News and Analysis
Survey: Media Buyers Concerned About Programmatic Disruption
Is the death of third-party cookies more hype than reality? The majority of media buyers are still using third-party data in their digital campaigns, with an average of 11.9 data providers used for each campaign, according to the results of a new study of media buyers, planners, and strategists released this morning and conducted by the data firm Datonics.
Commentary
Google My Business Posts: Your Unexpected Holiday Hero
We’re in an era that allows enterprise businesses to tap into the API and upload Google Posts at scale (with help from a local platform management partner). Year-round, businesses can feature new product launches, new store openings, in-store events, and more, but perhaps one of the best times of year to leverage this space is during the months of November and December, when shoppers are gearing up for the holiday season.
Let’s walk through the top five best uses for Google Posts over the holiday season.
Foursquare’s New Audio Assistant is a Peek into the Future of Local Tech
Dubbed Marsbot for Airpods, Foursquare’s virtual assistant will whisper insights to users about their surroundings, unprompted, as they move throughout the world. This may be a recommendation for a local coffee shop or a fun fact about a landmark.
For brick-and-mortar businesses and the technology providers that help them connect with customers, the marketing possibilities are tantalizing.
Latest Posts
How to Capture the Attention of Multiscreen Consumers
We’ll reach for our phones because the TV alone isn’t enough to entertain us, but this constant overstimulation leaves us wanting more. The fact that we’ll often use the ad breaks to check our phones throws the effectiveness of TV advertising into doubt, but the truth is whatever outlet consumers choose, marketers can no longer take a captive audience for granted.
Here are some tips to capture attention in a multi-screen media environment.
Roundtable: How Google’s Third-Party Cookie Announcement Will Disrupt Search, Ad Tech
Google indicated it is making the change to boost user privacy on the Web, and the company believes digital advertising can survive on the back of evolving, more privacy-aware data sources. Chief among those sources, at least in the case of Chrome, will be Google’s privacy sandbox, which will offer advertisers and ad tech companies personalization opportunities based on browser data without granting them direct access to user-level information.
To size up the impact of Google’s announcement on ad tech and hyperlocal marketing, we turned to a slate of industry professionals for their takes on the move.
What Consumers Believe About Ads: Effectiveness, Creepiness, Transparency
The good news for advertisers is that members of Gen-Z, while finding ads just about as threatening to privacy as respondents of every other age group, appear to see their benefits, too. Forty-six percent of Gen-Zers said personalization can be beneficial, compared to 30-36 percent of older age groups. About three quarters of respondents in all age ranges said personalizations imperils privacy.
2020’s Location-Privacy Winter: The iOS Edition
CCPA isn’t the only factor that will impact privacy and data collection. There are less-discussed and potentially more significant variables like the death of browser cookies and other tech-centric measures. Especially for location tracking, private sector influences and accelerants loom.
2020 Arrives: How Brands and Marketers Can Survive the New Decade
Brands have an obligation to adhere to what their customers care about, but given how easy it is for people to digitally project an aspirational lifestyle, it’s no wonder brands are having a tough time understanding who their consumers are and what they want from the brands they support. To combat this knowledge gap and align what consumers say with what they actually do, we need more real-world intelligence.
Dispatch from CES: Giant TVs, Obsequious Gadgets, and Artificial People
I’m fresh from a couple of days wandering the halls of the Consumer Electronics Show, affectionately known as CES — the annual conference that descends upon Las Vegas in January and proffers the latest in technological solutions to improve every aspect of our daily lives. This is my first time attending the world’s biggest technology conference, where 4,500 companies this year are vying for the attention of 180,000 attendees, according to my Uber driver.
As I made my way through the crowds at the massive Las Vegas Convention Center and other conference venues, I tried to get a sense of the common themes defining consumer innovation as we begin a new decade.
Gimbal App Gives Consumers More Choice, Privacy Controls
While the digital marketing industry waits for full enforcement of California’s Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) to go into effect later this year, the mobile advertising, location solutions, and data company Gimbal is actively working to position itself as a leader in the consumer privacy space. The company recently launched a mobile app called LocationChoices, which gives consumers more control over how their data is used. Gimbal is also building a coalition with other industry players that would give participating vendors a way to systematically honor the requests of individual consumer opt-outs.
Local Search Association Rebrands as Localogy
In 2019, updates to Google’s local search algorithms and changes in the way consumers use mobile devices caused a shift in the way local businesses marketed themselves online. Digital marketing firms have been quick to pivot to meet market demand. As of today, one of the industry’s most influential not-for-profit associations is making a change as well.
Local Search Association (LSA), a not-for-profit association of companies focused on local and location-based marketing, will now be known as Localogy. The name change is part of a larger rebranding effort as the group looks for ways to better showcase its mission to re-invest in the changing nature of local business.
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