Month: September 2024

This election cycle, one of the lessons learned from consumer advertising is the use of connected TV to target ever-more precise audience segments.

Ad spending on CTV inventory among presidential, local and down-ballot campaigns is rising. In some cases, campaigns are spending up to 80% of their media budgets on CTV.

AdImpact estimated that $1.1 billion of political investment had been spent on CTV ads between Jan. 1, 2023, and Sept. 5 of this year. WPP media network GroupM, which also includes categories such as direct mail in its projections, estimates that total political ad spend will reach $15.4 billion in 2024. Five percent is projected to flow to CTV. (The network made its most recent projection in June.)

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As the US Open comes to a conclusion, the tennis tournament is teaming up with other major tennis events to keep the excitement rolling inside Roblox. It’s a demonstration of the power of gaming — and the metaverse — to build bridges across intellectual properties and their fandom.

At this year’s US Open, the United States Tennis Association opened the first-ever dedicated gaming space inside New York City’s Billie Jean King Tennis Center, giving visitors the chance to play a smorgasbord of tennis video games including the official US Open Fortnite and Roblox experiences. During the official “fan week” prior to the start of the tournament, over 1,200 people passed through the space on a daily basis, according to USTA senior director of digital strategy Brian Ryerson.

“We realize, when it comes to Gen Z and even younger folks, sports fandom is changing,” Ryerson said. “They engage with sports in a very different way, and they want to be a little bit more hands-on in that engagement, and video games just translates that so well.”

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From Banksy and Bernanke to Bell and Jedi Blue, the coterie of internal Google code words that will likely pop up during the Department of Justice’s antitrust trial against Google shed a curious light on various aspects of the case — and many of the giant’s past and present ad tech operations.

The biggest ad-tech antitrust trial, which begins Sept. 9, has nothing to do with mysterious artists, Fed chairmen or Star Wars sages. But court documents are rife with almost two dozen colorful code names for projects related to what the DOJ alleges Google did in dealings with advertisers, publishers and ad-tech rivals. 

Google’s choice of names also reflect some unique metaphors that could help the U.S. government illustrate its case. During the search antitrust trial in May, one lawyer for the DOJ brought up Google’s project called Polyjuice. Mentioned during closing arguments, Polyjuice was a name for Google’s Randomized Generalized Second-Price (RGSP) program that allowed it to randomly swap bids in search auctions.

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Next week (Sept. 9) marks the beginning of one of the most pivotal antitrust trials in U.S. history, a case that could send shockwaves through the ad industry. Central to the trial is an investigation into whether Google’s business practices and corporate culture have been skirting the rules of fair competition.

Here’s a rundown of the key points and potential implications:

First, some background

In 2023, the Department of Justice, joined by several state attorneys general, filed a civil antitrust suit against Google, accusing the company of monopolizing the digital ad market. If this sounds familiar, it’s because the DOJ has also filed a separate antitrust suit against Google, targeting its dominance in the search business.

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YouTube wants to scare up excitement from younger fans for this year’s NFL season. This week, YouTube premiered a new spot ahead of the NFL season, which kicks off today, as part of its campaign to promote NFL Sunday Ticket, the platform’s NFL subscription package. The spot stars football pros and popular content creators in…

True Crime Thursdays dives into the latest crime stories being chronicled on news and streaming platforms. This week, travel back to 1981 when L.A. was riveted by a shocking series of drug-related murders on Wonderland Avenue in the otherwise peaceful Laurel Canyon neighborhood. When is a true crime series also an unexpected final testament? When…

Welcome to another special episode of the Marketing Vanguard podcast. Today, Jenny Rooney speaks with Jennifer Halloran, CMO and head of marketing and brand at MassMutual. Join us as we discuss the evolving role of CMOs as visionary business leaders who drive innovation and growth at their companies. Halloran shares insights on the challenges of…

Veteran journalist Ed Gordon is boarding CBS News as a contributor. The network confirmed the Emmy-winning interviewer and host’s new role to TVNewser on Wednesday. Gordon has a long history with CBS including a stint as a correspondent on 60 Minutes II from 2004 to 2006. He’s also been a regular presence on BET, which…

Glamorous. Evil. Fun. These are some ways advertising has been depicted in film and television. But what do the real people who work in advertising think about their media portrayal? In this episode of Yeah, That’s Probably an Ad, community editor Luz Corona is joined by advertising veterans Shannon Miller and David Griner, two of…

This is TVNewser’s basic cable network ranker and cable news report for the week of August 26, 2024. With the 2024 Democratic National Convention in the rearview, it was a return to the status quo among the cable news networks. Fox News reclaimed the top spot in total viewers and the Adults 25-54 demo, and…