The results are in for the annual IAB UK and PwC Digital Adspend study, which reveals that UK advertisers spent £13.44 billion on digital advertising in 2018. A year-on-year increase of 15% to £1.7 billion shows the continued confidence in the power of digital advertising.

Almost all growth was driven by mobile and video. For the first time ever, ad spend on smartphones exceeded desktop, accounting for 51% of the total digital ad spend compared to 45% in 2017. These figures reflect consumer behaviour, with recent data showing that people spend two-thirds of their online time on smartphones.

Growth for display accelerated over the past year, with video driving the majority of growth in display, making up for 44% (£2,307 million), followed by banner ads 28% and native 23%. For the second year running, outstream has exceeded pre-roll video, accounting for 57% of all video advertising.  

YouGov data produced specifically for the report revealed that nearly two-thirds of marketing decision makers agree that online video assets should be made bespoke for the platform or device they are shown on, confirming that marketers use online advertising for longer-term brand building not just short-term sales activation.

Commenting on the results, the IAB’s chief digital officer, Tim Elkington said “seeing mobile now account for over half of all digital ad spend is a significant milestone. In a decade of reporting these figures separately, we’ve seen spend rise from £38 million in 2009 to a staggering £6.88 billion in 2018.”

“Alongside increased investment from leading advertisers, digital advertising remains an accessible route to market for SMEs. We continue to see evidence of online advertising being used for brand-building, especially by the growing market of direct to consumer brands,” commented Jon Mew, CEO of IAB UK.

In addition, the figures show that companies with the IAB Gold Standard outperformed the total display market, seeing a 30% year-on-year increase in ad spend revenue versus 22% overall.

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Tradedoubler hosted its very first DisrupTECH conference at CodeNode, the UK’s largest venue dedicated to technology events. PerformanceIN was proud to be the official media partner of the event, which saw representatives from the likes of Global Savings Group, RevLifter, Mindshare and Increasingly take to the stage to share their insights on how performance marketers can take advantage of emerging technologies and opportunities available in the technology industry today.

Here are some highlights of the jam-packed day which saw engaging talks and panel discussions from industry leaders that have shown intentions to disrupt the affiliate channel.

A vision for a new generation of affiliate marketing

Tradedoubler’s UK country manager Chris Russell-Smith welcomed everyone just before Tradedoubler CEO, Matthias Stadelmeyer kicked things off with his session. He touched on Tradedoubler’s belief that being open, transparent and collaborative is good for the industry and outlined how Tradedoubler’s vision of an open platform will allow automated and transparent direct relationships between publishers and advertisers using blockchain technology.

An open platform concept means the network can utilise tech and API so that partners can integrate with the platform using assets such as tracking and data and other functionalities. Some of the opportunities include easier access to affiliate marketing, shorter publisher payment delays, direct communication with advertisers and better transparency, to name a few. Russell-Smith said in the last few months, they have developed a prototype which has been available since the end of February.

Next up was Ricki Jones, COO of Soreto, talking about referral marketing and how referrals can be a powerful way for brands to leverage their existing happy customers to win new ones.

The growth of personalisation in technology

Soon after was Michael Alexander Hold (global product lead, Dynamic Solutions) from Global Savings Group, who explored why hyper-personalisation has become the norm and how companies like Facebook, Netflix, Google,and Amazon have made us accustomed to only what we find relevant. Take Amazon for example – Amazon utilises consumers’ previous shopping history and matching it up against all of its other transaction data to create hyper-personalised product recommendations. Hold said that research indicates that Amazon’s retail business is driving 35% of its revenues through its personalised product recommendations, which is a lot. The likes of Amazon, Facebook and Google are all customer-centric companies. Hold added that personalisation is not about high tech but about customer centricity.”

He looked at company size vs personalisation and noted the change in personalisation when businesses begin to scale the business and become more efficient, and delivering that personalisation can be tricky. Then, once a business grows to become a small enterprise, funds and stability comes back, and personalisation becomes more prevalent.

He also outlined how marketers can adopt dynamic coupons as a strategic marketing tool for not only driving customer acquisition but also take the coupon tool to a higher level to drive towards the overall objectives of your company and achieve them. “The more we know about customers, the better personalised we can be. It is a human thing, which we cannot forget,” he said to an eager crowd.

Following a quick networking break, Diana Golovko, intelligence consultant at SimilarWeb, delivered her ‘competitive intelligence for growth strategies’ session. She looked at three brands that had significant growth in their affiliate traffic and the lessons we could learn from them.

Dynamic deals and the future of personalised marketing

James Maley, head of business, EMEA & APAC at RevLifter, delivered a session about personalisation within affiliate marketing and how it was impacting the industry. “Executing your deal in real-time to a customer is important but personalisation is not just personalising towards the customer but personalising towards the retailer,” he said. Maley pointed out that we are shifting from moving to being able to dynamically serve content in real-time to hitting the retailer’s needs as well. He went on to say that technology is shifting to being able to hyper-target those consumers in real time. This is happening across the board in terms of third-party voucher code sites, too. He went on to outline what retailers want to achieve from personalised deals, before finishing with the ways in which you can personalise your travel deals based on rich data, and what the future holds for personalised deals and brand loyalty going forward.

Later, a panel of experts comprising Will Leuchars, sales director at Increasingly, Mike Fisher, direct to consumer e-commerce manager at Philips, Hannah Johnson, affiliate lead at The7Stars and Daniel Sichel, head of digital performance at Mindshare, all moderated by Amy Lucas, head of partnerships and business development at Tradedoubler, hosted a Q&A discussion looking at how technology as a whole will impact the affiliate marketing channel in the next 12 months and beyond.

Wrap up

James Boden, global business development director at SmarterClick wrapped up the afternoon with his talk investigating five key challenges of last year, such as time, control, innovation and trust, and how we overcame them. After networking drinks, we headed home thinking about the informative afternoon.

With many interesting talks inspiring debate, conversation and education, it seemed the conference went down a treat with attendees and we look forward to what’s next in store for DisrupTECH in 2020.

Do you know Tradedoubler is the headline sponsor for the Performance Marketing Awards taking place on April 30? There is still time to secure your space and enjoy an unmissable night of networking, drinking and celebrating the industry’s best. Find out more here.  

The post DisrupTECH 2019: Growth of Personalisation and the New Generation of Affiliate Marketing appeared first on PerformanceIN.

The sunshine has just come out, so what better time to announce PerformanceIN’s annual networking and BBQ boat cruise?

Once again, the regional boat cruise will bring together those in the affiliate and performance marketing community for an afternoon of informal networking, drinking, eating and celebrating the ever-growing industry. With free-flowing conversations (and drinks), this is set to be an afternoon to remember for all the right reasons.

Everyone will meet at noon sharp on Thursday, July 18, 2019, ready to climb aboard the boat, which will depart from the pontoon by King Street Brew House before docking at Beese’s Riverside Bar and Garden for a delicious BBQ and more drinks. We will then reboard and head back along the river to return at 4.30pm.

Hurry, as there is limited space on board; just like before, the capacity on the boat is limited to 95 passengers, therefore only two people per company can hop on. Event sponsors will be able to bring along up to five people, however.

Tickets are £45 + VAT. Drinks will be included along with your BBQ lunch, and a cash bar will operate at Beese’s Riverside Bar and Garden. We can’t wait to see you all there and do stick around as Bristol Harbour Festival commences the day after.

Don’t miss out and nab your tickets now via the Eventbrite page – we look forward to seeing you all there.

The post All Aboard for PerformanceIN’s Bristol Networking & BBQ Cruise appeared first on PerformanceIN.

Programmatic viewability rates have outperformed publisher direct buys across desktop and mobile web display for the first time in the second half of 2018. The findings were revealed in Integral Ad Science (IAS) UK Media Quality Report for H2 2018.

Programmatic UK desktop display ads meeting the minimum viewability standard rose by 8.2% from 63.4% to 69.1% in the second half of 2018. In comparison, publisher direct ads rose from 65.1% to 67.7%. Meanwhile, 62.4% of programmatic mobile web display impressions met minimum viewability standards, having increased 16.6% year-on-year from H2 2017 to H2 2018, reflecting the industry’s demand for higher standards in the programmatic inventory from the buyer side.  

Advertisers looking to capture consumers attention can look to time-based measurement, as video campaign impressions provide the best opportunity, surpassing both display and mobile web for the total length of time an ad was in view.

“Findings demonstrate the major shift towards programmatic trading, with the term ‘programmatic’ no longer associated with lower quality inventory. This is likely due in part to an increase in publishers utilising programmatic to sell valuable inventory, via private marketplaces” commented Nick Morley, EMEA MD at Integral Ad Science.

The report also found that brand risk continued to decrease, with the amount of desktop display ads served in inappropriate environments falling by 28.9% from 4.5% to 3.2% in HQ 2018. When looking at the bigger picture, brand risk has fallen by just over half in the past two years.

All this is thanks to an industry-wide focus on cleaning up the digital ad space, with clear progress having been made as a result.   

IAS’s report highlights brands safety, ad fraud, viewability and time-in-view trends for programmatic and publisher direct advertising across display, video, mobile web, and in-app advertising. IAS analysed data from billions of UK impressions from ad campaigns that ran between July 1 and December 31.

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With the Performance Marketing Awards (PMAs) taking place on 30 April, PerformanceIN invited the very best in the performance marketing community to attend an afternoon of informal networking over a few drinks prior to the big night.

Webgains, a 2019 shortlisted company, hosted the shortlist networking drinks (March 27) at their impressive London HQ on 21 Farringdon Road. The affiliate network, who are shortlisted for three awards and representatives from other shortlisted companies, including the PMA headline sponsor Tradedoubler, TradeTracker, Smarter Click, Publisher Discovery, Groupon, Honey, Acceleration Partners and Global Savings Group gathered with fellow nominees and members of the judging panel to discuss the latest trends, their entries and anticipation ahead of the awards ceremony next month.

“It was a pleasure to host so many key players in the performance marketing industry at the Webgains offices for the PMA shortlist party. The opportunity to network and converse with so many who know what it takes to succeed in this industry was hugely enjoyable and maintains my opinion that the future of the industry is very bright indeed,” said Derek Freer, Webgains UK managing director. 

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Book your seat

With the shortlist now announced, the countdown is on for the PMAs at the Grosvenor House Hotel, Park Lane, London next month.

Still haven’t booked your table or individual seat yet? Last year’s event was a sell out so make sure you secure your seat for the PMAs now and mingle with the most forward-thinking senior performance marketers who are pushing the industry forward. It is your chance to build existing relationships and make new contacts whilst celebrating a year of brilliance in the ever-evolving performance marketing world.

Congratulations to the 2019 finalists – find out who made the shortlist and is in the running to take home an award by visiting the website.

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Affiliate marketing spend in the UK grew 15.1% in 2017 from £482 million to £554 million, according to the IAB (Internet Advertising Bureau) & PwC’s Affiliate Marketing Study, revealed today (May 10) at Affiliate Huddle.  

This growth generated £8.9 billion in sales, a 9.2% year-on-year hike from £8.1 billion, demonstrating an estimated return of £16 per £1 spent.

The industry’s annual benchmark report takes a different tack from its previous iterations, taking into account total spend as contributed to by sales generated, technology spend, consultancy fees and data cleansing.

The IAB UK’s Performance Marketing Advisory Group’s chair and Acceleration Partners’ MD, Helen Southgate, commented that the Affiliate Marketing Study shows the industry is “in great health” and seeing the benefits increased transparency and a “pure performance” model which can be applied to a range of marketing activity.

“As the market matures, we are seeing more innovation, transparency, broader reach and brands increasing their spend in the sector whilst maintaining ROI,” said Southgate.  

“Affiliate Marketing is still the one true performance model and I expect this growth to continue into 2018 and beyond.”

Providing another perspective on the overall 15.1% growth, the figure represents a 0.8% edge on that of wider digital marketing itself (14.3%) as according to the IAB UK’s Digital Ad Spend 2017 released earlier in the year.

Driven by e-commerce

Amid the results, which are based solely on data provided by affiliate networks, software-as-a-service (SaaS) platforms and major in-house affiliate programmes, it was found that affiliate spend on smartphone grew 49% year-on-year, while sector-wise, retail held the largest share of revenue at 43%.

“The affiliate channel is a key driver of growth for e-commerce retailers and aligns well with some of the largest retail-focused publishers,” said Kevin Edwards, global client strategy director at Awin Global.

Much of this is a result of a rapid uplift in entry by “fast-fashion” brands, Edwards added, attracted by new opportunities to tap into blog and social media content that “aligns perfectly” with target audiences.

Behind retail, other sectors seeing sizeable chunks of revenue share included Telecoms & Media (24%), Travel & Leisure (16%) and Finance (9%), while B2B (2%), Auto (1%) and Other (5%) accounted for the remainder.

Industry benchmarking

PwC Strategy’s director, Dan Bunyan, commented that this year’s study has been “re-scoped” to focus on areas of the marketing where there is “greater visibility and availability of accurate data.”

Last year, the IAB UK and PwC grouped UK affiliate marketing and lead generation together in the Online Performance Marketing (OPM) Study for 2016. Under the previous methodology, spend on OPM was put at £1.578 billion, 88% of which was attributed to affiliate marketing (£1.39 billion).  

This year’s study, however, narrows the focus onto areas of the market where there is greater visibility and availability of accurate data, away from areas of performance marketing that are “more heavily reliant upon modelling and qualitative estimations”, according to Bunyan. The focus has been on “pure CPA” activity, which has seen a large portion of the wider industry – such as the gaming sector – omitted from the research. Meanwhile, total spend has been captured, rather than just media space ‘ad spend’, including commission on sales generated, technology spend, consultancy fees and data cleansing.

Data was gathered exclusively via survey submissions and interviews from 12 companies representing affiliate networks, SaaS platforms and major in-house affiliate programmes, which included Awin, Rakuten Marketing, Performance Horizon, MyOffers, CAKE, Impact and Quidco, among others.  

“The new study gives us better insight into the affiliate marketing sector and we can see much more clearly how the core affiliate marketing model is growing year-on-year across a broad range of sectors and participants,” Bunyan added.  

The official Media Partner of Affiliate Huddle, PerformanceIN streamed the Affiliate Marketing Study reveal and discussion via Facebook Live, available to watch here.

The post Affiliate Marketing Spend in UK Grows 15% to Top £550 Million in 2017 appeared first on PerformanceIN.

Smartphone video was the fastest-growing ad format of 2017, with advertisers spending £476 million more on the format, according to the latest Digital Adspend report by the Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB) UK and PwC.

That figure accounted for a sizeable 69% increase on 2016 taking total spend on the format to £1.17 billion. Video ad spend overall – including phones, computers and tablets – increased 47% to £1.61 billion, meaning that nearly three-quarters (73%) of video spend now goes on smartphones.

When it comes to smartphone advertising spend itself, video was a key contributor to a year-on-year spend increase of 37.4% to £5.2 billion, which accounts for 45% of all digital ad spend (£11.55 billion), compared to just 9% five years ago.

Commenting on the results, the IAB’s chief digital officer, Tim Elkington, said rapid the spend increase comes as consumers spend more time online, “specifically on smartphones”.

“Digital has led to a change in consumer behaviour as people use their smartphone for a wider variety of things, be it listening to podcasts, learning a new skill or following stories on the likes of Snapchat and Instagram.”

“The ad community has responded to this change – particularly the growth of mobile and video – by developing dynamic ad products that fit seamlessly into their environment.”

Despite the punchy figures, however, Elkington believes there’s still “significant room” for smartphone video share to grow, as a result of accounting for 59% of users’ online time in the final quarter of 2017.

Podcast popularity

Accompanying online YouGov data produced specifically for the report revealed that in terms of online smartphone activities, listening to podcasts has seen the biggest increase among users, up by 30%, while viewing social media ‘stories’ (29%), reading news articles (24%) and learning new skills (22%) have also seen a rise in popularity.

Looking at other digital ad formats, the IAB UK and PwC found social media spend saw a considerable rise of 38%, reaching £2.39 billion, or one in every five pounds, while 83% of this was directed on smartphones.

Meanwhile, outstream video (up 94% to £900 million) overtook pre/post-roll (up 11% to £671 million) as the largest video format, and programmatic continued its ascent, accounting for 80% of the total £3.34 billion spent on display, up from 72% in 2016.

Other formats of note include in-feed advertising, which rose 9% to account for £950 million, paid search which increased 16% to £5.82 billion, while classified ads dipped 1%, totalling £1.47 billion.

The post Smartphone Video Fastest-Growing Ad Format of 2017 in UK, Finds IAB & PwC appeared first on PerformanceIN.

UK-based media agencies predict that their primary focus will shift from media buying and management to strategic and creative work.

The findings come from a survey of 100 UK media agencies and 100 advertiser respondents by dataxu with Sapio research, aiming to explore the expected transformation of agencies in the next five years, as client demands evolve.

At present, over 41% of media agencies feel that their primary focus lies within media buying and media management on behalf of their clients, with 43% currently offering media buying in ‘walled garden’ environments. By 2023, however, just a third (33%) expect to be offering the same, with operational consulting for clients predicted by most (38%) to become the main priority, while 36% forecast audience segmentation to be the top capability.

Meanwhile, asked what capabilities agencies needed to improve in order to stay relevant and ahead of the competition within the next five years, just shy of a quarter (23%) of advertisers responded “advanced analytics and data science”.

‘Struggling’ to adapt

At the tail-end of last year, a similar-sized international study by Infectious Media on 200 marketing decision makers saw 71% of advertisers claim that agencies had “struggled” to adapt to programmatic advertising, with the media-buying method accounting for four-fifths of all display spend in the US.  

Meanwhile, despite further concerns around agency roles in terms of providing transparency and tapering fraud, the research showed advertisers still considered agencies “valuable”. Infectious Media’s CEO suggested that they look to adopt a “flexible hybrid approach that caters to advertisers’ specific requirements”.

The post UK Agencies Predict Focus to Shift from Media Buying by 2023 appeared first on PerformanceIN.

International affiliate network Tradedoubler has appointed Chris Russell-Smith to the role of UK country manager, effective immediately.

The news comes following the announced departure of James Milne, who held the same responsibilities under the title of VP business development & regional director UK & IE, ascending the ranks since joining as senior account manager in 2011.

Russell-Smith joined the network himself in 2012 as sales director, and most recently held the position of group director for international business development, while prior to Tradedoubler, he held roles as UK country manager for nonstopConsulting and sales & marketing director at dgm.

Russell-Smith spoke of his “delight” on being appointed to the position having been part of the company for six years; “I am excited about this challenge and, together with the dedicated team, I’m looking forward to leading the drive for significant, long-term, revenue growth across the UK business,” he commented.

The new UK MD will work closely with CEO Matthias Stadelmeyer in delivering ROI to “each and every” client, read the announcement, which includes brands such as Microsoft, HP, Accorhotels, Puma and Philips. He’ll also work alongside the company’s key functional positions, including strategy director, Franck Georget, client success director Rebecca Pickworth and projects & operations director, Clement Labbe.

“Chris has a strong track record in driving business development and revenue growth and will play a key part in continuing the successful development of Tradedoubler in performance marketing,” commented Stadelmeyer.

Announcing his departure on LinkedIn, Milne thanked his former colleagues and spoke of “mixed emotions” around his departure to take on a “new challenge”.

“After seven years, a huge number of different jobs, countless laughs and challenges, amazing clients, partners and most importantly, colleagues, I am leaving Tradedoubler,” said Milne.

The post Tradedoubler Appoints Chris Russell-Smith to UK Country Manager appeared first on PerformanceIN.

While influencer marketing continues to grow, there is a lack of awareness of how the medium is being regulated with 61% of UK consumers criticising brands for poor transparency around how they use influencers to promote their products online.

Promotions agency Prizeology asked 2,000 UK shoppers about influencer marketing campaigns on social platforms including Instagram, YouTube and Facebook and a staggering 88% said they should be made aware when an influencer is being paid to promote branded products online while 57% want to understand how they are being influenced by brands and influencers.

Backing this further, over half (61%) believe influencers don’t have to disclose that they have been paid to talk about a product.

When it comes to hashtags and language, 49% are not aware on the terminology to indicate there is a commercial relationship between a brand and influencer.

“Consumers do value transparency, because they want to understand exactly how they are being influenced by brands or influencers,” said Sarah Burns, managing director at Prizeology.

Tighter compliance

The study also found 71% of UK consumers wrongly believe that influencer marketing is not regulated at all. Younger people, however, are more likely to be aware of the compliance rules surrounding influencer marketing which is currently regulated by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA).

Despite this, 71% of consumers believe the ASA should be doing more to enforce disclosure among brands and influencers and a further 56% stating both parties should be punished if they fail to disclosure.

Overall when it comes to the impact of influencer marketing, 44% indicated that the medium is damaging to society.

“It is clear that this is an area of promotion that is growing rapidly, and the regulations need to be enforced more rigorously to keep pace with its growth,” added Burns; “I know the ASA has committed to comprehensive education and enforcement this year, and our research shows that this would be welcomed by consumers.”

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