Global brands to halt ad spend for six months

In response to the global pandemic, global brands are set to cut ad spend for even longer – for at least six months, according to research from the World Federation of Advertisers.

From the survey, 52% of marketers at these companies said they’ll now hold back ad spend for six months or more, while 89% of large multinational companies have deferred marketing campaigns this month, up from 81% in March.

New platform to offer discounts to NHS staff

Earlier this week, discount website VoucherCodes.co.uk launched a new gated offer platform that provides NHS staff with exclusive discounts from a host of leading retail brands including Miss Selfridge, Boden and Bensons for Beds – a great plan to thank those working on the frontline against the Coronavirus pandemic.

Employees’ welfare a top priority in what consumers buy

Meanwhile, in a study from PR agency MWWPR found 84% of consumers said how companies prioritise their employees’ welfare during this period of change will become a more important factor on what they buy, while 81% said businesses have a responsibility to help solve social or policy issues, even those outside their product category or industry.

Increase in shopping demand for loungewear

As we grow more accustom to working from home, new research from Epsilon-Conversant has found that demand for loungewear and casualwear has skyrocketed by 49%, showing that retailers highlighting their most lockdown-friendly stock can reap the rewards. According to the year-on-year comparison, homeware purchasing has also risen by 41% during March and April as consumers turn their eyes to home improvements.

Twitter CEO allows staff to work from home permanently

Whilst on the topic about working from home, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey emailed employees on Tuesday telling them that they’d be allowed to work from home on a permanent basis. The company confirmed in a statement to CNN Business that “If our employees are in a role and situation that enables them to work from home and they want to continue to do so forever, we will make that happen.”

Will we see other companies following suite as we continue to work from home?

Advertising and social media facing trust issues

Earlier this week, a study from Kantar Dimension revealed a growing mistrust among consumers towards both advertisers and social media platforms at the moment. The report, referenced in The Drum, surveyed 8,000 people in eight markets, including the US, UK and China – with the resulting finding advertising to be the least likely source people would use to garner information about a business, with just 14% saying they trust advertisers in this respect.

UK Agencies experience 33% revenue drop due to COVID-19 impact

With businesses across the world in all sectors feeling the impact of the economic changes and consumer spending due to the Coronavirus pandemic, a new study from platform Deazy found more than 200 small and large UK agencies have experienced a drop of revenue by a third (33%) on average due to the COVID-19 impact.

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With that in mind, here’s a roundup of the top headlines from the world of digital marketing this week in response to the Coronavirus pandemic.

Q1 figures – companies feeling the pinch

This week saw the release of Q1 figures from a number of companies including Amazon, Facebook, Twitter as well as a number of agencies. Each report has unveiled the current economic climate and its significant impact on revenue towards the latter half of the quarter. For instance, Facebook saw a reduction in advertising which led to a dip in ad revenue in the last three weeks of March. Meanwhile, Twitter surpassed its earnings projections for the first quarter of 2020, led by 24% growth year-over-year in monetizable daily active users.

In terms of agencies and ad tech firms, a number of them have updated figures reported in Q1 with WPP, Publicis Groupe and more experiencing falls in revenue towards the end of March. In ad tech, Criteo saw a 10% year-on-year fall in revenue as they reported revenues of $503 million for Q1. The ad-tech company stated the COVID-19 crisis impacted revenues by around $24 million during the period.

WPP request for UK government loan

Having released figures for Q1, WPP has requested to taxpayers for support through the pandemic as clients around the world continue to make cuts to spending etc.

Speaking to The Telegraph, chief executive Mark Read told the global advertising agency had applied for £600m of potential support under the Covid Corporate Financing Facility. The Bank of England scheme lets big companies borrow up to £1bn to help them avoid a cash crunch.

Financial Times launches subscription business initiative

With the rise of traffic on news sites and increase in subscriptions, The Financial Times’ consulting arm, FT Strategies, has launched a nine-month-long project to help grow sustainable, digital reader-revenue businesses with eight European subscription publishers, funded by Google as part of the Google News Initiative Subscriptions Lab — in a bid to retain new subscribers long-term.

Brands go DTC to capitalise on e-commerce surge

Retail brands across the marketing spectrum are accelerating their shift to e-commerce in response to the unfolding coronavirus crisis. For example, Heinz has introduced its first direct-to-consumer website offering bundles of core Heinz products to locked-down customers, with free shipping to NHS staff and other emergency service workers.

Shopify launches consumer shopping app ‘Shop’

E-commerce platform Shopify this week released a new app to support its one million merchants currently affected by the current economic changes to better connect with consumers and smaller businesses. The app is an update and rebrand of Shopify’s existing app Arrive, used for tracking packages from Shopify merchants and other retailers, which the company states have been used by 16 million consumers already.

Facebook unveils grant funding to financially support publishers

Similar to Google, Facebook has unveiled a $2 million grant fund which will aid 50 publishers in Australia and New Zealand with support in mentoring and training journalists who are reporting on the latest developments around the world — helping them to navigate the economic impact as well as building a sustainable digital business.

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Here’s what’s been hitting the headlines this week:

ASA revamps priorities in response to fake COVID-19 ads

A rise in misleading ads promoting coronavirus cures and treatments online has led the UK’s advertising watchdog to change its priorities in response. Talking to The Drum, the ASA said that they’re working with speed to adapt operations and procedures in order to target bad actors during this global pandemic.

Late payment terms rise for publishers

With commission rates and payment terms shifting for affiliates at the moment, it was reported this week on Digiday that through the first three weeks of April 2020, payment delays on invoices to publishers and media agencies have increased 20%, according to data collected by FastPay.

Additional research conducted by Oarex, an invoice factoring firm that serves media companies, found that the number of firms that paid their invoices late rose 14.6%, to 55%, in the first quarter of 2020. Findings involved invoices sourced largely from publishers and media agencies.

Spending shifts to feeling great

As the global pandemic continues and we begin to adjust to the new norm under lockdown, new data from e-commerce platform RedBrain has found the UK consumers’ focus online has shifted away from the early weeks of panic buying foods, exercise equipment and dealing with entertaining the kids to wanting to look and feel fantastic. For instance, demand for hair scissors was up over 3,000% whilst fishing nets were up over 1,000% resulting in high conversion rates.

UK Ad budgets see biggest drop since recession

In case you missed it, The IPA Bellwether report was released this week and recorded a net balance of -6.1% of UK firms reducing budgets since the start of 2020. In addition, 25% of respondents recorded a budget cut, compared to 18.9% signalling growth.

The report drew results from a panel of around 300 UK marketing professionals from the UK’s top 1000 firms as the impact of the global pandemic has caused many budget cuts and paused from multiple businesses in the UK.

Industry bodies back government’s call to review keyword blocking

Industry bodies representing UK advertisers, agencies, publishers and ad tech companies have come together in support of a message by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) calling on brands to review their use of keyword blocking during the COVID-19 outbreak. It follows concerns that overzealous keyword blocking of coronavirus-related terms is impacting publishers’ ability to monetise news content.

Display ads least disruptive channel for consumers

New data from Epsilon and CJ Affiliate has found the majority (87%) of consumers are happy with the number of display ads they’re currently seeing from brands during this time. Epsilon and CJ Affiliate surveyed 4,045 consumers across five regions on their current ad preferences during the COVID-19 crisis.

Merchants free to sell via Google Shopping

A huge talking point which has got the community discussing this week was Google’s changes to its Google Shopping Service. In a blog post, Bill Ready President, Commerce at Google announced they will be advancing plans to make it free for merchants to sell on Google. From next week, search results on the Google Shopping tab will consist primarily of free listings, helping merchants better connect with consumers, regardless of whether they advertise on Google.

Is this a good or bad move from the tech giant? Let us know in the comments below.

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Here are just a handful of some of the top news stories this week:

Ads pulled, starving sites from revenue

Following reports of online traffic spikes on publisher websites and commerce content, BuzzFeed has found out this week that despite the unprecedented surge in news readership, activity hasn’t actually led to advertising revenue. Furthermore, advertisers are pulling back on running ads that would be placed next to content reporting on the Coronavirus pandemic.

In response, large news outlets are calling on advertisers to let their placements show up because that’s how they support their journalistic efforts.

More budget cuts

To no surprise, advertisers and brands continue to pull or cut back on marketing budgets in response to economic uncertainty. Airbnb is the latest of many to pause on their budgets due to the pandemic, in a move which will save $800m a year. 

Meanwhile, retailers continue to suspend affiliate programs, impacting the income source of many content creators. Walmart this week announced it’s the suspension of its programs currently running.

Pressure on ad tech industry

The economic volatility caused by the coronavirus pandemic has stressed ad tech and accelerated consolidation. This week saw Cavai call out to the industry to do more to support suppliers and people during this time, while Digiday has reported of companies being in “freeze mode” as the current climate continues to strain the ad tech licensing model.

Revising approach to consumers

Software company eyeo reported that the advertising industry will need to adapt in order to recoup lost revenues, this included advertisers adapting their approach to consumers online with altered needs. Marketers will also need to address them with relevant ads in a calm and non-intrusive manner.

WPP launches pandemic savings plan

With its market performance impacted last month, global advertising agency WPP has unveiled a coronavirus savings plan to retain its market position while continuing to serve its clients during this crucial time.

Events and brands pulling out

It was just announced that Cannes Lions Festival has been cancelled for 2020, despite it being rescheduled for October this year. According to AdAge, The move comes after several agency companies pulled out.

Meanwhile, Amazon has dropped out of the Interactive Advertising Bureau’s Digital Content NewFronts, which on Tuesday was moved to the week of June 22 due to the coronavirus pandemic, according to Adweek. The e-commerce giant was set to make its debut as a presenter and said it plans to attend the NewFronts in the future.

Amazon joins others in pulling out of the annual pitch to advertisers and media buyers. Twitter withdrew last week, prior to the event’s rescheduling; Walmart’s streaming video-on-demand service Vudu dropped out three weeks ago and the agency Digitas told Adweek via a spokesperson that it is focusing on employees and clients for the time being.

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With news updates coming in daily and changes being ongoing, PerformanceIN will be bringing you a weekly roundup of the latest information on the pandemic and its impact on the wider digital marketing industry.

Here are just a handful of some of the top news stories this week on COVID-19:

Brands freezing marketing budgets

There’s no denying that businesses are adapting to short-term strategies in light of current circumstances. Particular brands and their marketing budgets, where a number of companies including Coca Cola are suspending their budgets in response to economic changes.

Affiliate programs and revenue

Meanwhile, there’s been news that fashion retailers are reporting closing affiliate marketing programs and links as the pandemic impacts on sale levels. In an exclusive report by BoF, brands such as Macy’s, Ulta, Dillard’s and TJ Maxx are terminating links in a bid to save costs, leaving content creators who might have brand sponsorships assigned in limbo.

High traffic to commerce content

Although revenue opportunities are fluctuating as the market response to the pandemic, some media outlets are reporting high traffic levels online. Businesses like The New York Times’ Wirecutter and Future have identified hikes in traffic to commerce content and expect that to translate to revenue, according to Digiday. 

However, as mentioned above, publisher commerce revenue lines could be at risk as retailers close their programs and merchants reduce commission rates for high demand products.

Supporting SMEs and publishers

Some good news to come out of these changes is that global network Awin has announced a number of measures to support its partners affected by the economic changes. 

The company has announced it will waive the monthly fee for the first three months for businesses launching an affiliate programme via its Awin Access Service. This is in addition to zero set up fees. In addition, the firm has confirmed that all its publishers will be notified at least seven days’ notice before any commission changes are made.

Unilever launches extensive Coronavirus programme

A number of food and consumer brands have been launching extensive programmes to support consumers, suppliers and employers. Unilever, in particular, has committed €100m to curtail the spread of coronavirus through the donation of soap, sanitizer, bleach and food to help protect the lives and livelihoods of its consumers, suppliers and workforce. 

Meanwhile, Campaign has reported that the firm is considering paying some of its smaller agencies and other suppliers early to help these partners address the economic difficulties they’re facing due to pandemic-related shutdowns

Ad spend on media channels shift

A new study from PubMatic has shown dramatic shifts in category spending by global digital advertisers in the first two weeks of March.

For instance, news providers received a high uptake in advertising spend, up 52% from March 1 to March 18 followed by hobbies and interests (31%) technology and computing (14%) and education (13%). Meanwhile, travel ad spending has been cut by two-thirds, while digital advertising in sports has fallen 40%.  

Stay tuned next week for another roundup up of the latest COVID-19 headlines and stats impacting the digital marketing industry.

The post Coronavirus News Roundup: Freezing Marketing Spend, Affiliate Programs and More appeared first on PerformanceIN.

Whilst the rainy weather continues and the world sets its eyes on the city of Bristol as Greta Thunberg prepares to lead the biggest climate change protest in the UK, this is the perfect time to catch up on all the breaking news in performance marketing — and there’s been plenty!

Scroll below and check out the top headlines from RevLifter, Intuit, Mindshare and more.

• Revlifter has unveiled another integration, with SasS platform Eagle Eye to boost performance marketing and personalisation capabilities for retail, leisure and hospitality operators.
• Speaking of integrations, Upsellit has joined Pepperjam’s integrated partner ecosystem, enabling brands to instantly customise and optimise the route to conversion, addressing consumer touchpoints both on-site and off-site. 
• Intuit, the makers of TurboTax and Mint, has made a bid to acquire personal-finance portal Credit Karma for a whopping $7 billion in a bid to strengthen its position in the consumer-finance market.
• Mindshare is in the final stages of developing a LGBTQ private marketplace in the US and UK – an initiative to help LGBTQ media titles win a greater share of advertising investment, with Skyy Vodka set to be the first brand to pilot the platform.
• App Samurai Inc has successfully closed an investment of $2.4 million in Series A funding. Led by 212 Ventures and co-invested by Collective Spark, 500 Startups and Degerhan Usluel, the raise takes the company’s total investment to-date to $4.6 million and will be used to further develop the mobile advertising group’s product portfolio and global expansion.
• eMarketer’s latest study has found that users in the US on thriving video platform TikTok will top 50 million by 2021, reaching 60 million by 2024.
• Programmatic media buys now account for 85% of all digital ad spending, according to estimates released in a new report from the Interactive Advertising Bureau.

Stay tuned next Friday for another roundup of headline news. If you would like to submit some news to be featured, send us an email to content@performancein.com.

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Happy Friday! Another roundup is upon us and some top stories have made the headlines in the past few days. Recap on what’s happened during the week from the world of performance marketing and more.

• Affiliate marketing technology and services provider Pepperjam has announced an integrated partnership with RevLifter to bring turnkey AI-personalisation to the affiliate channel on a performance-based payment model.
• MoneyExpert launches first above-the-line activity in a bid to become the UK leading price comparison site of choice.
• Following the recent launch announcement of PI LIVE Advanced, Early-Bird tickets for the first-ever US event are now officially on sale.
• Influencer has launched Influencer Labs, a first to market series of insights and data workshops aimed at educating advertisers on best practices in influencer marketing.
• With Brexit now taking place, Google is reportedly planning to move control of Britons’ data from Europe to the US, where privacy law is weaker. 
• Taboola has announced a 70% year-on-year increase in the adoption of its Newsroom product by publishers. It has also announced the introduction of a new subscription feature for Newsroom, to help publishers better understand and engage with subscribers.
• 88% of marketers this year plan to implement more omnichannel strategies, while 58% are investing in databases and analytics technology instead of campaign and decision management tools, according to Merkle’s latest study.

Stay tuned next Friday for another roundup of headline news. If you would like to submit some news to be featured, send us an email to content@performancein.com.

The post PI Newsdesk Roundup: February 21 appeared first on PerformanceIN.

Happy Valentines Day! We’re back with our weekly news roundup and it’s sure been a busy one! From acquisitions and investigations to new appointments and rebrands. We’ve collated the top stories so you don’t miss a thing.

Spread the love and scroll down below for the latest headlines of the week:

• Rakuten Marketing has become Rakuten Advertising, a global powerhouse digital marketing platform that provides advertising technology and consumer insights to the world’s leading brands, publishers and agencies.
• The Federal Trade Commission is currently investigating all non-reportable acquisitions by Alphabet (including Google), Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Microsoft over the past decade
• Contextual advertising company GumGum has successfully closed a $22 million funding round. Furthermore, global marketing veteran and former CMO at Live Nation, Lisa Licht, has joined the company’s Board of Directors.
• Dentsu Aegis Network has acquired Media Storm to elevate Merkle’s multi-channel performance media services
• Following a year of rapid growth, including a multi-market expansion, global partnerships and bolstering its non-executive board, leading influencer marketing service, TAKUMI, announced the appointment of Mary Keane-Dawson as CEO.
• Global commerce content platform Skimlinks has extended its publisher portfolio in Asia-Pacific (APAC) with additions including Pedestrian Group, Yahoo! Australia and South China Morning Post
• Sideqik has announced its integration with SaaS platform Partnerize. The new partnership will enable brands to better quantify, grow, and optimise their influencer programs and understand the true ROI of those campaigns. 

Stay tuned next Friday for another roundup of headline news. If you would like to submit some news to be featured, send us an email to content@performancein.com.

The post PI Newsdesk Roundup: February 14 appeared first on PerformanceIN.

We’ve reached the end of January (felt like an eternity!) and it’s Friday which means a roundup of all the top headlines of the week.

Scroll down below to catch up on all of this week’s news stories from PerformanceIN and more.

• Awin has released its annual report to mark it’s 20th anniversary, reviewing the latest developments within the affiliate marketing industry featuring case studies, expert commentary, predictions and much more.
• Partnerize has announced a range of product enhancements to support partner marketers to further drive business growth and streamline time-consuming workflows.
• Dentsu Aegis Network has acquired Digital Pi, a leading digital marketing agency focused on marketing automation consulting services in the B2B sector.
• UK ad spend increased by 5.6% year-on-year to reach £5.97 billion in the third quarter of 2019, according to the latest Advertising Association/WARC Expenditure report.
• Facebook’s advertising revenue rose 25% to a record $20.7 billion in Q4 from a year earlier as the social network expanded its number of advertisers by 14% to eight million from seven million in October.
• Amazon has shared its latest transparency report, revealing a slight dip in the number of government demands for user data.
• Dentsu Aegis Network has acquired 4Cite Marketing, a leading people-based identification and data services technology company. 
• Outbrain has announced an exclusive partnership deal with Euronews, a leading international news channel. The deal will enable Euronews to leverage Outbrain’s Smartfeed, a digital experience that transforms every page to an infinite stream of discovery.

Stay tuned next Friday for another roundup of headline news. If you would like to submit some news to be featured, send us an email to content@performancein.com.

The post PI Newsdesk Roundup: January 31 appeared first on PerformanceIN.

Another week, another news roundup! Ahead of the weekend, catch up on all the top headlines from the busy world of digital marketing:

• Global affiliate marketing network Awin has launched Awin Access, a new service to support grassroots e-commerce growth via affiliate marketing
• IAB UK has confirmed plans to launch Gold Standard 2.0 in Q4 2020, announced at IAB UK’s Digital Trust Forum on Wednesday (January 22)
• The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has fined Fender Europe £4.5 million for breaking competition law by illegally preventing online discounts for its guitar products in the UK
• New research from Rakuten Marketing finds just one in three campaigns are personalised ad campaigns
• Spotify is testing a new feature that allows influencers to post Stories to their public playlists
• The Information Commissioner’s Office outlined further details of how it will tackle the problem of real-time bidding and GDPR compliance
• Mobile commerce platform Button saw a 68% increase in all mobile spend per shopper during the 2019 holiday shopping season
• Connected TV households set to grow to 82% by 2023, according to a compiled study by The Association of National Advertisers and Innovid the State of Connected TV Report 2020
• AppsFlyer has announced a $210 million Series D funding round led by General Atlantic, a leading global growth equity firm based in New York.

Stay tuned next Friday for another roundup of headline news. If you would like to submit some news to be featured, send us an email to content@performancein.com.

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