Partner Content

Brands and organizations already know that walled gardens have exploited and distorted privacy for their own ends. On the open web, the choice is up to marketers whether they’ll do the same. Cutting corners and seeking loopholes around privacy principles will only further undermine consumer trust.

Amid seismic shifts in the digital landscape, one question consistently arises: What can brands and advertisers do to adapt? One major part of the answer is first-party data, which is expected to play an outsized role as cookies fade, privacy rules ramp up, and consumers continue to demand more privacy and better customer experiences. Strong first-party data strategies look different for each organization, but here are seven tips every marketer should consider.

While raising awareness about diversity has been a long-standing effort among many brands and organizations, more advanced companies are embracing what is now a global social movement to make substantive and sustainable changes in the marketing field with diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives.

To be sure, technology and online regulation are top of mind for brands and organizations. But they shouldn’t overshadow the needs of people. That means marketers must get to know their audiences — and not just on an insert-first-name-here basis, but in ways that will legitimately help to inform how brands create memorable customer experiences.

If brands want to ignite growth in a post-pandemic environment, they must reimagine the way they deliver experiences — and that means weaving experience through every part of their organization.

The 1920s became known as the Roaring ’20s. And if 2020 was a taste of things to come, the current decade seems likely to be at least as fraught as its centennial predecessor. How should advertisers and marketers prepare, act, and react?

Brands willing to stand behind a cause that jives with people’s own beliefs will earn their loyalty and support, but it’s impossible to align with everyone all the time. When a person or company aligns with a certain cause, they risk alienating people on the other side. Organizations have to figure out how to handle polarizing narratives and which side of an issue, if any, they choose to support.

Amid the rapid growth of connected TV (CTV), marketers are already seeing evidence of fraudsters moving in fast to take advantage of the medium. Ensuring an appropriate industry response and establishing a dialogue regarding fraud in CTV is vital for publishers, tech companies, and advertisers. After all, CTV’s share of media consumption is only going to grow.

It’s imperative that event professionals innovate how they approach event planning and proactively open the lines of communication with exhibitors and attendees, creating a transparent workflow so safety mitigation needs are met with confidence.

Technology and data are accelerating TV’s digitalization, transforming it from a monolithic channel to a multifaceted, dynamic medium. With that evolution comes more sophisticated transaction practices, and conflicting priorities for buyers and sellers.

User-generated content can grab consumers’ attention and orient their path through a highly fragmented online journey.

Attribution models are often used to gauge the potency of digital marketing campaigns and refine channel strategies, but these don’t always take customers’ real-world actions and behaviors into account. Without a view into customers’ offline activities, it’s nearly impossible to tell what’s working and what’s not. However, there are several ways to accurately measure what happens offline.

While some channels perform well across the customer journey, others see drop-offs at various stages. Putting more resources into the same channel probably won’t improve results. Instead, marketers should rely on direct mail to support other channels when they need a boost.

While institutional knowledge is an important element to understanding the agency landscape, that knowledge doesn’t always get into the right hands at the time when sourcing decisions are being made — but what if it could? Here’s how Pfizer’s procurement team is creating a central repository of global agency information for its teammates around the world.

As the pandemic prolongs and states impose their own unique set of social distancing guidelines, major brands and organizations are tapping into radio partnerships at the local level to boost their visibility and drive consumer engagement.

Influencer marketing has redefined the way companies drive awareness of their business. Leveraging brand messaging, endorsements, or product placements from industry icons in direct mail campaigns can help companies further capture consumer attention when and where it matters. Here’s how brands can leverage today’s top direct mail innovations and tactics to help make the most of their influencer marketing efforts.

The production back office is a hive of activity before, during, and after the cameras roll. Teams manage a multitude of essential functions, including onboarding talent and crew, tracking the post-production process, and managing the hand-off to campaign activators.

Choosing between in-house and outsourced marketing is an age-old debate, and there has been a lot of industry discussion over the past year about brands opting to bring their outsourced agency work in-house. The idea is that brands can cut costs, increase focus on their business, and improve speed to market. However, there are pros and cons to making this change.

With streaming at an all-time high, having a CTV-focused media strategy is now table stakes for advertisers. But it’s not smooth sailing just yet. At the same time as marketers shift ad dollars to streaming TV, they’re waking up to a world with holes in identity resolution, which makes it difficult to accurately engage and report on the new CTV audience.

One of the most pronounced effects of the pandemic has been the change in how people shop at brick-and-mortar stores: They have become more deliberate in their behavior, focused on keeping within budgets, making fewer visits, and getting in and out as fast as possible.