Messenger: How to Use the Everyday Earth Sticker Pack

As part of its Earth Day initiatives, Meta released a new sticker pack in Messenger inspired by the holiday. The Everyday Earth sticker pack features eight embellishments users can send in conversations. Our guide will show you how to use the Everyday Earth sticker pack in the Messenger application. Note: These screenshots were captured in…

Suddenly, Buying Some Peanuts and Cracker Jack Is a Whole Lot Easier

Boston’s Fenway Park is the second-most expensive venue in the U.S. to see a baseball game, behind only Wrigley Field in Chicago. While Instacart can’t change that, it’s making paying for food and drinks easier for Red Sox fans. The online grocery platform is bringing its AI-powered point-of-sale system, Caper Counter, to Fenway Park, its…

4 Search Trends Retailers Need to Watch Out For

Across all of the different search landscapes, retailers will likely see some of the biggest changes in years to come. Google is trying everything it possibly can to make up ground in the commerce space. This has resulted in more aggressive testing in what types of results it shows users–in other words, it’s attempting to…

Backlash Against Consent Pop-ups Is a Misleading Argument

The future is zero- and first-party data. Audiences must regain a central role in the digital advertising ecosystem. But the industry is facing one of its biggest challenges to date, and it’s not on the technical and regulatory fronts. There is a clash between the need to regain credibility by embracing society’s expectations around privacy…

Affirm Solves Life’s Awkward Moments With Buy Now, Pay Later

Buy now pay later (BNPL) platform Affirm wants shoppers to say yes to the dress–and the home furnishings and anything else they might need to purchase for major life moments–without worrying about paying the full cost upfront or getting hit with fees later. And it wants them to know it is uniquely situated to help…

TikTok Is Meta’s Quite Convenient Competitor

“Data-Driven Thinking” is written by members of the media community and contains fresh ideas on the digital revolution in media.  Today’s column is written by Allison Schiff, managing editor at AdExchanger. It’s part of a series of perspectives from AdExchanger’s editorial team. TikTok doesn’t compete with Facebook or Instagram. Neither does Twitter, Pinterest or LinkedIn.Continue reading »

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FaZe Clan’s Matt “Bk” Augustin on Staying Curious and Hungry

Like many marketing leaders, Matt “Bk” Augustin started out in the agency world, working on just about everything imaginable–from Tinder to the NFL to Activision Blizzard. However, when “the Social Nerd” (as people have come to know him) had the unique opportunity to join revolutionary gaming brand FaZe Clan, it was something he couldn’t pass…

Listen to Adweek’s Most Powerful Women in Sports Podcast

Childhood sports and other interests can serve as formative aspects of professional careers and leadership qualities. This is exemplified by Johanna Faries, general manager of Call of Duty at Activision Blizzard who dabbled in martial arts, soccer, basketball and music during her time in primary school and then at Harvard University. During their conversation, Faries…

Why advertisers should focus on well-categorized content and contextually relevant ads

By Caroline Blavet, VP Global Client Strategy, Dailymotion

Occasional volatility is a given for any business, but it can be even worse for ad-supported social media platforms, the consequences of which reverberate to marketers. Brands and software developers can have the rug pulled out from under them if any major player makes a sudden policy change, such as a new approach to privacy. 

Even if business can continue as normal in light of these changes, it’s still time for advertisers to make some adjustments. According to a report by Deloitte, consumers believe that trustworthiness (83%), integrity (79%) and honesty (77%) are closely aligned with their favorite brands. And none of those attributes can be attained by tracking consumers surreptitiously or taking their data without their knowledge.

If advertisers want to evolve and keep up not only with the many evolving privacy policies but, more importantly, the privacy concerns of consumers, they’ll need a platform that can meet their needs without tracking off-site behavior — a platform that instead cultivates trust and integrity with the ability for consumers to opt-in or opt-out. And while users’ diverse basket of interests creates opportunities for advertisers, successful campaigns are more effectively connecting with audiences by focusing on context, not user data. Video categorization is one area where context can be hugely helpful toward this goal.

Embrace relevance and respect privacy with contextual data from video

Unlike ads based on viewers’ browser history, contextually relevant ads serve up promotions inspired by the video currently being watched. For example, it might make sense to pair an NBA highlights video with an ad for a sporting goods store or an ad for a basketball video game.

And with the right technology, contextual relevance can be taken a step further. Advanced machine learning models can better interpret what a video is about by using a combination of video and textual classifiers. This opens up a near-endless list of opportunities for hyper-contextual targeting, allowing advertisers to reach the right consumers at the right moment without infringing on their privacy.

One type of contextual data extracted from video categorization is textual classifiers. Every video has a title and a description, and both can be used to help categorize the video for future ad placement.

For example, if the title is “Best new cars from the auto show,” an algorithm could determine that there are two keywords — “cars” and “auto” — that indicate how this video should be categorized. This would enable the video to be paired with ads for automobiles, car dealers and used car lots.  

If the video is about prehistoric creatures — with a title of “Exciting dinosaur discoveries of the 21st century” —  then “dinosaurs” would serve as a solid textual classifier. This video might pair well with an ad for an upcoming movie about creatures from the Jurassic period. 

But what if the video was a bit of a joke, like a clip of kids playing with dinosaur toys or a chef making cakes and cookies in dinosaur shapes? In this instance, the contextual relevance would be vastly different. But to get to the bottom of what the video is really about — and display relevant ads that will resonate with viewers — more information would be needed.

This is where visual classifiers come in. To drill down further and uncover nuances that may be missed by textual classifiers alone, advertisers can significantly benefit from a video platform that relies on visual classifiers’ power. 

This algorithm allows the video to be evaluated more carefully. In the example above, the visual classifier would be able to differentiate between toys and baked goods and deploy ads based on the actual category. Therefore, an advertisement for toys would be an appropriate match for a video about kids playing with dinosaur action figures. Similarly, an ad involving baking needs, baking dishes or other related products would be in line with a video about cakes and cookies, even if they are in the shape of a dinosaur. 

And the possible contextualization doesn’t stop there when it comes to video. Signals from audio tracks can also be used for more accurate classification.

Well-categorized content empowers advertisers to be contextually relevant

The need for contextually relevant ads has never been more pressing. In addition to concerns about privacy, a survey from Integral Ad Science (IAS) shows that consumers’ perceptions are impacted by ad relevance. 

In fact, 80% of those surveyed perceive brands more positively when their ads are paired with appropriate content. Ad messaging that aligns with content sentiment was also shown to increase brand favorability by 107%, as well as memorability (76%) and receptivity (57%). This demonstrates the power of contextual relevancy and the need for well-categorized content, and successful advertisers are building these steps into their strategies when planning their next campaign.

Sponsored By: Dailymotion

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Messenger: How to Use the Earth Chat Theme

To mark Earth Day April 22, Messenger released an “Earth” chat theme that adds vines and bees to a conversation’s background. When a user activates the Earth chat theme on a conversation, the conversation’s emoji will automatically be updated to the Earth emoji. In addition, six word effects will automatically be added to the conversation…