The Mobile Marketing Association has formed a new advisory board focused specifically on brand marketers and insuring mobile is integrated strategically into the overall marketing mix. The members of the MMA’s new Executive Marketing Advisory Board were selected based on their commitment to marketing innovation in mobile and include executives from Visa, Coca-Cola, Home Depot and Wal-Mart. Sheryl Daija, chief strategy officer for the MMA, will oversee the board, which will meet this month to create a preliminary agenda for the group. Below is the full advisor board membership: -Linda Boff, Global Executive Director, Advertising, Digital and Design, General Electric …

Mobile advertising firm Pontiflex on Tuesday announced closing a fourth rounding funding of $7.7 million led by Talus Holdings, a media technology holding company backed by Blackstone's GSO Capital. Existing investors RRE Ventures, New Atlantic Ventures and Tribeca Venture Partners also participated in the round. TechCrunch first reported the investment last week. Pontiflex said it would use the new financing to accelerate adoption of its flagship AdLeads program, in which advertisers are charged for ads running in mobile apps on a cost-per-lead basis rather than for clicks and impressions. The self-serve system also lets local marketers geo-target ads down …

The startups behind social TV apps Viggle and GetGlue have terminated their planned merger. Viggle, a TV rewards site that automatically identifies shows people are viewing, announced in November it would acquire TV guide and check-in app GetGlue for $25 million and 48.3 million shares. Both sides said the split was amicable. “During the time we started talking to GetGlue about an acquisition and since the merger agreement was signed in November, we have seen impressive growth in our business," Viggle CEO Robert F.X. Sillerman said in a statement on Monday. "We wish GetGlue and [founder] Alex [Iskold] all …

John Arianas has been named executive vice president-advertising sales & partnerships at Participant Media, which is developing an as-yet-unnamed new cable TV network aimed at Millennials. Arianas, who reports to Participant Media President Evan Shapiro, most recently was senior vice president-linear & digital ad sales at Current TV, and previously was a cable TV ad sales vet working at VIacom's Comedy Central and MTV networks. He will be responsible for assembling and managing the advertising sales and media partnerships team for Participant Television's new cable network as well as TakePartTV on YouTube and Takepart.com.

WPP's Grey New York office has been named agency-of-record for the National Park Foundation, the philanthropic partner of the National Park Service, following a review.

Coupon hunting just got a lot easier. Koupon Media is today unveiling a Facebook offering that will allow brands and retailers to use the social media site to send mobile coupons that users can redeem with one click. Companies will be able to use the offering, called "One-Click to Mobile," to get potential customers more involved with their products. The offering is run on Koupon Media's Digital Campaign Management (DCM) platform. Koupon Media is also offering a free 30-day trial of the service.

More evidence tablets sales surged over the holidays comes from Millennial Media, which saw tablet impressions on its ad network grow 12% a day on average from Dec. 23 to Dec. 27. That was far higher than the rate for smartphones, where impressions increased only 2% over the same period, reflecting the larger installed base of smartphones compared to tablets. Impressions on Android tablets in particular shot up, increasing 18% on average around Christmas, with the Samsung Galaxy Tab, Kindle, Fire and Google Nexus 7 all doubling their impressions over the 5-day period analyzed. Even with the addition of …

MPG Global CEO Maria Luisa Francoli Plaza is leaving the agency after 20 years with the shop, the company has confirmed. A replacement is expected to be announced in the next few weeks. Signaling the importance that the agency placed on the U.S. market, Francoli Plaza relocated to New York from Spain in 2007. The company has been relatively quiet on the new business front of late, although the shop did manage to retain the Sears Holdings media account late last year after a lengthy review. Francoli Plaza's departure comes amid some reshuffling of the senior ranks at two other …

Groupon on Friday released an updated version of its Groupon Merchants app for Android devices that incorporates its mobile payments service. When launched in September, Groupon Payments, the daily deals company’s answer to services like Square Register and PayPal Here, was only available for the iOS version of Groupon’s merchant app. Given that Android is the world’s dominant mobile operating system, with a 53% share of smartphones in the U.S., the move will give Groupon Payments a broader footprint. Groupon has boasted that its offering is the most cost-effective way to take card payments, charging 1.8% for MasterCard, …

The digital media industry -- including technology, content, commerce, marketing, mobile and social firms -- contributed contributed $31 billion and more than 100,000 jobs to the New England region, primarily in Massachusetts, according to findings of an academic study released this morning by MITX (Massachusetts Innovation & Technology Exchange). The study, which was researched and written by Babson College MBA students, estimates that is a 13% increase in the amount of revenue and a 30% increase over the 87,000 people the sector employed two years ago, based on a similar study conducted in 2010.