformation,” added the source. “Think of a website that can have a super-viral headline on a social media platform and they can monetize as well as an established premium news site that people go to get their news every day because the data is packaged and sold across domains, it’s really negative for the business.”

Fears over FLEDGE

Meanwhile, Privacy Sandbox’s proposals for conducting ad auctions within Google Chrome, as opposed to on an external server, known as FLEDGE — more formally known as the “first locally-executed decision over groups experiment” — also stokes concern.

Specifically, there are concerns, over whether the proposals will treat all supply-side platforms equally in programmatic auctions within Google’s marketplace? Normally, publishers sell ads via header bidding partners but under the new proposals, bids will flow through the Google Ad Manager marketplace.

Whether Google will relinquish its control over these auctions via FLEDGE remains to be seen. For while Google has suggested that it will, sources told Digiday it has been vague on details thus far. “Google hasn’t given us a straightforward answer,” said Lukasz Wlodarczyk, vp of programmatic ecosystem growth and innovation at RTB House.

Ideally, the ad tech industry would like an independent arbiter to fulfill the role currently occupied by Google Ad Manager with Joel Meyer, a software engineer at ad tech vendor OpenX telling Digiday the current juncture is an opportunity to shift control of programmatic auctions from GAM to a more neutral party.

“We would love to see GAM participate on an even footing as Chrome becomes the final arbiter in programmatic,” he added. “Expectations aside, we just want to see Google at least consider this alternative. It’s in the publisher’s interest.”

At an early February W3C working group meeting, Google representatives appeared to encourage this thinking — full minutes of the meeting are detailed here — but not all attendees were convinced, according to multiple Digiday sources.

Google is still figuring it out

Dissent over Privacy Sandbox proposals has already contributed to the delay of phasing out third-party cookies in the web’s most popular web browser with the process already delayed beyond its originally scheduled 2022 start date. Some wonder if the ongoing disagreements will result in a case of history repeating itself?

Although, speaking later in February, David Temkin, director of product management, ads privacy, and user trust at Google, moved to reassure attendees of the IAB’s Annual Leadership Meeting that things remained on course. “We believe that we’ve built enough buffer into this system to get there,” he added.

Although Privacy Sandbox will involve much trial and error between now and the close of 2023 according to Temkin who described W3C as primarily a software engineering body. He further added that much arbitration was needed before that wing of W3C’s membership would see eye-to-eye with those representing advertising businesses.

“This is a journey, and of course, it’s not going to be perfect, self-service software is never perfect, stuff like this gets to be good around [version] 3.0, we’re on a journey… a fundamental transformation,” he concluded.

The following conversation has been edited for space and clarity.

How much has health become a centerpiece of parent company Publicis? 

There is a lot of merit to having centralized expertise and having agencies that focus exclusively on the health and wellness category. It lends to different skill sets that just don’t exist in other agencies, for good reason. Over the years, the way we’ve organized and how we’ve dedicated specific agencies to health has really shown positive growth and momentum for the group. We’ve continued to invest in the right talent, the right infrastructure, and continued to put investment toward growing our footprint in health. Especially on the media side, we have absolutely the largest footprint.

How is your approach is different?

Having purpose and having passion for the industry is a starting point. But then we have the clout and the scale behind it being part of Publicis Groupe, so it’s the best of both worlds. For about five years, I was at smaller agencies. And if you look at some of the independent agencies that are fully focused on health care, they’re not fully focused on media. Then automatically from a health media perspective, you’re behind a little bit in terms of the capability when you’re not held up as a media powerhouse. As a smaller independent, where you may not stack up is in some of the big heavy hitter media — whether it’s partnerships, whether it’s rates, whether it’s access from the media side. Everything we’re doing is designed with this industry in mind versus some of the main general market agencies — who are incredible at what they do. They’re trying to fit health into something that exists already and trying to make it work.

What are some unique elements about the health media discipline that a general agency wouldn’t understand?

The big blanket one [is] the compliance, the regulation — the way that the industry operates within almost every space is just slightly different. Rarely is something thrown at us that’s met with a hard “No,” but it almost always is met with a “Yes, comma, but…here are the five things that have to be true for us to be able to do this. And here are all the extra things we have to put in place.” There’s just a different approach to how we have to operate within these channels. Closely related is the use of data. That pertains to the acquisition of data, privacy policies, how and where we can use data for targeting, how far you can take targeting before it risks being invasive.

[Creatively] the TV spots are a little longer. And what you can and can’t say between branded and unbranded is a little different. There are channels in healthcare that aren’t channels outside of healthcare — for example, telemedicine. No one would consider it a media or marketing channel for, you know, toothpaste.

How does Epsilon’s massive trove of data fit into what you do? 

Epsilon is a massive asset, and it’s absolutely propelled our abilities to both crunch data as well as build product. At the end of August last year, we launched a product called PeopleCloud Physician, which is Epsilon-powered [connecting doctors to data]. We were able to deliver truly one-to-one communications between physicians and pharmaceuticals, [and] we were able to do that compliantly. It’s something that was a great value proposition for physicians.

Much like the agency holiday card, the April Fools’ prank is an easy way for brands to get attention, show their personality and prove they can have a sense of humor, according to marketers, agency execs and PR professionals who’ve worked on the stunts. It’s also an easy way for brands to test out off-the-wall or zany ideas that they’re unsure of to see if there’s interest and potentially convert said ideas into a reality. 

“Brands are always looking for attention,” said Jared Kozel, evp and executive creative director at Wunderman Thompson, adding that April Fools’ Day can serve as an “unofficial playground” for brands and agencies alike. “It’s pretty low risk for the most part, as it doesn’t require much effort and might help a brand break through the clutter.” 

How seriously a marketer treats its April Fools’ Day prank will vary. Some brands will send agencies briefs requesting ideas for that day because they plan to dedicate media dollars to it as part of their editorial calendar. Others will brainstorm with their agency or in-house creative team to spitball worthwhile ideas — often a photoshopped concept to use on social media. Sometimes a brand will trot out a more outlandish idea and earmark it for April Fools, agreed agency execs and PR professionals. 

“A lot of agencies are really good at using April Fools’ to sell that one crazy idea that’s totally off-brand,” said Craig Elimeliah, executive creative director at VMLY&R. “It’s kind of like brand Halloween – it’s a day they get to dress up and do something a little bit differently.” 

Doing so is a “strong PR play” to help boost brand awareness rather than marketing meant to drive sales, explained Pilaar Terry, managing partner at PR firm MC Brand Communications. Leaning into April Fools’ pranks for their PR value used to make more sense prior to the shift in brand communications on social media in recent years. 

“Brands started to humanize themselves with the rise of social media – communications used to be more corporate and more rigid,” said Terry. “Now there’s more opportunities to communicate with consumers so April Fools’ has become less needed because brands are showing personality throughout the year. It was a way for brands to show a playful side.” 

The long-term value of April Fools’ is unclear. While brands may get some attention with inclusion in a roundup or a headline, – it’s hard to say if a brand’s perception will change with a stunt. As the volume of pranks by brands has normalized the behavior, it’s also become something people tend to roll their eyes at, noted Elimeliah, adding that some efforts feel like they have “jumped the shark.” 

Jumping the shark isn’t the only potential problem. While agency execs and PR professionals say it’s a low-risk marketing effort, there can be potential fallout like last year’s name change prank from Volkswagen. 

Brands that are doing April Fools’ Day pranks this year should “tread really carefully,” said Rob Schwartz, chairman of TBWAChiatDay in New York. “There’s more that could go wrong than could go right. There’s a war, there’s Covid, there’s inflation. It’s going to be very hard for a brand to strike the right tone right now.”