Television's upfront market will take a turn backwards this season. A new estimate says that with most of the deal-making completed, total television upfront prime-time advertising revenue for broadcast and cable networks will sink 6% to $18.1 billion from the $19.3 billion tally in 2013, per Media Dynamics.Broadcast upfront revenues are estimated to drop 7.7% to $8.45 billion from the $9.15 billion level in 2013. Cable TV upfront revenues look to retreat 4.7% to $9.68 billion from $10.16 billion.While broadcast networks have seen steady declines for the last two upfront selling periods, this season will be the first decline for cable since it dropped to $6.92 billion in the 2009 upfront period (for the 2009-2010 season) from its $7.6 billion level in 2008 (the 2008-2009 period).In 2009, the TV ad revenue declines were part of the overall U.S. economic collapse that hit all businesses during the Great Recession in 2009. In the midst of the recessionary period in 2009, total TV upfront revenues were down sharply -- off 14% -- with the cost per thousand viewers down 4%.Some of that upfront market was also affected to a major degree by TV networks withholding much more inventory that year for sale in the following scatter markets -- in the hopes the economy would improve.
Comcast’s NBCUniversal unit barely pulled in the same revenues as a year ago for its second-quarter results -- in part due to its lower-performing filmed entertainment unit.NBCUniversal’s cable, broadcast and theme parks businesses, however, earned good results in the period.Cable networks, NBCUniversal’s biggest business unit, grew 2.6% in revenue to $2.48 billion -- with a 4.2% increase in distribution revenue and a 14.3% gain in content licensing fees. But advertising revenues for its networks sank 2.2% during the period. Operating cash flow overall was up 6.3% to $914 million.Broadcast television grew 4.9% to $1.8 billion -- mostly due to higher retransmission revenues and content licensing agreements. But like its cable networks, advertising sank. The NBC network and stations slipped 1.7% in advertising revenue -- which the company says was the result of fewer hours for “The Voice,” compared to the same period a year before. Operating cash flow climbed 16.2% to $240 million.Filmed entertainment witnessed a sharp 15.3% decline in revenue to $1.2 billion, due to lower theatrical revenue resulting from fewer theatrical releases. Still, operating cash flow was up to $195 million from $162 million.Theme parks' revenue was up 12.8% to $615 million from higher attendance and higher guest spending. Overall, Comcast Corp revenue was up 3.5% to $16.8 billion, with net income up 14.8% to $1.99 billion.The company continued to lose video customers -- some 144,000 -- to land at 22.4 million. Revenue from its video cable business was up 1.2% to $5.24 billion. Broadband business continue to be a strong revenue gainer -- up 9.7% to $2.8 billion.Phone business revenues were up 1.3% to $922 million. Advertising revenue for Comcast systems was up 7.5% to $599 million.Comcast Corp., which is looking to buy Time Warner Cable in a $45.2 billion deal, witnessed its stock rise 1.6% to $54.70 in midday trading.
Indexeus, a new search engine, is turning the tables on hackers by exposing their exploits. The search engine crawls and indexes mostly Web sites frequented by the hackers. Indexeus allows searchers to query millions of records from some of the larger data breaches, including Adobe and Yahoo. The results list information including email addresses, usernames, passwords, Internet address, physical address, birthdays and other information associated with the accounts. The site boasts logging 10 million entries, and growing, but security expert Brian Krebs estimates there are more than 200 million entries. He describes those behind Indexeus are "a gaggle of young men in their mid- to late-teens or early 20s --envisioned the service as a way to frighten fellow hackers into paying to have their information removed or 'blacklisted' from the search engine." Searches initially cost one credit or $0.50, whereas a blacklist costs 10 credits, for all searches. If the searcher doesn't have money to blacklist themselves, they can have the data removed for free by providing proof that includes a photo ID, photo of parent ID or proof of owning the email address. The site also describes how to purchase credits. The original model requires donations paid in Bitcoin to remove the entries and buy insurance against having their information indexed by search engines in the event of a future database leak. Not for those living in the European Union, however. Indexeus founder Jason Relinquo tells Krebs that blacklisting is now free because of the European Union's right to be forgotten law. He can't charge for something the search engines are giving away for free. The purpose of Indexeus is not to provide private information about someone, but to protect them by creating awareness, per the company's Web site. "The goal is to make people realize that using the same information all over is stupid and will lead to you getting your information stolen, but also showing you how badly administrators keep your private data stored." Indexeus' customers are mostly unskilled hackers Krebs calls script kiddies, a term describing malicious hackers learning how to write their own programs to attack computer systems and networks.
When is native advertising a smart strategy for reaching online news readers? For advertisers, it’s critical that their message be highly relevant to audiences. Publishers would be wise to steer clear of less respected brand partners. That’s according to new research from Interactive Advertising Bureau and Edelman Berland, which found that relevancy (90%) is the top factor in sparking interest in in-feed sponsored content. For native adverting to work, it’s critical that “consumers’ viewpoints are taken into account,” according to Sherrill Mane, senior vice president of research, analytics and measurement at the IAB. “News publishers get greater impact when they work with familiar and trusted brands,” Mane stressed. All told, brand familiarity and trust (81%), as well as subject matter expertise (82%), were all identified as key to driving news reading consumers’ interest in sponsored content. Preconceived views about a publisher also need to be considered. In fact, research showed that a positive view of a news site’s credibility can significantly impact readers’ feelings about sponsored content -- driving a 33% spike in perceived credibility of an ad’s content. Nearly two-thirds (60%) of online news visitors said that they are more open to digital advertising that focuses on a story rather than selling a product.The research also revealed differences in each news user group’s perception of sponsored content. For instance, when asked to look at real-world mockups of news pages, most business and entertainment news audiences (82% and 85%, respectively) felt that in-feed sponsored content was easy to single out, while the general news audience had more trouble, with less than half (41%) recognizing that the material was advertising. Also of note, more than half of business and entertainment news users surveyed stated that sponsored content has the potential to increase the favorability of a brand advertiser and news site across a variety of dimensions. A similar response is also possible with a general news audience, but, according to Mane, it seemed they have a higher bar for in-feed sponsored content in order to boost their approval of a marketer or publisher. For their findings, the IAB and Edelman surveyed 5,000 people who visit U.S. news sites from their personal computers. The group was surveyed after they were exposed to mock in-feed ads that resemble what is now common on business, entertainment and general news sites.
LOS ANGELES -- While TV is “still relevant” and continues to represent an important reach medium for national marketers, it is no longer sufficient for influencing consumers -- especially the kind of 20- and 30-somethings American Honda Motor Co. is looking to reach, Assistant Vice President-Marketing Tom Peyton asserted during a keynote opening OMMA Premium here this morning. In its place, Peyton said, Honda is turning to music -- both live events and a multitude of digital distribution channels (even its own cars) -- to pick up the slack. “It’s a big money play. It’s a bold play,” Peyton said of Honda’s pivot away from TV and toward music sponsorship and distribution, adding: “Frankly, we think it’s not great that a company that makes cars is getting into the content business.” That said, Peyton noted that Honda simply is working with the cards that have been dealt to it, adding that it is using music as a means of leveraging “what the digital age has brought us.” The concept, he said, began with the “Civic Tour” in 2001 -- a series of live, experiential concert events sponsored by the Honda brand -- and has blossomed into the “Honda Stage,” which will feature 200 live performances during the next year. He estimates those events will generate 2 billion media impressions, including 1 million live event-goers, and “tens o millions of earned and promotional views” via social media. Peyton described the strategy as a “TV replacement for us,” citing data indicating that only 34% of “Millennial” consumers watch “very little or no TV today, and if they do, they watch it online.” He said that has increased from just 17% of the consumer segment a “few years ago. “We said, ‘Geez, let’s get in the music business.” Based on the success of the “Civic Tour,” Peyton said Honda jumped in with both feet, sponsoring or helping to create “150 events just like it.” The events are amortized in a variety of ways and media channels for Honda’s brands including its own -- including its Web site, as well as its cars. The next generation of entertainment systems in Honda cars will enable consumers to access Honda Stage content like any other audio channel. But the main distribution driving Honda Stage are big digital music publishers including Clear Channel’s iHeartRadio, Live Nation, Vevo, Revolt and YouTube, the last of which he said currently is “the largest distributor of music in the United States.” “It was amazing to me when you see the gravitas that YouTube has now as a music channel,” Peyton said, noting that YouTube currently generates about 50% of Honda Stage’s reach, compared to 33% for Pandora and only 23% or “TV music channels.” “We think that is a potential replacement for the reach and video access we had with TV previously,” he concluded.
Business software giant SAP said Tuesday that it has consolidated its global account for communications, advertising, media and other marketing services with Omnicom Group. The incumbent holding company on the account was WPP. The Omnicom shops that will handle the business include BBDO, RAPP, PHD, Critical Mass, FleishmanHillard, Siegel + Gale, GMR, and eg+ Worldwide. Other shops within the holding company will likely take on SAP duties over time, an Omnicom rep said. Global spending by the client wasn’t immediately clear. In the U.S. it spends and estimated $15 million to $20 million annually on ads. "Omnicom's agencies delivered us a compelling, end-to-end vision for the next generation of the SAP brand," said Bill McDermott, CEO of SAP. "The 'Run simple' movement has limitless potential and Omnicom is the partner we believe gives us the strongest team and approach to scale it globally." “Run Simple” refers to the company’s marketing tagline. "We are extremely pleased to have been selected by SAP to provide innovative marketing solutions," said John Wren, president and CEO, Omnicom Group. "We are dedicated to bringing together the best Omnicom resources around the world to help SAP tell a simple and powerful brand story across geographies, products and services."
Silo-like thinking can be the bane of any form of marketing that requires the integration of multiple disciplines, but when it comes to social marketing campaigns, where different areas of expertise -- social community management, content creation, brand management, etc. -- must come together as a unified whole in or near real-time, it can be devastating. In a move to get the entire social marketing organization on the same page, Expion today will unveil a new version of its social relationship and content marketing platform that seeks to bring the pieces together in a unified way. “Each person sees the world from their own world view,” explains Expion CEO Peter Heffring. The goal of the new version of Expion’s platform, he says, is to give everyone in the enterprise access to the information necessary to be on the same page, but also to see the page in a way that makes sense for the role they play within it. To do that, Expion has centralized all of the enterprises data, but enables each user to customize the way they access and view it in a way that makes sense or their individual workflow. That may mean giving social community managers more immediate access to discover what content is being created in order to create or build on social relationships for a brand. Or it could mean the flip-side, giving content creators insights on what themes or memes are resonating most with a brand’s fans in order to generate more content that will capitalize on the idea or trending story. And it’s not just the relevance of the data each stakeholder needs to perform their role, but the focus. Because most social platforms are typically standardized, they can overwhelm individuals with more tools than they need, causing them to neglect the ones that are most important to them. Conversely, social marketing executives frequently must navigate across multiple applications and modules layered inside their tech stack, losing data and efficiency in the process. Expion’s solution is to provide centralized access to all the social marketing data and assets, but enabling each user to customize how they access and visualize it, regardless of whether it is content discovery, content planning, publishing, moderation or other roles critical to the campaign’s success. A good example of the new interface is the platform’s content discovery library, which organizes each client’s social content and ranks them based on both paid or organic performance, as well as specific performance criteria, such as reach, cost-per-action, or other metrics relevant to a brand’s social marketing goals. “It’s about arming the content marketers with paid media analytics for the first time,” says Heffring, adding that in many agencies or marketing organizations content creators or community managers don’t even have access to the paid media data. “They’re the ones creating the content,” he says, adding that with access to both paid and organic performance, they can create campaigns based on what’s actually working.
Active International, an independent barter media shop, on Monday announced the appointment of Alan Izenman as chief digital officer, a new position at the company. He will be responsible for building and implementing new technologies at the firm. In a release announcing the news, the company notes that Izenman will have a focus on developing the company’s programmatic offering. “In recent years, we have seen a dramatic shift in the way that clients approach media strategy. We believe that both digital advertising, and the purchase of digital and linear media through programmatic technologies, will grow exponentially in importance,” said Dennis Quinn, executive vice president at Active. “We continue to invest significant resources to build out Active’s programmatic offering, having seen success over the past year placing digital media programmatically for our clients.” The company has also announced the appointment of Jon Lumerman as VP of its Integrated Media group. He will oversee the day-to-day digital business of the group. Lumerman was most recently head of media operations at Crossmedia.
LinkedIn announced Tuesday that it will acquire Bizo, which focused on business audience segments and marketing automation. The tools, mostly used by business-to-business marketers, enable the measurement of display and social online advertising and audience segments. The companies value the transaction at approximately $175 million, subject to adjustment, in a combination of approximately 10 percent stock and approximately 90 percent cash. The acquisition should close during the third quarter of 2014. Following the close of the acquisition, many of Bizo's executive team members will join LinkedIn. "The Bizo team has been part of our LinkedIn API Partner Program for some time now," David Thacker, vice president of products at LinkedIn, wrote on the company's blog. "Through these interactions, we've gotten to know the team and their capabilities well, which surfaced the possibilities of a deeper relationship between the two of us." Bizo recently shared what it calls "record setting revenue" after launching its marketing automation platform in late October 2013. By February, it had more than 25 companies adopt the new offering including Avis, Rockwell Automation and Concur. Avis saw near immediate return on investment, about 300% per Bizo. In fact, Bizo revenue in 2013 rose about 75%, compared with the prior year. The company said it built one of the strongest channels through agencies, which accounted for $9 million in annual revenue.
Positioning itself as a DVR for Web content, Facebook just launched Save -- a feature that allows users to save anything they find in their News Feed for later. “Now you can save items that you find on Facebook to check out later when you have more time,” Daniel Giambalvo, a software engineer at Facebook, explained in blog post. “You can save items like links, places, movies, TV and music.” Given Facebook’s immense size, Save immediately threatens more established content-savers like Pocket -- formerly know as Read It Later -- and Instapaper. While what users choose to save is not immediately shared with “friends,” Facebook’s new feature does offer that option. Users’ Saved items list is organized by category for easy storing and sharing. The feature will send occasional reminders of users’ saved items in their News Feed.With Save, users can also view their collected items from any platform, be it mobile or desktop. To do so, users need only go to their saved items in the “More” tab on mobile, or by clicking the link on the left-hand side of Facebook on the Web. Save was co-developed by a small team of engineers that Facebook hired in 2012. They had previously built Spool -- a free Google Android and Apple iOS app for smartphones and tablets that let user save Web content for later viewing. The gateway to the Web for million of consumers, Facebook is already a top driver of traffic for publishers of all shapes and sizes. The social giant now drives nearly a quarter (23.39%) of overall traffic to sites, a according to a new report from content discovery and sharing startup Shareaholic. Facebook’s traffic-driving powers only appear to be growing. Over the last year, Shareaholic found, the social network’s “share of traffic” skyrocketed -- up 150.49% (14.05 percentage points) from 9.34% in June 2013. By increasing its share 10.09% (2.14 percentage points) from the first through the second quarters of the year, Shareaholic suggested that Facebook even managed to steal share from other top social networks, which collectively lost 1.97 percentage points.
Clear Channel Media and Entertainment has partnered with AdsWizz, an advertising technology company, to develop a new method to insert targeted audio ads in live broadcast radio streams. The new system will enable advertisers to target listeners based on their user profiles, listening preferences, location, demographic and psychographic criteria and devices. Advertisers will also be able to create custom segments using listener data. The system will be developed with HTTP Live Streaming, which will allow advertisers more reach while ensuring reliable delivery of ads. It will be available for ad insertion in live streams from all Clear Channel stations across the U.S. The system will also provide a range of audience metrics and historical analytics for each stream. Last month, CCME unveiled the latest version of its digital radio app, iHeartRadio 5.0, for Android and iOS, with enhanced capabilities for personalization and a redesigned user interface. The new version of iHeartRadio includes a personalized listening option, “For You,” which adds a genre selection tool for more tailored station recommendations, powered by updated algorithms for analyzing listener preferences and music discovery. The Android version of iHeartRadio 5.0 is available now, with the iOS version set to debut next week. CCME also revealed plans to support Chromecast and other types of in-home listening integrations that are compatible with various devices. The first half of the year saw a flurry of activity in the digital radio arena. While Pandora remains the dominant player, with 31% share of the audio streaming space according to Edison Research and Statista, it faces new competition from rivals including Apple’s iTunes Radio. In May, Apple announced it would acquire Beats Electronics, including its Beats Music streaming audio service; the deal is expected to close in September. In June, WideOrbit, which provides advertising management software for media companies, announced its acquisition of Abacast, a company that specializes in streaming, live and on-demand advertising insertion and other monetization techniques for digital radio. Also in June, streaming music platform Rdio acquired TastemakerX, which operates a music discovery and curation service and enables listeners to discover new music, build and listen to virtual collections, and view artists based on social discovery. Similarly, in March, Spotify acquired “music intelligence” service The Echo Nest, whose predictive technology is used to power music recommendations on streaming radio services. And the Media Rating Council granted Triton Digital accreditation for Webcast Metrics Local, a service within Webcast Metrics that measures local streaming audio listening.
AOL UK on Tuesday announced that it will put 100% of its reserved inventory from all its owned and operated sites into AOL’s demand-side platform (DSP), including UK inventory from AOL, The Huffington Post, Engadget, TechCrunch, Parentdish and MyDaily. Agencies, trading desk and advertisers that are partners of AOL’s DSP include eBay, Amnet, Cadreon and VivaKi, which “will now have access to AOL’s complete reserved inventory,” per a blog post announcing the plans. The inventory can be purchased programmatically on a self-serve basis. "Making all of our inventory and premium formats available through our DSP is a major milestone for AOL UK and the industry as a whole,” stated Noel Penzer, managing director of AOL UK. “It reaffirms our investment in and commitment to automation and our belief that programmatic will be the main driver of digital advertising budgets going forward.” Whether or not AOL UK sells 100% of its reserved inventory via programmatic remains to be seen -- that will be dictated by demand. But this move by AOL UK means they are putting no limit on programmatic's potential. “We believe all of our inventory can be bought in an automated fashion, giving agencies and advertisers more time to spend on bigger creative integrations, sponsorships and tailored solutions," Penzer added. Danny Hopwood, head of platform EMEA at VivaKi, stated, “It’s refreshing to see a premium publisher like AOL embrace programmatic across all aspects of its business." AOL is no stranger to programmatic trading and has been a very visible player in the space since acquiring Adap.tv last summer. The company is meshing its continually growing ad tech stack into a single platform -- “One” -- that was expected to launch by year’s end, though a note at the bottom of the AOL UK blog post says the "One" platform is now expected in 2015. A recent report by the IAB UK projects that 47% of all display advertising spend in the UK to be programmatic in 2014. The same report notes that programmatic could reach 60-75% of total digital display advertising in the UK by 2017.
The sky isn't falling for Microsoft, but CEO Satya Nadella clearly has his work cut out for him. The software giant on Tuesday reported quarterly earnings -- the first since Nadella took over for Steve Ballmer -- which fell short of analyst expectations. For the quarter ended June 30, earnings of 55 cents a share fell short of Wall Street’s hopes of 60 cents a share, while revenue of $23.4 billion -- up 17% year-over-year -- beat estimates. The earnings fail was largely attributed to costs associated with Microsoft’s Nokia acquisition. Still, an optimistic Nadella cited Microsoft’s commercial cloud business -- revenue from which doubled year-over-year to a $4.4 billion annual run rate -- as evidence that the company is moving in the right direction. “I’m proud of the results we delivered this quarter,” Nadella told analysts on Microsoft’s Tuesday earnings call. During the quarter, devices and consumer revenue also grew 42% to $10 billion. Of particular note, Bing search advertising revenue grew 40%, while the unit’s domestic share of share of search grew to 19.2%. However, “display [advertising] revenue remains soft,” Amy Hood, Microsoft’s EVP and CFO, told analysts on the company’s earnings call. Last week, Microsoft announced plans to reduce its workforce by as many as 18,000 employees -- or about 14%. Nadella -- who telegraphed the move in a proceeding email -- said most of the cuts would be felt within the Nokia phone business. “Nokia Devices and Services is expected to account for about 12,500 jobs, comprising both professional and factory workers,” Nadella explained in a letter to employees. The reductions are expected to result in a pretax charge of $1.1 billion to $1.6 billion, according to the company.Also, as part of the restructuring, Microsoft is dismantling its Xbox Entertainment Studios division, which has about 200 employees producing original programming. Nadella said on Tuesday that closing Xbox Entertainment Studios was necessary to focus more fully on gaming, which he called the unit’s “core business.” Nadella, who said most of the restructuring will occur over the next six months, noted that Microsoft will also be adding roles in certain “strategic areas.” Since stepping in for Steve Ballmer earlier this year, Nadella has stressed the importance of accountability and strategic agility in countering Microsoft’s highly corporate culture. He reiterated those themes last week, explaining in his letter: “We plan to have fewer layers of management, both top down and sideways, to accelerate the flow of information and decision making.” “This includes flattening organizations and increasing the span of control of people managers,” Nadella explained. “In addition, our business processes and support models will be more lean and efficient with greater trust between teams."
AdMarketplace, a programmatic marketplace for search advertising, has announced the appointment of John Tolson as executive director of client relations and development. He will oversee agency development in the new role, per a release. Tolson was formerly at GroupM, where he most recently served as managing director and senior partner at GroupM Next. “[Tolson] will play a key role in educating the industry on the value of programmatic search advertising and how it can deliver performance at scale for brands,” stated James Hill, CEO of adMarketplace.AdMarketplace last week introduced programmatic bidding to its search marketing platform.
Brace yourself, as we enter the 2014 mid-term election cycle, for the larger impact political advertising will have on local media markets. Now that those high-profile court cases have removed many restrictions on spending, there will be no shortage of deep-pocketed advertisers fighting it out for media inventory this year. “How bad can it be?” you may be thinking. “After all, it’s not a presidential election year.” Expect a crowd. A big crowd. There will be U.S. Senate races in 33 states. If it’s an open race, both parties will be selecting a candidate during the primary – creating more competition for inventory. As usual, all 435 Congressional seats will also be in play. And there will be gubernatorial elections in 38 states, many coinciding with Senate races. To complicate matters further, nearly 60% of all funding is coming from out-of-state sources. Case in point: Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s (R-TN) battle to neutralize Tea Party attacks during the primary drew over $10 million of out-of-state money. What’s more, Harmelin’s Media’s analysis of TV data from Kantar Media shows that political advertising accounts for nearly 50% of all spot expenditures in the final weeks of an election. All of which indicates that media buyers and clients can expect serious challenges once the mudslinging begins: