Major Brands Still Avoiding TV News: Is Brand Safety Still A Thing?

TV news networks’ powerful video messages can speak volumes for consumers – good and bad – and can also affect print-based media publishers when it comes to display and other advertising.

Music Veteran Michelle Bell Joins Brand Macro as Head of Brand Partnerships

Music publisher and entertainment professional Michelle Bell has joined Brand Macro as senior vice president, head of brand partnerships. In this role, she will report to Macro chief brand officer Stacey Walker King and oversee business development, management of new and existing brand strategy clients, branded content creation, and experiential activations. Brand Macro is a…

To Help Buyers Increase ROI, TikTok Debuts AI-Powered Smart+ Performance Tools

TikTok kicked off Advertising Week in New York with a flurry of announcements covering artificial intelligence-powered automated performance tools, enhanced measurement capabilities, and new privacy technologies for advertisers. “TikTok is building for the future,” global head of monetization product solutions and operations David Kaufman said in a statement. “We have been listening, learning, and innovating…

Instacart Is Selling More Ads on Its Smart Grocery Carts

Instacart is equipping grocery carts with more ads. The online grocery service is rolling out three new ad formats that appear on the screens built into Instacart’s tech-enabled grocery carts, called Caper Carts. The carts use AI and retailers’ loyalty card programs to serve up personalized offers based on the location and past purchases of…

How To Monetize Dark Traffic

A new generation of what Ad-Shield calls brutal ad blockers – with about 700 million users – is blocking analytics and measurement software that would have captured publisher traffic.

Joker Box Office Shocker: Folie à Deux Bombs With $40M Opening

Todd Phillips’ sequel Joker: Folie a Deux bombed in its box-office debut with an estimated domestic opening of $40 million, well behind expectations, after becoming the the first Hollywood comic book movie in history to earn a D CinemaScore from audiences. (THR / Heat Vision) Those discordant domestic ticket sales were behind initial projections of…

Tombras Acquires New York Agency The Burns Group

Global independent agency Tombras has acquired The Burns Group, an independent advertising agency based in New York. The acquisition further bolsters Tombras’ capabilities with top CPG clients, including the Swiss cough drop brand Ricola, which Tombras will take over as creative AOR. The Burns Group also works with Haleon brands, previously serving as AOR for…