Ensuring Equity in Media Buys. The Partnership Between IPG and Gracenote.

With all of new reserves of data coming into the media marketplace, one of the more fascinating sets is offered through Gracenote which has recently announced a partnership with IPG. 

I must confess, I always think of Gracenote as a traffic log service but I found out, by talking with MAGNA Global’s, Brian Hughes, Executive Vice President, Audience Intelligence and Strategy, that there are great reserves of important audience data contained in their logs that can be applied in a myriad of ways.

Why Gracenote?

One of the major reasons why Gracenote is important to IPG is, according to Hughes, its ability to reveal how certain programs perform with under-represented groups. “We've made commitments to invest in Black owned media in the next several years. Part of those efforts and one of the things that we've seen in our own research in the past is that representation is very important. If we want to connect with very important audiences, then it's important that we are aware of that. Gracenote data allows us to be able to see a relationship to the population,” he explained.

Gracenote parses data in a way that shows, “how different programs stack up in terms of representation, giving us good information to us to strategically use our dollars to connect with those audiences,” he said.

Gracenote Data

Nielsen, which owns Gracenote, has been analyzing the data and has created a product that can register all content whether it is on streaming, broadcast or cable. “They've identified some very key metrics that I think will come in very handy for us,” he began and added, “It's a pretty simple comparison of the most visible cast members on a given show and how that compares to the general population.” Knowing how the percentage of the cast of a particular under-represented group matches up with the population will enable IPG to connect more authentically with that audience.

Gracenote, offered Hughes, “has a lot of metadata around TV programming whether it's the production crew, the staff, similar to IMDb. They have a lot of that information behind the scenes and then what Nielsen does is match that up with the viewing data that they already have so that we can do comparisons.” What can be revealed through this confluence of data is the degree of connection between the program’s attributes and the target audience so the agency can, “put our messaging in front of those audiences and get our brand messaging out to them,” he explained.

The theory behind this is that people are more responsive to content when there are characters that remind viewers of themselves. “We feel that also extends to advertising,” Hughes noted, “So what we'll be able to do is identify programs that are resonating  with a particular audience and ultimately place advertising creative that aligns with that messaging to make it contextually relevant and have that connection for the audience.”

Next Steps

This approach is in the early stages. For now, more research is being conducted. “We are really digging into it now and figuring out the best kind of wholesale way to apply it. It is still early days,” he explained. “But we've definitely looked at, in a general sense, where the video landscape is in terms of this representation and this is where we see the need for improvement.”

As far as Hughes’ clients are concerned, “They have been very supportive of all the other equity work we're doing and I think they will definitely want to lean into this as a component and they're definitely interested in our efforts around spend. This can be an element, a way to do that better and be more effective.”

Equity Upfront

Ultimately, this approach fits in well with IPG’s overall commitment to outreach. “We made commitments to spend with Black owned media partners. We're going to do 5% in over the next three years and we've held the Equity Up front in the spring. The Equity Upfront was designed to focus on minority owned and Black owned specifically media companies to build awareness for them and help them. We've been doing monthly equity sessions to allow different minority owned media companies to come in and present to our colleagues and clients to share what they're doing and put their products out in front of us in order to encourage that spend,” he stated.

While currently specifically within IPG, the plan is to eventually make this an industry-wide effort. “I definitely would like to see the Equity Upfront become an industry wide thing. That is a goal of ours. We would definitely like to see minority owned businesses that are just starting out and that might be underserved right now have an opportunity to be successful. We can put this data to good use in terms of making the video industry in general more equitable,” he concluded.

This article first appeared in www.MediaVillage.com

Artwork by Charlene Weisler

 

Welcome the New Mainstream with IPG's New Multicultural Study

The plethora of datasets coming from various sources, the fragmentation of audiences and platforms and the ever advancing technology that is changing media usage are all challenging the way marketers are shaping their business plans to reach the right audiences. But there is also increasing pressure on the creative to break through viewer distraction, ad avoidance and blocking. How to do?

IPG has just released the results of a study called The State of Video which is set to release on March 4, 2019. This study maps, what Brian Hughes, Executive Vice President, Audience Intelligence and Strategy, Magna (which is division of IPG), called, “The new mainstream” where multiculturalism needs to be taken into account in creative messaging. Hughes noted that we are on the way to a multicultural majority in America by 2060 with 2044/45 as the tipping point. In addition, the way we will reach these consumers will be digital. “2018 digital ad spend surpassed TV and it will continue,” he added, “driven by mobile.” 

So there will be many opportunities for brands to connect with this multicultural population that is surprisingly similar in some ways and extremely diverse in others. Some findings from the study upset our previous notions of what certain ethnic groups respond to in messaging and even what languages best connect to content. We need a more nuanced way to spend marketing dollars that takes all of these findings into account. 

Findings:

1.       Spanish language programming does not necessarily reach a large percentage of young Hispanics. There are great differences within the Hispanic population if we look at nativity, language used at home and out of the home and the number of years in the country, with the greatest behavioral differences occurring in nativity.

2.       The majority of American Hispanics (65%) are born in the U.S. and this has always been the case according to Dr. Jake Beniflah, Executive Director, Center for Multicultural Science, who conducted the study. Most Latinos are young; 75% of those born in American are age 35 or under while foreign born are 66% Generation X and Boomers. Each group has difference language uses, preferences and habits… and will respond to advertising differently.

3.       In the case of Spanish language TV, there is a difference between native and foreign born. Older viewers prefer Spanish language content on linear. U.S. born viewers view less in-language TV than foreign born.

4.       When it comes to creative, a general rule applies. “The consumer has to see themselves in the ad,” stated, Leslie Wood, Chief Research Officer, Nielsen Catalina. It has to make the consumer feel good about themselves and be their best self. “When that happens in an ad it resonates with consumer,” she said. Further, a deft message is required. It is acculturation rather than assimilation.

5.       When it comes to measurement, Nielsen has existing data sets, according to Hughes, that “enables us to get a more nuanced set of multicultural audience, but we are not using it today.” Yet, Wood noted that, “Race matters in getting measurement right,” and added that when a product has any connection to culture and it is part of the messaging, the response is tremendous. 

The study showed that all of these nuances need to be addressed not only in the creative but also in the media mix and platforms used. When a marketer applies nativity to their campaign spend, there is an increase in ROI, according to Beniflah.  “We are stuck in same ways of doing things in general,” concluded Hughes, who added that this is the time to improve measurement and take an acculturation approach to multi-cultural marketing.

Getting a Grip on AI and Metadata Madness at the MESA Smart Content Summit

Data and its think/speak has become so ubiquitous in the industry now that it's reference in any context - sales, content creation, marketing and branding - is not only commonplace but also becoming de rigeur. But as with anything that permeates the ecosystem, there is a time for it to be standardized with a common language, protocol and usage pattern. All of that is beginning to gel as evidenced by the panels at the third annual Media and Entertainment Day conference held at the Microsoft center in NYC. 

Monetization

Moviepass, where subscribers pay $10 a month to be able to see one movie a day for the month has proven to be extremely popular. But if Moviepass based their revenue success strictly on subscribership fees, they would fall short. Instead, Ted Farnsworth, chairman and CEO, Helios and Matheson analytics, seeks to turn Moviepass's data into the main revenue stream. While not selling their data to clients, Moviepass instead sells insights from their data to interested parties such as film producers. Moviepass also uses their data for recommendation engines that “push people to the theatrical experience,” and assist the company in acquisitions and “develop films based on the data we have.” Farnsworth explained that data also helps detect fraud including, “sharing passwords, subscribers selling their tickets or giving their tickets away or detecting unfair trade by theaters.” According to Farnsworth, Moviepass is helping to bolster attendance especially at smaller theaters, encouraging Millennials to go out to the movies and showcasing more independent films that may not have large marketing budgets. 

Content Tracking

There is a vast amount of metadata that is currently available and new sources are increasing every day. The challenge is not only capturing all of this data but also tracking it within a company and across companies in the industry. Various forms of data labeling, such as being able to distinguish specific ads and specific programming, ascertain which regions of the country and the world and even what subset of language (such as Latin American Spanish or Castilian Spanish)  is being spoken in the content must all be identified and properly labeled in an agreed industry standard. Efforts by companies such as HBO and organizations such as CIMM have begun the heavy lifting work in content labeling for the industry. “The challenge to these IDs is having people register and embed throughout their practice,” stated Jane Clarke, CEO and Managing Director, CIMM. However, according to Brian Hughes, Senior Vice President, Audience Intelligence and Strategy, MAGNA, agency clients are already using Ad-ID. “On the ad side we are generating use. In terms of how we sell it though, we say this is how we can tell where an ad goes, how it performs and what the results are,” he noted.

Storytelling

“From inception, data can ride along with the piece of content and enrich that piece of content,” noted Guy Findley, Executive Director, MESA. From a content perspective, there is so much data being created and collected that it can be challenging to present it in a form that makes it flexible to use and manipulate. Matt Turner, Chief Technology Officer, Media and Manufacturing, Mark Logic, spoke about smart content and the digital files created from content inception to pre-production, post production, distribution -both primary and secondary - to archiving and ultimately into future infinite uses. But the “traditional data approach makes looking at metadata difficult today,” noted Turner because it creates data silos.  He advocated a new approach using flexible schemas that link together in an operational data hub for media. “ This makes the data available across all parts of the business and interacts with all systems,” he explained. An example of this is NBCU’s Saturday Night Live which can now search for concepts using the data hub and “Disney’s creative genome project that collects data from all around the show.”

Conclusion

As Daniel Goss, Vice President of Innovation and Experience, LiveTiles, stated, “Data and analytics are embedded with everything you do.” From the media industry’s viewpoint, data is touching all aspects of the business from creative content creation to financial impact of our business decisions. Locking into industry standards for labeling, data framework and measurement will enable us to derive the maximum benefit of this growing and powerful resource.

This article first appeared in www.MediaVillage.com
 

The Media Crystal Ball

It is difficult enough to predict how the media landscape will look next year but it is arguably even more difficult projecting how things will look five years hence. A recent Mediapost event gathered some of the best industry minds together to share their thoughts about the state of the media state in 2023. Here is what they predicted:

TV Will Always Be Here

There was optimism regarding the robustness of the TV and the advertising business. According to Tom Goodwin, EVP, Head of Innovation, Zenith, “We tend to think that TV or advertising is dead but it is here to stay.” Further, there was a feeling that even old media has the ability to adapt and reinvent for the new digitized media environment. “The money keeps shifting to online and digital,” stated Brian Hughes, SVP, Audience Intelligence and Strategy, MAGNA. However, he believes that this momentum will slow that down and flatten as “old school media reinvents themselves.”

Delight the Consumer … or Else

Since consumers will have greater power to choose the ads they want to see, those companies that engage people in a negative way may experience blowback. Barry Lowenthal, President, The Media Kitchen, said that, “Facebook will be the big loser’” in the next five years because they fail at the “fundamental human truth” regarding shame about envy. “Facebook peddles in envy. Most feel bad about themselves after seeing Facebook,” he explained, “and you can't sustain a business on envy.”  He predicted that unless Facebook reinvents itself, they will lose money. “It is better to drive to gratitude,” he concluded.

There is also the thought that unless companies respect the consumer by providing them with relevant messaging (without getting creepily intrusive), consumers may decide to opt out and withhold their data and their attention. “Consumers will be in control of their data. GDPR will precipitate that,” noted Natalie Monboit, SVP, Futures for Samsung, Starcom USA, who added, “There will be a shift to drop data when in doubt. Consumers will have more self-sovereignty.”

Streamlined Processes Through Technology

Whether it’s the continuing increase in the amount and type of available data, the introduction of blockchain protocol into the media business, the use of artificial intelligence or the boundaries of privacy, all these issues will impact how we conduct our business five years from now. Monboit noted that, “Blockchain could be the one thing that disrupts today,” and has the potential to change the business.

Finally, it is important for media companies to continue to take risks. Sam Olstein, Global Director Innovation, GE Corporation, concluded that the biggest challenge today is the mindset to avoid more risks. Spending money on things that don’t pan out is “never wasted because it laid the bedrock for the next entrepreneur to benefit from previous mistakes.”

This article first appeared in www.Mediapost.com

CIMM Cross-Platform Media Measurement and Data Summit

Fostering innovation in cross platform media measurement and bringing more granular measurement to TV have been missions for CIMM since its inception. Now, at the seventh annual Cross-Platform Media Measurement and Data Summit held last week in New York, CIMM is proving that hard work and deep analysis can result in industry change. Panelists from networks, agencies, brands, associations and data companies exchanged ideas on how the advancements in cross-platform measurement and data are impacting the industry ad model. 

CIMM has created a Measurement Manifesto which serves as a roadmap to ensure a continued industry focus on cross-platform measurement. As Jane Clarke, CEO and Managing Director of CIMM, noted, “We need to keep the dialogue going about how to manage change by following our roadmap to plan, measure exposure and evaluate. There is still more work to do but we are making progress.”

Highlights of the seventh annual summit include:

The Erosion of the Advertising Market and Upending of Business as Usual

According to Rishad Tobaccowala, Chief Growth Officer, Publicis Groupe, the advertising industry is in for a rude awakening. He said that the increasing ad loads and irrelevant messaging has been disrespectful to the consumers’ time. The result is that they are increasingly spending more time in ad free environments. Because of this trend, there will be “less and less advertising,” resulting in a 25% to 30% decline in ad inventory in the next five years as brands go direct to the consumer.There will also be consolidation among media companies resulting in fewer networks and,therefore, less inventory.

There are three Connected Ages, according to Tobaccowala. The first was the Link, the second was the advent of Social Networks and Smartphones and the third is now Connecting to Data with Artificial Intelligence. “Things are connecting to things with the IoT,” he stated. “There will be new ways of connecting through Voice, AR and VR which are coming to us much faster than anticipated and will lead to different ways to measure,” he added. While we are in the business of measuring impressions from programs or networks now, this will shift to measuring interactions of people.

Going For Good Rather Than Perfect in Attribution

Attribution is emerging as a primary goal for advertisers and networks. But there are so many aspects to attribution that achieving the perfect industry standard is a chimera. “There is the lie of attribution,” noted Joe Marchese, President Advertising Revenue, Fox Networks Group because “the human brain is more complicated. Brands are bought with cultural relevance.” There is also, what Scott Hagedorn, CEO, Hearts & Science, Omnicom Media Group, described as “negative attribution,” where an ad placed next to objectionable content becomes tainted. And it is important to give credit where credit is due. Brand value is accrued over the long term according to Marchese, so “if we move to pure attribution, it is the platforms that achieve all of the value.”

Overcoming Obstacles

Industry associations such as the ANA, 4As, ARF and MRC are all focused on addressing a range of industry challenges including solving for fraud, viewability, deduplication and data labeling for cross platform measurement. 

Bob Liodice, CEO, ANA, noted that his organization has made progress in the fraud area and in eliminating waste. “We are learning how to control fraud and rein in bots,” he stated. “It is increasingly complex but we are all asking the same question - Do I have the information necessary to make right decisions to grow business?” Scott McDonald, CEO and President, the ARF, spoke of the Sunshine Rule advocating transparency in measuring exposures through deduplication. “There is a gap between exposure and ROI sales lift and it is not well understood,” he stated. 

Cooperation Between Frenemies

“Fostering competition is the only way to get innovation,” stated Clarke. This is true in the area of measurement. Brain Hughes, SVP, Audience Intelligence and Strategy, MAGNA, believes that competition between measurement companies “makes for better thinking for problem solving and that  is not a bad thing.”

Yet there are some companies that are finding that cooperating with their competitors can bear fruit. OpenAP, a collaborative effort between Fox, Turner and Viacom is one effort designed to measure attention and engagement. “We need to get better thinking about how measurement correlates to outcomes. What viewability drives outcome and then build back to measurement standards from there,” advised Howard Shimmel, Chief Research Officer, Turner.

“Measurement is now a team sport. Cooperation is needed,” concluded Elissa Lee, Director Research, Advanced Technologies, Google.

This article first appeared in www.MediaVillage.com