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News Hotline

• Microsoft Launches Social msnNOW
  by Laurie Sullivan 2 minutes ago

  promising ...

• ANA Video: Engagement Means Story Sharing
  by Karl Greenberg 59 minutes ago

  Speaking at the 2012 ANA TV & Everything Video Forum in New York on Thursday, Adobe's Chris Robinson pointed out that viewers are becoming participants in programming that is driving overlap in media platforms online and off. ...

• Dealer Counts Actually Rose Last Year
  by Karl Greenberg over 1 hour ago

  The number of U.S. auto dealers will steadily decline each year - with massive cuts during the industry's recent downturn - but 2011 saw an unexpected turnaround with the dealer count actually rising for the first time in years. ...

• Coalition Versus Highway Commercialization
  by Karl Greenberg over 1 hour ago

  A new measure, Amendment 217 of the American Energy and Infrastructure Jobs Act of 2012, is currently before the House of Representatives that would overturn the 50-year-old ban on the sale of food, fuel and other convenience items at interstate rest stops. ...

• Nestle Sales Beat Hopes
  by Karl Greenberg over 1 hour ago

  Nestle SA, the world's biggest food and drinks maker, managed to brush aside the impact of a soaring domestic currency to post a solid increase in profits in 2011 as sales rose strongly, particularly in developing countries. ...

• Do Affluents Just Want A Porsche?
  by Karl Greenberg over 1 hour ago

  Maybe affluent people want their sports cars to have gasoline engines. Tesla Motors, the maker of pricey battery-powered two-seat sports cars, said its fourth-quarter net loss grew to $81.5 million as electric Roadster sales end ahead of the release of Model S sedans. The business is owned by ...

• Are Shoppers Over The Naked Guys?
  by Karl Greenberg over 1 hour ago

  Margin squeeze and flagging same-store sales hurt Abercrombie & Fitch Co.'s fourth quarter profit, which dropped nearly 80% to $19.6 million from $92.6 million a year earlier. ...

• Kroger Inks Branded Content Deal
  by Karl Greenberg over 1 hour ago

  The Kroger Co. has launched a parenting website to promote its Comforts private-label baby line. Comfortsforbaby.com is an online community that provides articles, coupons, tips and forums. The Comforts line includes diapers, soaps, shampoos, lotions and baby accessories like cups and pacifiers. ...

• Charley's Grilled Subs In Dubai
  by Karl Greenberg over 1 hour ago

  Charley's Grilled Subs, the 454-unit Philly steak restaurant chain, has grown to 15 restaurants in the United Arab Emirates. The most recent opened Jan. 19 at the Dubai International Airport, the 14th busiest airport in the world. ...

• Ad Tracking Goes Digital, Could Save $1B
  by David Goetzl over 1 hour ago

  The Association of National Advertisers announced an industry transition from the "current analog commercial slate into a digital one," ending a 30-year-old industry practice for tracking commercials within content. ...

• Top Story: ANA: TV Media Budgets Up, Aide By STB Data

  New research from the Association of National Advertisers and Forrester shows 76% of marketers plan to keep their media budgets stable in 2012. About half (47%) of all budgets will go to TV. That's a 6% bump. Marketers are intrigued by the possibility of TV measurement systems based ...

• Users Accept More Video Ads

  During the fourth quarter of 2011, video ad volume growth outpaced video viewing volume growth for the second quarter in a row. That's according to new data from video technology company FreeWheel, which also found that ad loads -- the number of video ads per video view -- ...

• Velti To Debut Private Exchange For Premium Publishers

  Velti plans to debut a new private exchange for premium publishers. Krishna Subramanian, chief marketing officer at Velti, says it is the only exchange built specifically for mobile that offers the ability to create dynamic pricing models by setting floors and custom priorities. ...

• People.com Launches Tablet-Optimized Site With Unilever Support

  Both People.com and AOL.com have launched tablet-optimized sites this week. Unilever is supporting the People launch with a campaign designed specifically for a tablet Web browser. ...

• Top Story: GroupM: Search Good For What Ails Pharma Brands

  Pharmaceutical companies spent more than $4 trillion in advertising last year, but search only accounted for 2.6%. New research from GroupM shows that 42% of consumers filling new prescriptions usepaid search when making a decision related to the purchase. ...

• Mitsubishi Meets Floods, Blizzards, Ice, Sleet

  The Brea, Calif.-based U.S. sales and marketing arm of the Japanese automaker has launched a new marketing campaign that aims to increase consideration of its vehicles by making them stars of cinema verit-style real-world testing. ...

• Study: Retailers Flock To Online Marketing

  E-commerce is increasingly emerging as the primary language for most retailers, reports a new study from the National Retail Federation, with big investments in IT, Web sites and online marketing in store for the year ahead. ...

• Purina Tells Owners Pets Are 'Great'

  Every dog owner knows their pet is "good." Purina Pro Plan, with a new marketing campaign, is giving them a chance to make their dogs "great." ...

• Testing: Industry Wants Cross-Platform Metrics For Video

  A new cross-platform video identification system is being readied for testing at the start of the 2012 fall season. The industry is having difficulty accurately measuring video content as it migrates across a growing array of devices and channels including TV, online, tablets, smart phones and video-on-demand syst ...

• Apple Promises To Crack Down On Privacy Violations

  Faced with reports that app developers are scooping up iPhone users' address books without their permission, Apple said it intends to put a stop to the practice. Apple's statement came the same day it was grilled by congressmen on privacy issues. ...

• New OOH Buy Mortgages The House, Literally

  The newest thing in out-of-home advertising might be on-the-home advertising. Homeowners worried about making their mortgage payments can now tap a new source of income by turning their homes into ad platforms. ...

• CBS' Ad Base Holds Steady, Retrans Sees Uptick

  Looking at overall entertainment revenue for the CBS Televison Network, its studios, distribution, CBS Films and its interactive business, the company had a 1% gain to $7.5 billion for 2011. Cable and outdoor revs rose in the fourth quarter. ...

• Timeline Apps Drive Traffic For Facebook Partners

  A month after releasing 60 new Timeline apps, Facebook touted initial results showing big increases in sign-ups and traffic for sites including Pinterest, Foodspotting and Fab.com. The lifestyle apps that went live last month followed Facebook's launch of Timeline in September. The Open Graph platform allows developers and ...

• Blekko Begins Testing Search Ads

  Blekko has begun to test search ads on its site through feeds from Google and Bing. It works with brands through ad networks, but doesn't yet have direct ad relationships. ...

• Who Broke The News Of Whitney's Death?

  Here's an interesting post about journalists using Twitter tweets as an accurate source of news, centered around the timely issue of just who broke the story of Whitney Houston's death. Steve Myers contends that it was not really a Twitter user, after all. Analyzing the tweet said to ...

• NBCU Taps comScore, Google To Measure Olympics Audience

  In its third pass toward developing a single-source metrics system, NBC Universal will task both comScore and Google to create new ways of measuring viewership of this summer's London Olympics across a variety of platforms. Google will be working with special algorithyms, a 3,000-consumer panel and a meter-based ...

• Game Is On Between 'T' And 'WSJ' Mags

  The Wall Street Journal's luxury glossy, WSJ, is gaining momentum, with an increase in ad pages and frequency, heating up the competititon between this pub and The New York Times' T, which is having its own growing pains (a change in editor, some flat-lining in ad pages). John ...

• 'Sunset' Has New EIC

  Time Inc.'s Sunset, one of the country's biggest regional pubs, tapped Kitty Morgan as its new editor in chief. Morgan was previously executive editor of Better Homes and Gardens. She replaces interim editor Charla Lawhon, who took over after Katie Tamony was fired after 10 years in the ...

• Despite Q4 Slips, Comcast, NBC Revs Up For 2011

  For the year, Comcast revenue rose 47.2% to $55.8 billion, in part because of the NBCU equity transaction. NBC Universal's cable networks continue to do the heavy lifting -- up 5.3% in revenue to $2.2 billion for the fourth quarter and 10.6% higher for the year overall to ...

• Craft Brewer Presents 'Least Interesting Man'

  Craft beer brewer Breckenridge Brewery of Colorado is extending its low-budget "Truth in Beervertising" TV campaign with two new spots parodying big-brand beer advertising. ...

• Mobile Malware Attacks Up 155% In 2011

  A new report from Juniper Networks underscores the downside of the Android Market's hands-off approach to approving apps. In its annual Mobile Threats Report, it reported a record number of mobile malware attacks, especially to the Android platform. While there was a 155% rise in mobile malware across ...

• Toyota Leads In Tight Durability Race

  When it comes to vehicle dependability, Toyota's back on top -- but with little time for laurel resting: so is everyone else, it seems, and the domestic manufacturers -- General Motors, Ford Motor and Chrysler LLC -- are improving the fastest. ...

• Oscar Advertisers Include Movie Studios, MetLife

  At least seven companies that spent heavily to advertise in the Super Bowl will also air pricey spots in the Academy Awards later this month. Included on the list are two movie marketers and a beer company promoting a more niche brand. ...

• 4 SEO Trends Enterprises Should Know

  Search engine optimization within enterprise organizations will become more important this year as companies realize the power behind optimizing for social signals in search engine results. But there is other content that marketers should consider. For instance, Google has increased its focus on rich snippets such as author ...

• How To Use AdWords For Keyword Research

  Rand Fishkin shows us that the numbers and the queries in Google's AdWords data may not always match what is actually happening on Google's search engine. He warns against running discovery-focused searches in AdWords., which may not show all the high-volume keyword phrases connected to a word and ...

• BtoB Releases Search Study

  About 95% of marketers have optimized Web sites and landing pages to serve up results near the top of the search page, but the use of paid-search ads is much less pervasive, according to a new study released by B2B. In fact, only 35% of respondents have had ...

• Gliding Through Google Analytics

  Planning, customer segmentation, goal and event tracking, and page categories. These are some of the topics that Sarah Carling outlines in her guide on what to track through Google Analytics. For instance, she explains why some of the customer segmentations for an ecommerce site should include new visitors ...

• TV Retrans Fees Soar 27%

  Average monthly retransmission fees that TV stations get from cable, satellite, and telco video services continue to climb. Now the average monthly fee is about 33 cents per subscriber per month, as of the third quarter 2011, up 27%. ...

• Travel Channel To Debut 3 New Series

  The Travel Channel is making a bid to land a hit in the flourishing auction genre. Following the successful "Auction Hunters" on Spike and "Storage Wars" on A&E, the network will debut "Baggage Battles" April 11. Another upcoming show stays in the popular search-and-discover genre. "Toy Hunters" follows ...

• The To-Do App That Rocked The World

  Not since Angry Birds, has there been so much excitement around a mobile app. Even more remarkable, it’s a to-do list that has everyone talking. TheNextWeb puts Clear -- released this week on iTunes App Store -- in that category of apps “that make you re-think the way ...

• HTC Planning Music Service?

  You go, HTC. The struggling smartphone maker is reportedly working on several new products, including a music streaming service. HTC, which recently acquired a substantial stake in Beats Audio, is developing a streaming service that will be offered as a default music client on HTC phones and tablets, ...

• Apple Takes Top Smartphone Seller Crown

  Surpassing Samsung, Apple became the world’s biggest smartphone vendor in the fourth quarter of 2011, according to new data from Gartner. “Almost a quarter of smartphones sold were iPhones as Apple’s market share rose to 23.8 percent from 15.8 percent a year earlier,” Bloomberg notes, citing Gartner. All ...

• Top Story: Omnicom Group Takes Resolution Global To Optimize Data, Search

  In a bid to maximize the benefits of its global search operations, Omnicom Media Group is re-branding search agencies it uses in 40 countries under the Resolution Media banner, which it acquired in 2005 and had previously just operated in the U.S. The rollout, which represents roughly $2 ...

• Digital Viewing Of Traditional TV Rises

  Video plays on tablets, mobile devices and connected TVs nearly doubled in the fourth quarter of 2011 over the third quarter. At the same time, video plays on Google TV grew 91% in fourth-quarter 2011 over previous periods. That's good news for new video and TV-related businesses. ...

• Asian Brands Need To Be Ethical

  Eighty-four percent of Chinese and three-quarters of Indian consumers believe it is the responsibility of companies rather than governments to solve social and environmental issues, according to Havas Media's ASPAC Meaningful Brands survey. But just two-thirds of respondents in China feel that they can make a difference in ...

• Safeway Marketing Chief Guardedly Optimistic

  Safeway is recognizing "a little bit of a re-emergence of optimism among shoppers" as some come back to pre-recession behavior, Michael Minasi, the retailer's president of marketing, said during a panel discussion at the FMI Midwinter Executive Conference in Orlando. ...

• Eddie Bauer CEO To Take Hike

  Eddie Bauer chief Neil Fiske, who joined the retailer in 2007 and led it through bankruptcy, will leave his post effective March 2. No word on why he's leaving. Fiske will step aside for David Chamberlain, the company's executive chairman, who will serve as interim CEO until a ...

• Mercedes-Benz Keys Also Unlock Ads

  Mercedes-Benz has found a new way of showing off all the space inside its vans: by allowing consumers to open the vehicle's doors in its ads using their car keys. ...

• Starbucks Valentines App Still Live

  Cads: it's not too late to give a virtual Valentine's Day gift. Starbuck's app stays live until Thursday. It's part of the Starbucks Cup Magic App program developed last year for the holidays to allow its customers to share augmented reality experiences. The short-term program has Valentine's Day-themed ...

• Mazda Seeks Dance Partner

  Mazda is in a serious bind. The maker is forecasting a $1.3 billion loss for the current fiscal year, which ends March 31. And it is struggling to reverse a sales slide that saw it drop to 1.25 million units, a 2% dip, in calendar 2011. Mazda may ...

• Top Story: Digital Radio Overcomes Major Ad Hurdle, Pandora Fails To Get Out Of Black Box

  In a move that will make it easier for agencies to plan, buy, and perhaps most importantly, process new and emerging digital radio advertising platforms, Madison Avenue now has a standard format for coding HD and streaming radio stations it its media-buying systems. The breakthrough, which is being ...

• To Win Some Hearts, Agency Makes A Play For The Sole (Two At A Time)

  Most agencies try to create campaigns that move people to act not just with their minds, but also with their feet. A new one breaking today from the cementbloc hopes to do that literally - by appealing to people's hearts via their soles. The campaign for non-profit Coore ...

• SI Swimsuit Apps Also Peep At Magazine Watermarks

  As part of this year's Swimsuit Issue extravaganza, Sports Illustrated launches a special viewer app that detects watermarks in the special issue to trigger special videos of the models. ...

• Apple's Tim Cook: Tablet Sales Will Surpass PC

  At a Goldman Sachs keynote, Apple CEO Tim Cook argued that "off the charts" iPad sales indicated tablet sales will surpass PC sales in coming years. Addressing the Amazon challenge directly, Cook claims the iPad is aimed at a different type of consumer from the Kindle Fire. ...

• That's Entertainment: Screen Size Doesn't Matter

  Consumers are using their tablets and smartphones to stream video programming at an increasing rate, and they're doing it in their homes, where televisions are available. That's according to a new study conducted by Chadwick Martin Bailey. ...