Digital Marketing

The Journey From Deterministic To Probabilistic Marketing

多年来,品牌和营销人员已经使用3日party cookies & tracking pixels to track website visitors, improve the user experience, and collect data that helped them target ads to the right audiences. However, now this is going to change forever. Digital tracking capabilities are more restricted than ever. Third-party cookies are already redundant on browsers like Safari (iOS devices) as well as Firefox and now Chrome will discontinue supporting them from 2023. All apps on iOS require consent from the user to be able to track/monitor them. Law enforcement bodies across the globe are laying strict rules and guidelines for advertisers to restrict online tracking to avoid misuse of any PII (personally identifiable information) data. And above all the growing use of ad blockers by internet users restrict the data flow from one server to the other.

While this is progressing in the right direction as far as protecting users’ online privacy is concerned, on the flip side, these changes are taking digital marketing measurement back to its initial years. Back then, the digital infrastructure was just evolving and the most an advertiser could track from their digital marketing was how many people did they reach, how many impressions were delivered, and how many clicks/interactions came through. A major disruption in digital marketing came almost a decade back with the introduction of remarketing which was built on the back of third-party cookies and along with that followed a whole new eco-system of digital marketing attribution. Now marketers have complete visibility on who came to their website, from what source, using which device, which page of the website they dropped out, what products did they buy & finally retarget them with ads based on their interaction on the website. And the business world was only getting used to how sophisticated they can get when it comes to running as well as tracking their digital marketing campaigns when the lawmakers and the big tech giants decided to overhaul the system all over again.

So, let’s stop for a minute and imagine what the worst-case scenario would be – that all tracking goes away completely no more google analytics, no more data from Facebook you would have no idea who’s coming to your website, who’s buying your products or services, all tracking would be eliminated. How do we survive this situation & what should we do today to prepare ourselves if and when tracking starts to be depreciated? As per the latest update from Google, it will delay the deprecation of third-party cookies on Chrome by another 2 years or so. Therefore, it’s very important to use this time to have a strong plan to transition from what we call deterministic marketing to more probabilistic marketing.

In deterministic marketing, you can be 100% sure that John came from Facebook and brought a hat on your website. Probabilistic marketing on the other hand, only lets you know with a high degree of certainty that someone came from a particular channel or the probability that the user has certain attributes. Having said that, probabilistic marketing has its pros and cons. One of the best things about working in a probabilistic environment is that it’s going to work regardless of what they do to tracking. So, if we can start to train ourselves to rely on probabilistic data today and start to transition how we think about marketing into a probabilistic thought process we’re going to succeed when the big tech players continue to ratchet what tracking is available to us. Another advantage of probabilistic marketing is that it will still allow us to make optimization across all the channels and across various audiences so even if we don’t know specifically that John is John, we can still make a determination about the probability that John is John and that the audience that describes John will behave in this way. Another merit of a probabilistic marketing environment is that it really forces us to focus on the bigger picture without getting too far down in the weeds looking at individual landing pages, conversion points, customer journey, etc. We get to take a step back and analyze across all channels, landing pages, assets & customer journey what’s working well and what levers can we pull in order to increase the campaign performance. Working in a probabilistic environment will allow us to have access to campaign insights much faster as compared to that in a deterministic environment. In a deterministic setup, we need to track every single point of contact, know where the customer is in the journey, where they came from, have cross-device tracking, and all other aspects of tracking put in place perfectly. In a probabilistic setup, we just make assumptions and get close to similar results. It’s not going to be perfectly accurate, but the net results will resonate with what one would expect from having a perfect deterministic marketing setup.

However, not everything about probabilistic marketing is good. At its core, the data itself is less accurate. It is not as scientific as a deterministic marketing approach. A big drawback is that we lose the individual customer journey. All these journeys are grouped together into a probabilistic journey, but we can’t zero in on John to find out exactly what John did, how long he spent on each page, etc. If John comes in and he’s a top customer who did everything right and we want more Johns it’s pretty hard to determine exactly the steps that this one individual did so that we can get more of that customer. Instead, John is lost in the population of other people of who some were good, and some were bad but they weren’t all Johns and so with probabilistic attribution we lose that ability to get down to the individual level to know for certain what each person did. Another demerit is that as consumer preferences change and traffic on the website starts coming from a new source, the system needs to re-learn what this new traffic source is, how well is it converting, and then update the overall probabilities across channels. This disrupts the learning established so far and, in a way, resets the whole attribution pattern all over.

Therefore, to have an accurate attribution or to improve our marketing campaign with higher accuracy based on data, we need to rely on quality data. And typically, that is our own first-party data. We should start creating our own first-party universe and if we are successful in doing so, we should be able to thrive in today’s environment but also be future-proof in the event that cookie tracking goes away. As an immediate step, we should start capturing customer information by incentivizing the visitors on the website to register or login before they are able to access full content on the website. Once we build our own first-party data, we will not be reliant on the likes of Google, FB, and Amazon to target the right audience and get a better return on our advertising spends.

这个帖子是由Suparshv Chopra Director of Digital Media at Serviceplan Group, Middle East.

Verizon Media Rolls Out Connect ID To Replace Third Party Cookies

Verizon Media this week rolled out a new unified identity solution Connect ID in an industry-wide effort to help advertisers and marketers to transition from using third-party data as the center of online ad targeting.

The third-party cookies will soon be redundant as Google and Apple take steps to limit audience tracking owing to consumer’s data privacy concerns. Though the advertising industry has seen numerous innovations by many growing companies such asLotame introduced Panorama ID, VerizonclaimsConnect ID is powered by direct relationships with 900 million global consumers.

The company has valuable first-party data about the activities of millions of customers based on its 30+ owned and operated consumer brands including Yahoo (content, search, and mail), AOL, and TechCrunch. Verizon Media will generate 200 billion data signals based on deterministic first-party data to create an identity graph that can help advertisers target and track audiences across devices. With Connect Id, the company aims to provide audience targeting on a large scale.

该公司正在推广ID连接到更多的广告isers and publishers to use its programmatic platform to buy and sell digital ad placements in an ongoing effort to capture the market share from the industry’s biggest players. The company has a full-stack advertising technology solution with a demand-side platform (DSP) for buyers and a sell-side platform (SSP) for content providers like Newsweek that are looking to unlock the full value of their advertising inventories. Dev Pragad, CEO of Newsweek, said,

“我们希望尽可能提供最好的体验or our audiences as well as maximize revenue for the premium content we produce. To ensure we can maximize our clients’ user experience while maximizing our revenues, we need partners like Verizon Media who can connect our audiences with quality advertisers and experiences, maximize yield and ensure our audiences’ privacy choices are respected. That’s why we’ve signed up for Verizon Media ConnectID.”

As a part of the launch of Connect Id, the company also announced several partnerships with leading data providers like Acxiom, Adstra, Equifax IXI, Experian, Neustar, TransUnion, and Throtle. Concurrently, Verizon Media connect Id is also working with IAB Tech Lab programs to develop industry-wide pro-privacy solutions for addressability with accountability. Jordan Mitchell, SVP, Head of Consumer Privacy, Identity, and Data, IAB Tech Lab, said,

“IAB Tech Lab is proud to have Verizon Media involved in the development of new privacy-preserving addressability standards and industry accountability programs through Project Rearc, and we look forward to their support of these standards and programs once they are released.”

The unified ID helps advertisers buy, measure, and optimize ads while enabling publishers to manage, monetize, and navigate audiences–all without third-party cookies. The company says adoption of the unified solution delivered a 33% lift in performance compared to third party cookies. Iván Markman, Chief Business Officer at Verizon Media told AdWeek,

“Most of the identity solutions out there are largely dependent on third-party integrations. Most of the companies don’t really own the customer relationships, and more important they won’t have the assets [such as a news website or email services] to provide a value exchange.”

Presently, Verizon Media ConnectID is available in North America, APAC and select LATAM markets at launch and will soon roll out to more markets.

New To Brand Activation, Here’s What You Need To Know

When I first heard about the term brand activation, I thought it was just another marketing jargon that I have to write about.

But as I researched about it, I realized activation is one of the stages of brand campaigns, and what piqued my interest further, is how this simple term has the power to help you connect with your customers in the noisy world of the internet.

In this blog, we will understand what is brand activation and why is it essential for your business.

What Is Brand Activation?

It is often difficult for brands to get noticed in the world of the internet full of competition and media clutter. In this day and age, an average consumer is exposed to millions of products, how can a brand get noticed?Brand Activationis the answer.

Brand Activation forms a part of the overall brand strategy and helps the brand to connect with a consumer at a personal level, increasing brand engagement and awareness through brand experience. A study performed byEvent Marketing Institute’s EventTrack study, 98% of users feel more inclined to purchase after attending an activation.

Brand activations are one-off, in-person events, experiences, and interactions that forge lasting emotional connections between a brand and their target audience.

–Hubspot

Let’s understand with a simple example when a person starts a new business no one knows about him/her and the brand, the brand is lifeless and needs to be activated to bring it to life and create a position in the mind of the customer. The same logic applies for the businesses who want to rebrand itself for people to notice it.

How Is Brand Activation Important For Business?

The term ‘brand activation’ is not merely another marketing jargon but is a very powerful tool in this advanced and well-connected world where customers are more demanding. Consumers are tired of promises that are not delivered and due to this, it becomes difficult for brands to build up because the success of building brands depends on trust.

It involves building trust in people for the product and services as well as the company. Trust guarantees that people will receive what is promised and the company gives more importance to value and content than advertising. However, to establish this trust, the brand has to be exceptionally different from the others and provide the right products at the right time to stand out.

Therefore, all successful companies have built a strong brand with strong followers using brand activation. This creates an emotional connection with your customer. The stronger the bond, the better the brand, and this reflects on the sales rate.

Evidently next question is, how to build trust in a brand using brand activation?

How Do You Implement Activations Of Brands?

It easy to write or talk endlessly about brand activation as its an abstract topic but it is equally important to understand how can it yield tangible results for a brand. So, what are the methods to start activations with a bang?

With increasing channels and touchpoints, there are many ways to create a brand activation campaign, and below is a comprehensive guide for brand marketers to understand ways to create an effective brand activation strategy. It will also act as a resource for marketers to enable marketing activations in this digital era.

1.Experiential Marketing:

Perhaps, one of the best ways to activate a brand is to allow people to experience it for themselves using experiential marketing.

To define experiential marketing in simple words, it not only advertises brands but allows customers to interface with the products, get engaged, and feel more connected. These event activations can be conducted physically or digitally. Participants are encouraged to play games and apps or take a virtual car ride or have the photos taken. However, brands prefer an external vendor to achieve the goal of reaching people, connecting with them, and provide them first-hand experience.

70% of users become regular customers after an experiential marketing event.(Event Track)

One such experiential marketing campaign that created a WoW moment for visitors isIKEA’S FURNISHED CLIMBING WALL.

Ikea stunned the marketing world with the incredible furnished climbing wall, an experiential marketing campaign to promote the opening of France’s 30th IKEA store. A simple stunt but visually an effective brand activation campaign was conceptualized by the best experiential marketing agency Ubi Bene of France. The company installed a vertical rock-climbing wall covered with the brand’s furniture. The wall that looked like one floor of the house was operated by experienced climbing professionals who guided any willing customer to scale the temporary exhibit. The creative activation campaign also showed the sturdiness of its furniture as it supported the weight of the participants.

2.Digital Campaigns

A brand activation campaign can happen online or in-person. Digital marketing campaigns enable brands to reach audiences beyond physical interaction. Brand activation online engages customers and provides marketers a chance to collect data and gain insights to improve their marketing and sales campaigns. Digital marketing is a part of the larger brand activation and supports in-market campaigns.

An interesting example isPepsi’s interactive drink bottlesto understand digital brand activation. During the 2014 World Cup, Pepsi led a football-specific augmented reality campaign with Blippar as a flavor of the month. 250 million interactive cans were produced where users can play a football game with the world’s five leading players. The result was 60,000 hours of engagement on the cans within a month and a conversion of 2 percent.

3. Sampling Campaigns:

In simple words, sampling campaigns are events where a potential consumer can try a sample product of a brand or get the product or service free. Determine the target audience and find relevant events or spaces to get the right audience to try the products. The positive brand experience from the audience can boost sales and create brand awareness. A study reveals,

80% of polled attendants mentioned that live demonstrations and free samples drastically helped solidify their purchase decision.(Event Track)

An unusual but brilliant sample and storytelling campaign by Lays in Argentina.

Pepsi Co salty snack brand Lays did the sampling campaign just right. Consumers of every participating store were given a raw potato with a sticker as a sample. The participant had to follow the sticker instructions and reach the endpoint – the snack aisle. In an unusual vending machine that looked to manufacture Lays potato chips accepted potato as a payment mode instead of coins. The potato ensures that the machine rolls out the hot chips bag.

4. In-Store Brand Activation:

Another way for activations is through in-store campaigns or events. This also involves an experiential element of brand activation where customers can touch, feel, and interact with brands. These types of activations are suited more for a restaurant or a retail store where people can experience products than any service business.

IKEA has always surprised marketers and consumers with its unique campaigns. One such brand activation strategy was creating apop-up restaurantin London that allowed visitors to cook their meals for family and friends and “celebrate the joy of cooking together.”

The event showcased their products (kitchenware to kitchen outfits) and their food product line. The event activation was for 2 weeks that offered guidance from chefs and press coverage. Such brand activation events help to reach a larger audience and create brand awareness.

5.Promotional Marketing

Promotional marketing is a technique of brand activation to promote the product and services of a brand to raise awareness, build a customer base, and increase sales. There are various ways for consumer promotion like a loyalty program, contests, sampling, giveaways, special offers, and digital campaigns especially mobile interactions. Business promotions include trade shows, events, email campaigns, or reward sellers.

An example of consumer marketing isWrigley’s #5 Game On. No Pain, No Gain Contest.

Wrigley invited consumers to buy a pack of 5 Gum and upload the UPC code online to win daily prizes and a Grand Prize Trip to the EB Games conference. The brand gathered more than a thousand entries from the consumers who went in-store to purchase the pack of gum.

6.Social Media Engagement:

Social Media is a component of larger brand activation. It drives engagement, creates brand awareness, and generate buzz with compelling content and offers. With experiential marketing at its peak, it is essential to incorporate social media activity to ensure the campaign receives the exposure that is needed.

One of the finest and relevant instances isCarlsberg. Part of the campaign was promoted on social media encouraging user participation that gave the campaign an additional push and publicity.

I know that@carlsbergwant me to tweet this – but I can't stop myself. Hats offpic.twitter.com/k7OCNv2Knk

— Stuart Aitken (@stuart_aitken)April 8, 2015

How To Plan A Brand Activation?

After learning and understanding what is brand activation and its importance, let’s explore how to plan it. It doesn’t need a big budget but a creative and strategic approach. The momentum set by brand activation should be carried forward in all the marketing campaigns and messages. Simple steps to be followed to plan a brand activation campaign.

1.Set goals:Decide what you want to achieve through your market activation campaign. SetSMARTgoals:

• Specific:Who are the participants and what is the activation about?
• Measurable:What is the quantifiable change you expect to see through the objective?
• Achievable:Are the targets achievable with the available resources and time?
• Realistic:Set a realistic objective or goal to be achieved.
• Time-Bound:Decide a timeline to achieve the goal or objective.

2. Create a budget:Though brand activation doesn’t require a huge budget, you should allocate a budget for the marketing activation campaign. It will help you to measure the ROI after the campaign is over.

3. Know your audience:It is essential to know your target audience so you can plan your promotional activities and communication accordingly. Targeting the right audience will help in the success of the campaign.

4. Create a compelling call-to-action:Every brand activation campaign needs CTA. After reaching your audience, telling them about the product or service, and holding their attention – it’s time to create CTA that will help you achieve your goal. For example, if the goal is to increase participation in an event, then the CTA should be ‘to register.’

5.Choose the right platform to deliver the marketing message:The experiential brand activation would have been a success with all participants loving it but there is a larger audience on the Internet to be catered via the online campaign. Make the campaign viral to let more people know and engage users in the online brand activation. Let the participants tag the brand on social media platforms, share videos, or engage them in online activities.

Psychological Tactics Behind Successful Brand Activation

As a brand or marketer, one would want that its social media activation campaigns show results. Many times the likes, comments on the posts shared seem insignificant but it counts. What if one can understand the psychology of social media so that it can help to connect with the customer, create brand awareness, and build a better relationship. Let’s decode the psychology of social media.

1.Color Psychology:

Every color associated with a brand has a specific meaning and conjures an emotion. The below infographic shows the emotional meanings of colors. Take advantage of the color psychology for the activation campaigns on social media. Acompiledresearch by Colorcom reveals,

Research reveals people make a subconscious judgment about a person, environment, or product within 90 seconds of initial viewing and that between 62% and 90% of that assessment is based on color alone.

2. Social Proof

It does what it sounds like. It’s proof that people are happy with what you do. Social proof can be a review or testimonial from users or followers and engagement on social media.

When people notice how others trust and like a brand, they are compelled to learn more about your service or brand or purchase it. User-generated content (UGC) and positive reviews show the audience how happy and loyal customers are of a brand. It helps to distinguish a brand positively from its competitors. Astudyby Olapic states that76 percent of consumers believe the content that the average people share is more honest than advertising from brands.

3.Visuals are appealing

Visual content like images, videos, infographics, GIF, or any other form is important for interactions with your audience. Visuals are the most effective way to engage the audience with the content. Research compiled by Hubspot reports80% of marketers to use visual assets in their social media marketing.

Another study reveals visuals are processed better–60,000 times faster than any text. Strong visual elements help to promote products successfully and create brand awareness.

4.Aspirational Content

Aspirational content inspires emotions and evoking emotion has a positive impact on the audience. Joy, excitement, sadness are some of the emotions that resonate with consumers. Create drool-worthy content that fits the brand and helps to connect with the audience’s real aspirations.

The surprising discovery that wields emotion power is‘emojis’. The study byEmoticons and Phrases: Status Symbols in Social Media支持这一事实。在研究emoji Tw使用itter, researchers found “individuals who use emoticons often (and positive emoticons in particular) tend to be popular or influential.” Brands like Ikea, Coca-Cola, Burger King have created their own branded emoji for their fans to share.

Next time do not hesitate to use an emoticon in the social media content.

5.Build a brand voice

The internet and technology have given brands many ways to connect and engage with consumers. To attract a new audience and maintain a customer base it is essential to have a brand voice and a unique identity. Customers are likely to engage with brands that resonate with their values. Therefore, it is vital to know your audience and tailor your identity to increase engagement and build a customer relation.

6. Reciprocity

In general terms, it means when someone does something nice for you, instinctively you would feel to do something nice for them.

For brands, this could mean being generous with the audience with a product giveaway, any type of free content, or anything else that is suitable for the business. Freebies are a type of promotional marketing and help to build trust with the audience. It encourages the user to return and that might be to purchase the product, follow you on social media or promote you in their network.

These are the general tactics for impactful marketing activations. Let’s explore the psychology specifically to individual platforms apart from the above and know the most popular social media platforms:

• Facebook

1.Show Faces:

To draw attention to the campaign, make sure to add a face to it. The study reveals that a specific part of the brain responds to only faces. People can easily recognize faces as well as read the emotions which are ultimate social tools. Hence, faces are a great way to gain attraction from users especially if they are of known personalities.

2. Emotions always win

Emotions rules heart and mind. Generally, people are more drawn to emotions in particular in their faces. Therefore, it a perfect blend of faces and emotions and a great way to use the above tactic.

Facebook campaigns get more attention with positive emotions but one may find a few ads that can use any emotions and get noticed. Below is a Snapwire Ad showing happy faces with positive emotions.

3. Color is the key

The color of Facebook ads is to stand out from the rest. The brighter and contrast colors are the best bet for Facebook campaigns. And red is the color for Facebook campaigns as it gets the most attention. The color red excites the brain cell most, reveals a study in 2008. A study suggestscolor increases readers’attention spans and recall by 82%.

Other colors also work well but red signifies boldness, attraction, and strength. The opposite of red’s excitement is blue’s calm and friendliness. Facebook platform color is blue and it would be challenging to use the color on Facebook for any campaign as it wouldn’t stand out. The Elegant Times are surely gaining attention with the bold ad.

4.Fear of Missing Out (F.O.M.O)

In simple words, if there is scarcity then people feel they are missing something valuable. This is also the psychological tactic behind sales, exclusives, or events. You can see FOMO in any advertising. For instance, Banana Republic uses scarcity to drive sales and membership card.

Present cardholders would go shopping in the fear of not missing out and non-card members shall fear missing the exclusive offer. Double FOMO.

5.Visuals are appealing but so are words.

Images are king but words also weave magic and hold value. Therefore, words should not be neglected.Copyblogger Gregory Ciottihas picked out the 5 most powerful words –new, because, instantly, free, and youto be used in a context that is effective for the business and audience.

• Instagram:

1. Visuals are everything

‘A picture speaks a thousand words ‘, a proverb is made for Instagram. Images are a powerful tool and the photo-sharing app as it is all about visual content.

According to research from 3M,our brains process visuals about 60,000 times faster than they process text and visual aids have been found to improve learning by up to 400 percent. So, utilizing images makes a story effective and more efficient.

2. Engage your followers

Instagram is not only about posting drool-worthy images but interacting with your followers and building a community around your brand. Users don’t scroll social media feeds out of habit but because they feel connected. When participants post on social media and do not receive any response, they feel ignorant and affects their self-esteem.

Brands should proactively respond to all the messages and comments. Another way of interaction is by tagging people on the posts. They will share the content further in their network increasing the reach.

3.Evoke emotions

Most successful and memorable brand activation campaigns appeal to people’s emotions. In an analysis of the IPA dataBANK, campaigns with purely emotional content performedabout twice as wellas those with only rational content. Images play a huge role as it is a great way to grab user attention to convey a message and evoke an emotional response. Brands should list down the emotions (joy, happiness, humor, or others) to inspire and then plan their campaign accordingly to connect with the users.

4. Reciprocity

The concept of reciprocity is important in social psychology and Instagram is all about connectedness. Brands can reward their followers with promo codes, frequent discounts, exclusive offers, or product giveaways. Brands can select followers of the week or conduct live Q & A sessions to create brand awareness, build customer relations, and increase engagement.

5.Post consistently

Brand activation campaigns should be lively, consistent, and interactive. Brands need to post regularly to create an interactive and engaging feed with a predictable schedule. They cannot show up once a while as the famous saying is true; ‘Out of Sight, Out of Mind.’The more frequently the followers see posts, the more they will remember and value the brand.

• Twitter

1. Use image psychology

Studies show that images have the highest conversion or click-through rates but what kind of images? The close-up face of a person increases the success of an ad or webpage. Similarly, tweets with images get more engagement. Research byBuffershows sharing images on Twitter increases retweets by 150%.

品牌识别和构建意识for your Twitter audience, head up your profile image with the face of a company or founder. This will help the user to relate to the brand on a personal level. If it’s a SaaS company include images of happy customers within individual tweets and link it to blogs and articles.

2. Share Positivity

The campaign should offer positive messages and tweets. The audience is more likely to respond to positive tweets or funny posts over negative ones. Researchers believe such positive tweets have a psychological effect that spreads across Twitter and outside too.

https://twitter.com/DanEnglishby/status/1045694211092185089?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1045694211092185089%7Ctwgr%5Eshare_3&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.makeuseof.com%2Ftag%2Fpsychological-tricks-twitter%2F

3. Usage of Initial Caps

A study by Conductor shows 64% of users favored sentence case when given a variety of headlines to choose from all caps to all lowercase.

The use of initial caps increases the speed of reading shows studies by James Cattell. Brands should use initial caps in their tweets especially while promoting the headline of a blog or an article. This will catch the attention of more users and improve the speed of reading of the audience to digest the headline. Buffer is a classic example of initial caps while promoting its blog to engage readers.

4.Tweet on how-to-Type of content

While planning your campaign, understand what kind of posts gains attention and retweets. According toQuicksprout, tweets linked to a how-to or list-based articles received 3 times more retweets than any other text-based content.

The psychology behind the fact is simple. Such tweets fill in the knowledge gap of the users, receive more retweets, and following as well as more engagement.

Sourdough Bread – How it’s done

I’ve learnt myself, no training, just my own ‘technique’

I can guarantee my bread it’s a@RealBread#Soudough@HouseOfFeastsBakery#HowTopic.twitter.com/ptQp2JgDQa

— Damian Wawrzyniak (@ChefConsultant)September 26, 2018

5.Images perform better than videos

Quicksproutsuggests thatusers on Twitter tweet images 361% more than they tweet videos.Most people use Twitter by just scrolling through the feed and scan through the tweets for interesting and valuable information.

This implies that brands need to post tweets that are self-explanatory without clicking on it with a WoW factor. Brands can embed images and videos in their tweets with valuable information in an effective way within the character limit to drive engagement.

The Rise of Robotics and AI#AI#infographic#tech#MachineLearning#BigData#IoT#VR#DataScience#blockchain#ArtificialIntelligence#robotics#technology#data#DataAnalyticsvia@AnsonMcCade@athis_news@JackChurch_AIMT:@MikeQuindazzi#AI#IoT#BigData#infographicsMTpic.twitter.com/xlcJ3lvJXy

— Harry Miller (@Harry_Robots)September 30, 2018

6. Promotional Tweets

Brands should design their activation campaign in line with the concept of reciprocity. Brands can reward with giveaway promotions and prizes. The promotional tweet can also include an easy-to-follow CTA to boost engagement with a self-explanatory image. This will also ensure brand awareness and grow Twitter following.

To kick off Monday and celebrate 400k followers on Twitter – we're giving away 2 Buffer bottles: retweet to enterpic.twitter.com/jditNMlV40

— Buffer (@buffer)November 2, 2015

5 Brand Activations That Will Inspire Your Next Campaign

Brand activations require the right strategy, content, and execution to engage consumers and build a loyal brand community for its products and services.

Below are five successful brand activation campaigns to learn from.

1. Google Home Mini

To activate its latest new home assistant, the Home Mini which is roughly the size of a donut, the search engine giant set up a tour of eleven pop-up donut shops around the States.

Well, what is the connection between a donut and a home assistant?

Image Credit: The Drum

朗朗上口的口号——甜甜圈大小,权力of a superhero, Google launches its Home Mini. This quirky brand activation created an interactive Google home experience inside 11 pop-up donut shops. Every visitor inside can ask Google Home Mini a question and the donut box slides down from the conveyor belt. The fun and excitement part comes here- Will it be a new Google Home Mini or two delicious donuts?

A win-win situation, isn’t it?

2. Aperol Big Spritz

Aperitif brand Aperol executed a well-thought and fun brand activation in Shoreditch. It involved elements such as a rowboat on the orange river, swinging seats, and Aperol spirits which made it attractive. The bartenders were well informed and answered every product-related questions as well as explained about the Italian heritage and event. The orange palette, swinging seats, pizzas, and branded giveaway made it Instagram worthy. Following week after the event, there was a lot of outside advertising to continue the buzz about the brand and stay fresh in the minds of the people. Perfect Timing!

3. Sonic Square Shakes

Sonic prepared a delightful on-site campaign for Coachella, the music and arts festival in California for their celebrity-chef-backed brand activation. The highly designed campaign especially for Instagram to promote the brand’s premium flavors. Festival-goers could view, order, and post about the square milkshakes on Instagram and then the shakes would be delivered on the ground free of charge. After delivery, there would be a #squareshakes post made by the customers.

The aim is to build the brand among millennials by growing its social media presence and building a community and followers on Instagram.

https://youtu.be/AgKfH-G-q6E

4. Intel Drone Light Show

激活使品牌得到更多的关注和transform themselves in more creative ways. It is not necessary that the brand activation campaigns should directly be connected to the primary function but gives a chance to consumers to see a different version of the brand outside the functional view. This is what happened with Intel, a company known for microprocessors transformed into a company for its spectacular world record-breaking drone light show at the 2018 Winter Olympics.

Over 12 billion media impressions in under 12 hours and trending #1 on the internet made Intel memorable across the world.

5.Charity Water Waterwalk

Charity Water is an organization that creates clean water sources for remote villages in developing nations. It participated in a trade show and is an excellent example of experience marketing.

It created a lifetime experience for their booth visitors by inviting them to walk two 40lbs jugs of water across 50 yd platform, which African villagers do every day. This gave a reality check to the visitors about the real and challenging situation faced by the villagers in the developing nations. This experience helped the visitors connect with the brand and boosting the chances of donation for the cause.

Tips For Effective Brand Activation

There are multiple types of brand activation and creative campaigns and the process would be different for every brand. However, no matter what method you choose but the ultimate goal is the same for all- to reach the target audience, increase sales, and help business leverage. Here are a few tips that will help you to build a brand and successful campaigns to stay ahead in the race.

1. Know your audience:

While planning the brand activation events, remember this simple rule -Put the customer at the center. Brand activations should be engaging and fun but not offensive, annoying, or inappropriate. Understand your target audience and market segment to engage with the brand. Avoid bad brand activation and inconvenient interaction which will lead to prospects and customers avoiding the brand. Ensure to prepare the brand activation while keeping the audience in mind.

2. Keep it simple:

AD Scholars have been managing brand activation campaigns for brands from various industries, and if there’s one tip that we can share from our personal experience is to keep it simple. Really, as simple as it sounds, most brands mess up in trying to be out of the box constantly without even identifying what their audience wants. Let the brand get acquainted with the audience using proven brand activation ideas, and gradually spread wings in testing out new ideas. Obviously there are certain brands that are new but still hit the bull’s eye at the first attempt and become viral. However, that’s an exception and not the norm.

3. Build connections:

Human interaction is the best way to begin meaningful relationships with the audience. There can be any method of brand activation but the crucial factor is to involve real human beings who are associated with the brand. Human interactions give a face to the company and a personal touch to the campaign. Humanize the brand in a way that makes it more relatable.

4. Include storytelling:

Storytelling is the most creative way of brand activation campaigns. It is the most crucial component of brand communication and marketing. It can be executed in several ways such as AR and VR experiences, other digital elements, face-to-face interactions to name a few. Brands should involve the audience to offer a personalized experience and encourage them to share on social media platforms. The positive experience will give way to extend reach to a wider market and help to boost sales and create brand awareness.

4. Listen to the responses:

Ensure to collect the feedback before, during, and after brand activation. For an effective campaign, the interaction has to be a two-way street. Document all the positive and negative interactions during the activation -digital or live event. Take a survey post-campaign to understand what worked, what failed, and did it help to achieve the desired goal. This will also ensure that future activations are improved and assist brands to grow and learn.

Final Thoughts:

Rome wasn’t built in a day!

Building a brand is a gradual process and cannot expect any event or campaign to turn the brand into a phenomenon or increase your audience overnight. The ongoing branding initiatives and brand activation will help to build the brand and give the boost to achieve the set objective. It will help to build customer relationships, create brand awareness, and reshape the way customers perceive the product or service. Brand activations are an integral part of brand strategy and will help to engage with the target audience and establish an emotional connection.

Read more:How Email Marketing Will Help Your Business Grow in 2020

AdForm Set To Solve The Cookie Problem With Its Proven First-Party ID Solution

Adformannounced this week that advertisers can now use the first-party ID on their platform in the absence of third-party cookies. The demise ofthird-party cookieshas been a cause of concern for all advertisers and publishers on some browsers and are looking to future-proof their offerings and tech stacks. And Adform’s success in switching to first-party data is a major breakthrough for the industry. Now, agencies can sharefirst-party dataand IDs with Adform to personalize advertising, target specific audiences, and report results – all without the use of any third-party cookies.

Ajoint collaborationbetween Adform, the European publishing groupSanoma, marketing agencyDagmar, and global groupIPG MediaBrandsis leading the way forward for the digital advertising industry and leveling the playing field with the walled gardens. The collaboration not only prepared for thefuture cookie changebut also improve the functionality of advertising buying for Safari and Firefox browsers. The change in first-party data allows programmatic targeting and helps to direct advertising money into publishers’ properties who are eager to secure their ad revenue.

Adform states that without the need for hundreds of third-party cookies, compliance with regulations such as GDPR and CCPA will be easier. First-party data and ID’s is beneficial to brands as they live longer than third-party cookies. With first-party IDs from publishers and advertisers, impressions and data are completely traceable increasing transparency that helps to deal with issues like discrepancies, accountability, hidden fees, arbitrage, and ad fraud and reducing the risk of data leakage.

Adform has a complete digital infrastructure and is uniquely placed to switch to first-party data with its integrated advertising platform(IAS). Jakob Bak, CTO, Adform said,

“We have proved that it is possible to switch from third-party cookies to first-party IDs and, as such, have provided a leap into the future of digital marketing. The industry is on an inevitable road to life without third-party cookies and ongoing success for the open ecosystem will depend on collaboration. So far, publisher announcements around first-party data have represented positive yet individual approaches, now it’s clear that working together presents a more powerful way to ensure profitability for independent publishers. In fact, the evidence of how impactful shared first-party IDs can be has already led to many agencies and sales houses to express interest in moving spend away from media giants.”

Jaakko Kuivalainen, Director, Digital Advertising Business, at Sanoma also commented,

“Finland is an established hotbed for innovation, but there is a huge opportunity for wider global progression. This venture is a great example of what can be achieved when publishers and technology companies come together. Working as one, we can be consistently at the forefront of industry development; and effectively preparing for the coming demise of third-party cookies with first-party centric digital advertising.”

Read more:Top 10 Emerging Indian Ad Tech Startups You Should Know About

Influencer Marketing Comes Back Strong Amidst Pandemic Crisis

The pandemic had disrupted every industry forcing marketers to shift their plans and thrust into an uncertain and swiftly changing landscape.Brands are looking for independent creators than productions due to pandemic restrictions such as sheltering in place.

The industry was in troubled waters as pandemic had put a pause on all the plans, took many industries out of the market, and affected many influencers’ content. Some marketers even continued with Facebook boycotts or social media pauses.

It has been quite a challenging period forinfluencers.However, the influencer industry is recovering and bouncing back, showing incredible resilience and creativity. Consumers are spending more time on social media interacting with content creators after being cooped up at home. With budgeting constraints and large scale, ad production is difficult, brands are turning to independent creators for a quick, less-expensive, and easy-to-produce creative content. This is providing the much-required boost to the influencer marketing industry.

Numbers Says It All

Social Bakers released the State of Influencer Marketing Report and found out that there is a fall in sponsored content from March to May and a pivot towards micro-influencers. Yuval Ben-Itzhak, CEO, Socialbakers said,

“Nano and micro-influencers are now seen as high-value resources, bringing high impact without the big price tag of macro and mega influencers. As budgets remain tight, savvy brands will likely continue to expand partnerships with these smaller influencers as part of a smarter social media strategy in the wake of the continuing worldwide pandemic.”

Another finding by Shareablee, an audience-based social media measurement company states that branded content from influencers on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter was up 21% in July from March despite a decline in sponsored influencers post- 87% on Instagram and 57% on Facebook in April compared to last year.

Influencer marketing has changed in several ways during the outbreak. There is a shift in consumer behavior more towards digital in this pandemic due to the lockdown. The engagement with branded influencers posts grew 5 times faster to 57.2 million total actions in July compared with March, according to Shareablee.

赞助的帖子后7月以来上升the volume fell almost 17 percent in March and another 6 percent in April reveals Data from CreatorIQ.

This proves that the industry is still very strong and influencers are quick to adapt with conversion rates increased across platforms in the pandemic. As quoted in Adage, Melissa Rosenthal, co-founder at Circle said,

“Brands took a few weeks to figure out how to position themselves for a new world. Now I’m seeing probably 5 times the outreach I was seeing pre-pandemic. Small brands, large brands, new brands, everyone.”

The pandemic is benefitting the influencers with the increase in viewership as alternate media or sports events have declined drastically. Presently, influencers are the only production houses that are open and can make new, creative, and custom content for brands amidst pandemic restrictions. According to the eMarketer report, followers are looking for more DIY activities and short videos.

Clorox Followed The Influencer Way!

Clorox.Co is getting back to sponsored influencer work after a pandemic pause.Through the Reach Agency, Clorox recently teamed up with YouTube comedians The Try Guys to market its latest scent of Fresh Step cat litter. In the video, the creators open the world’s smelliest foods to demonstrate the ability of new Fresh Step cat litter with Febreze Freshness and Gain Scent covers the odors. The video garnered nearly a million organic views on its first day on August 15. The partnership with Try Guys who have 7.3 million subscribers is Clorox’s third venture into influencer-led demo-tainment.

Clorox shifted the plan of conventional ads to influencer content while planning the campaign in March as the pandemic situation would make it hard to produce ads. Another major decision taken by the brand was toboycott Facebook and Instagramadvertising for the remaining year while the project was ongoing.

As reported in Adage, Deb Crandall, director of marketing and studio lead said,

“我们必须要求我们的合作伙伴不发布on their Facebook or Instagram channels, and we’re not putting any paid support behind it. It definitely takes a channel out of the mix to reach our audience, but that’s why we’re excited about the results we’re seeing. To reach almost a million views without Facebook or Instagram makes us think we’re onto something.”

Finally, brands and creators are learning to operate in the ‘ new normal ’. In the time of crisis, savvy social media influencers are engaging with their followers in a fairly two-way communication that even brands could never have on their own.

Explaining ACCC vs Google: Clash Over Paying Media Companies For News

Tech giants are facing tremendous pressure to pay publishers for their news content from across the world and Google is preparing for the fight in Australia. Recently, the competition regulator in Australia issued a draft bill- New Media Bargaining Code that wants to force the duopoly Facebook and Google to pay media companies for news.

The question arises, should Australia implement the new rules that will pave the way for other global regulators to follow the suit as the European regulators ramp up the pressure on the digital giants.

Here are all the latest updates you need to know over the row between Google and media companies and can have a huge impact on the regulatory agencies and governments right around the world.

Google’s Tussle With Publishers in Australia

The long-running tension between Facebook and Google with the media companies have been for years over how the former display content, with publishers demanding to be paid by the tech giants for the privilege.

Last month, Australian regulators the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) released a draft code –News Media Bargaining Code.The code allowed news publishers in the country to negotiate compensation collectively or individually with the two tech companies for sharing or displaying their services. The draft code is aimed to address “bargaining power imbalances” between Australian news businesses and Google and Facebook.

The ACCC proposes a compulsory arbitration process and if the news businesses and digital platforms cannot strike a deal during the three-month negotiation and mediation process then the parties can select an arbitrator or there can be an assigned arbitrator by the Australian Communications and Media Authority. Non-compliance with the code would result in fines up to $10m per breach, three times the benefit obtained or 10% of a digital platform’s annual revenue in Australia, whichever is greater.

The code involves minimum standards that would require digital platforms to give news businesses 28 days’ notice of algorithm change that will affect the referral traffic or the placement of the news. It also requires the tech companies to provide news media businesses clear information about the data they collect through users’ interactions with the news content.

Why Did The Australian Government Introduce The Draft?

Google and Facebook have had a huge impact on Australia’s news industry as there is more than a 20% fall in the number of newspaper and online journalists since 2014 and the duopoly capturing a large share of digital advertising revenues. Earlier the plan was for a voluntary code. However, the Covid-19 pandemic resulted in a decline in advertising and revenues of news businesses as well as delayed the negotiations on payment. This led to the development of a mandatory code by the Australian treasurer, Josh Frydenberg to ensure a fair level playing field for news media companies.

Google’s Response to the New Draft code

The cacophony over Australia’s proposedNews Media Bargaining Code law, which is currently in drafts is gaining momentum with Google publishing an open letter to the users about it. Google users visiting the homepage were presented with an ominous pop-up message that warns, “The way Aussies use Google is at risk”and“their search experience will be hurt by the new regulation.”

Thisopen letterfrom Google Australia managing director Mel Silva is a bold lobbying move that presents Google’s arguments against the new rules in front of million Australian users. Google argues that the proposed regulation would ‘put their free services at risk’ with data being handed over to big news businesses.

It also argued that the law ‘forces’ to give an “unfair advantage” to news publishers alone in Google Search and YouTube because they would be given information that would help them “artificially inflate their ranking over everyone else”.The Guardian reportsthat eligible media companies must meet the criteria of having revenues exceeding $150,000 a year and must have a certain presence in the Australian market. This points out that most larger media houses will have access to the information. Google also said that the law is putting user data at risk.

ACCC Hits Back With A Quick Response

The consumer watchdog was swift in its response, labeling the post as ‘misinformation.’ In thestatement released, it said that Google would not be required to charge Australians for its free services unless it chooses to do so. Similarly, Google doesn’t need to share any additional user data unless it wants to.

Google Makes a Comeback

Google issued a strong rebuttal in its response to ACCC claims. It retaliated saying,

“We strongly disagree and are concerned that our view of the Code has been represented this way during a consultation phase.”

In response to the ACCC claims that Google would not be required to charge for free services, Google explained with an example that the code requires them to provide advance notice over changes in algorithms and said,

“Even assuming Google could comply with this provision, it would seriously damage our products and user experience. It would impact our ability to continue to show users the most relevant useful results on Google Search and YouTube.”

The search giant also disagreed with ACCC claims that Google would not require to share data and said that the codes require that.

“[It] requires Google to tell news media businesses what user data we collect, what data we supply to them, and ‘how the registered news business corporation can gain access to’ that data which we don’t supply to them.”

“This goes beyond the current level of data sharing between Google and news publishers.”

What Did Facebook Say?

Facebook had far less to say for now – William Easton, MD for Australia & New Zealand said in a line,

“We are reviewing the Government’s proposal to understand the impact it will have on the industry, our services and our investment in the news ecosystem in Australia.”

However,Facebookhad earlier expressed disappointmentover making voluntary ACCC code to mandatoryand described the news as “highly substitutable” content.

Will This Make Way For U.S Publishers?

In the U.S, The News Media Alliance, a trade association that represents 2000 publishers is promoting a bill namedJournalism Competition and Preservation Act, a law that would allow news companies to negotiate with online platforms regarding the terms on which content is distributed. However, at present competition law does not allow this.

Regulatory Changes Elsewhere in Europe

Spain and Germany had previously passed similar laws on the usage of news snippets but couldn’t manage to extract payments from Google or Facebook. In 2014, Spain made payments to publishers mandatory, Google chose to shut down its news service. Google threatens a similar response to French new laws as well.

In April this year, France’s competition authorityorderedGoogle to negotiate with publishers over payment for using their news content – such as images, videos, or article extract. However, Google refused to compensate for displaying the content and setting up a legal fight against new EU copyright laws.

Last year, the EU introduced newcopyright rulesthat require tech companies to license the content from rightsholders.

Does This Mean Google and Facebook Don’t Pay Publishers?

The answer is Yes and No. They pay to some publishers. In June, Google said it would pay certain media outlets it will feature in their news service (not released yet) in Germany, Australia, and Brazil. Terms of the deal weren’t disclosed. However, after the competition watchdog proposed the new code, Google informed local publishers that plans of licensing products – Publisher Curated News -are put on hold until further notice.

Another BIG Question, What’s Next?

As Google prepares for the ACCC fight, it would be interesting to watch the tide turning in which direction and how this landmark move will change regulations across the world.

The consultation on the draft proposals concludes on 28th August with final legislation is expected to be introduced shortly after the conclusion of consultations.

Here’s More:Morgan Stanley Forecasts Australian Ad Spend To Fall By 9% In 5 Years

Top 10 Emerging Indian Ad Tech Startups You Should Know About

The market for advertising technology is expected to record exponential growth between now and 2023.

-CMO Adobe

Just as advertising is the business of making advertisements, ad tech is the business of using technology to make advertisements faster, quicker, and efficient. The business is driven by powerful algorithms and data points.

The Adtech ecosystem consists of two major entities – the advertiser (Demand-side) and the publisher(Supply-side). Adtech helps advertisers and publishers achieve their goals in harmony by providing solutions that meet the demands of both parties.

Learn more:A One-stop Guide On All You Ever Need To Know About AdTech In 2020

The Growing Ad Tech Trends

The year 2020 is full of technological advancements – Artificial Intelligence, data-driven marketing, and much more. Digital commerce is going strong and growing, leading to new paths such as mobile, programmatic, analytics, data management, and more. With new tools and technologies emerging every year, marketers can choose from a plethora of options across digital marketing to connect to a new audience and promote their products.

根据Emarketer的调查,到2020年,数字ad spending will be 50% of total advertising. The statistics prove that there is a shift from the traditional medium of marketing to digital platforms.

Here are six significant ad tech trends in 2020 that will change the advertising world

1.Programmatic Advertising:

Programmatic advertisingis becoming a star strategy, and businesses spend almost $60 billion every year. It is projected that programmatic transactions two-thirds of digital display ad spend around the globe in 2020.

Programmatic needs to resolve many challenges before realizing its true potential, such as in the absence of the cookie, the industry needs to search new ways for retargeting and personalization, keeping customers’ privacy in mind. Meanwhile, first-party data is essential in the success of programmatic advertising. Lack of transparency, ad fraud, and efficiency are vital concerns that need to be addressed adequately.

The largest programmatic markets are the U.S, China, and the U.K with a double-digit Y-o-Y growth rate. Indonesia, Brazil, and India will be the fastest-growing programmatic digital ad market in 2020.

There are top three auction type segments for the global programmatic advertising display market which has gained momentum are :

• Global programmatic advertising display market by open auction:买家所允许出版商参与the public sale. It is likely to be the leading segment in the programmatic market with more number of buyers entering the digital market that allows publishers to get the best price for their inventory.
• Global programmatic advertising display market by automation guaranteed:出版商可以储备库存keeping the price fixed. The inventory in this segment is premium advertisement such as the Super Bowl, or pre-launch page of a website and the growth prospects for automated guaranteed are big. It is forecasted by 2021,88% of all digital display ad spending will flow via automation.
• Global programmatic advertising display market by invitation only:It is a private marketplace limited to buyers with an invitation only. The growth driver for this segment is more control over ads that are being run, and the relativity of ads is high due to which advertisers are ready to bid high to get the ads placed.

2. Mobile Advertising:

Mobile advertising continues to take share with substantial gains over the last five years. A report by a research firm Berg Insight forecasted that the global mobile advertising market is expected to grow at the compound annual growth rate of 43%. Another eMarketer report projects that mobile ad spending will reach $400bn by the year 2023, up from $286bn this year. The numbers say it all! It is evident that the industry is growing and projects to represent 80% of global digital ad spend.

A lot of in-app is driven by gaming. A spike in gaming is witnessed during COVID with 1.2 billion weekly mobile game downloads. Buyers are eyeing a vast opportunity to reach a diversified audience within the data-rich environment. There is an exponential growth of in-app advertising. Comscore research says that 75% of digital users consume all their social media, lifestyle, travel, news, and utility content using mobile apps. 5G will also be a considerable contributor to boost mobile-in app advertising, opening doors of opportunity and creativity for advertisers. With technologies such as OM SDK and app-ads.txt rolling out, the industry is moving towards a cleaner and more measurable environment.

Consumer time spent on media is shifting towards mobile, and eMarketer reports India and Thailand will witness the fastest mobile advertising growth in 2020.

3. Video Advertising:

The video will remain the key driver and cannot underscore its role in 2020. With large-scale events postponed and ad budgets cut down, marketers rely onvideo advertisingas effective means across platforms. It is projected to account for 31% of the overall display ad spending next year.

Verizon researchshows,almost all (96%) advertisers will be investing in at least one video ad format this year, and more than three-quarters say they plan to invest more in premium video content in 2020. The reason is ROI.

Advertisers and marketers plan to invest in shoppable and interactive emerging video ads formats. With shelter in place and people continue to work from home, there is a rise in digital and mobile usage with CTV and OTT becoming increasingly dominant. Verizon research states.36 percent plan to invest more in Connected TV ads, while 30 percent intend to increase their spend on mobile video.USD 70 billion ad spend from linear is shifting towards OTT channels. Major companies are keen to take advantage of the changing scenario with the right technology.

4. Digital 360 services:

Marketers are focusing on areas like the personalization of media and content marketing. Voice and visual searches are playing a huge role in the ecosystem, and marketers are developing new techniques to enhance it. Many companies are offering 360 digital services that include social media marketing, SEO, content marketing, analytics, automation and transparency, and many more.

TheDrumindicates that by 2022, the global digital software industry will grow by $74.96 billion.CMOpredicts that around 87% of marketing budgets will be spent on digital marketing by 2022.

Another fastest growing digital marketing trend is interactive content – click on, swipe, or interact with online. Outgrow states93% of marketers rate interactive content as highly effective at educating the buyer.The cutting edge technology like augmented reality and 360-degree videos offer a dynamic, engaging, and immersive experience.

5.影响力营销:

Theinfluencer marketingindustry is set to hitUSD 15 billionby 2022. With a high ROI, the industry will witness tremendous growth in the coming years.

Influencer marketing is in the early stage, but its usage growth is impressive.Less than one third (27.9%) marketers have been using influencer marketing for over three years, 20.9 %have been using for less than a year, and 7% have never used it.Reach and engagement is critical factors in an influencer mix and there is a negative correlation between engagement rate and followers. Most marketers prefer micro-influencers, typically followers between 10,000 and 100,000.

In the series ofGlobal View For Adtech Start-Ups, we bring you ‘Top 10 India-Based Ad Tech Start-Ups’ -a curated list of promising start-ups from industry-main anchors to up-and-comers leading the advertisement industry in India.

Company:ADZ Junction

Founder:Ashok Nain

Category:Digital Services, Ad- Affiliate Network, Mobile Advertising

Geo-Markets:India, Dubai, U.S.A

What they do:ADZ is the brainchild of Ashok Nain started with Mobile advertising and expanded the business to video and web gradually. Their services also include Digital Strategy, Content, Development and Marketing, and Search Marketing. Since its inception, the company is focused on delivering high-quality traffic to clients who have scalability issues and help them to identify their targeting audience, especially in Mobile advertising.

How it’s changing adtech:

• With its innovative advertising solutions and strategies, the company has built a robust affiliate marketing platform that can assist clients in real-time tracking and analytics.
• The 360-degree digital provider has 100+ clients from various sectors with a business of over USD 15 million and is developing technology – a real-time traffic buying SMS platform.

“We introduced real-time bidding, Mobile in-app advertising, rich media, and many other innovations to overcome clients’ problems of quality traffic generation. We have now a separate mobile division by name of AJ Mobile, where we encourage clients to work exclusively on mobile campaigns.”

The company successfully launched a digital campaign forDr. Lalpathlabs, an established company in the healthcare sector. Here is a short case study:

Challenge:

• Expand its online market reach and user base
• Identify digital channels to generate revenue.
• Being completely behind in digital marketing and competing with emerging players in the healthcare sector.

Solution:

• Provided brand awareness strategies for different online channels.
• Established a full-fledged and cost-effective affiliate marketing channel.
• Established a brand development strategy and marketing campaign to rise above the competition.
• Successful digital campaigns resulted in 3X monthly transaction growth.

Founded:2015

Headquarters:Gurugram (With offices in Mumbai, Bangalore, and Dubai)

Company:Aristoma

Founder:Kumar Nishanth

Category:Online Digital Services

What they do:Aristoma, a 360-degree marketing incubator, offers services to increase customer reach using online mediums with some brilliantly creative and engaging ideas. Its portfolio includes top clients such as Diesel, Sportmate, CII, CREDAI Chattisgarh, Goldbricks, to name a few. All its endeavors have resulted in 100 percent growth.

How it’s changing adtech:

• Aristoma is all about helping brands grow with a mantra“Commits, Creates & Connects”with expert result-oriented ideas and making advertising a better experience for advertisers and consumers.
• The company advises in Brand Management, Email Direct Marketing, SEO, and Social Media Planning to help businesses to get the most out of their marketing campaigns.

Founded:2015

Headquarters:Raipur

Company:DigiVigyan Marketing

Founder:Amit Verma

Category:Digital Services, Digital Display Advertising

What they do:A dynamic full-service digital marketing agency that provides clients with multiple solutions through different marketing verticals- Website Management, Search Engine Optimization, Search and Display Advertising (Pay Per Click – PPC), Native Advertising, Online Reputation Management, Amazon Marketing Services, and Social Media Marketing.

How it’s changing adtech:

• DigiVigyan offers world-class digital advertising solutions to businesses to achieve their digital marketing goals.
• The company offers services such as creating landing pages with attractive ad copies, banners, and other optimizations to meet the marketing needs of businesses on various social media platforms. It has worked with renowned ad agencies like Dentsu, M&C Saatchi, to name a few.
• The bootstrapped adtech company is now working towards being the go-to digital marketing agency worldwide after capturing the market across the country.

Founded:2018

Headquarters:Delhi

Company:Do Your Thng

Founder:Ankit Agarwal

Category:Social/ Influencer, Influencer marketing platform

What they do:DYT is a leading Influencer Marketing Agency and a shared economy for digital assets. It acts as a platform to create space for brands to connect with the largest team of nano, micro, and mega influencers.

How it’s changing adtech:

• DYT is an online community that offers content creators an entry in the market and connects brands to the influencers depending on the campaigns. The active users through the app can promote the brand and earn for each post made, whereas the brand can find a safe and secure marketplace to discover the right influencers for their product.
• DYT operates on a broker based model where a percentage of the total spending is charged to maintain the platform. In a short period.
• The phenomenal fundraising and affable work culture have made DYT one of the fastest-growing startups.

Funding:

The tech platform raised $150K from angel investors and plans to use it for further expansion and growth. Previously, the company has also raised an undisclosed amount from angel investors and intends to raise more funds in the future.

“DYT within months of its operation has successfully worked wonders for brands such as Mastercard India, Havells, etc., thus bringing engagement for the brands. With increased investor interest, we plan to expand the team, improve the technology, and go further with the associations.”

-Ankit Agarwal

An exciting campaign with Havells:

For the new digital-only campaign#BeardKyunHoWeirdwith Havells, the company selected 60 creators from the male grooming niche by using the technology to find people uploading their selfies with the beard and spelling about male grooming.

Challenge:

• To increase user engagement for the launch of the new range of BT 9000 beard trimmers with digital platform-only campaign #BeardKyunHoWeird.

Solution:

• Selected 60 creators. Each Instagram creator had a follower range of 1,000 to 85,000.
• Creators created unique and compelling content on how the new Havells trimmer helps in male grooming.
• The 20 days campaign got more than 100,000 engagements, reaching 500,000 users.
• The campaign attracted traction and engagement rate of 10% with authentic creators.

Founded:2019

Headquarters:Gurugram

Company:EMIAC Technologies

Founder:Divya Gandotra

Category:Digital Services, Social Media Marketing

Geo Markets:United States, United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, Israel, South Korea, Russia, Ukraine, Vietnam, Singapore, and UAE, among others.

What they do:EMIAC is a perfect blend of innovation and technology determined to serve businesses in front of their target markets. Their principal services include Content Development, Paid Marketing, and Web Design and Development. The leading digital firm has 1200+ clients, 2900 projects across 30+ countries.

How it’s changing adtech:

• EMIAC offers an array of services from content development and full-service digital agency to paid social media marketing and blog outreach. It is a top-rated digital marketing and content development agency on the world’s popular freelancing site Upwork that adds to their credibility and goodwill.
• 怎样区分他们从人群中是一个超重的llent record of delivering projects on time, offering personalized products and services, premium quality services, and providing it at competent prices.

“We are the game-changers, trendsetters, pioneers, and revolutionaries with a passion for creating an ideal digital future where everyone is connected.”

Founded:2017

Headquarters:Jaipur (With offices in U.K and U.S)

Company:Globale Media

Founder:Bhavesh Talreja

Category:Mobile Advertising, brand safety/ verification, programmatic advertising

What they do:Globale media offers an integrated marketing platform that maximizes revenues by bringing in direct advertisers and showing relevant ads that best fit the user audience using banners, interstitial, videos, social, and native ads. The companyspecializes in digital marketing for all major kinds of app verticals including gaming, e-commerce, lifestyle, utilities, social, education, entertainment, and others on CPM, CPI, and CPA cost models.Publishers can access to the full feed of available campaigns as well as real real-time tracking and automation to multiple devices with programmatic GLOBALE API. It excels with a reach of over 500+ direct publishers, 1000+ live campaigns over 120 countries.

How it’s changing adtech:

• Globale media has developed a marketing program primarily for the mobile age.
• Globale media has been sincerely providing“transparency on inflation level and not just on the click level.”The company is aggressively pitching for its recently launched productkeyword search traffic where revenues have increased 3x from quarter-on-quarter and are expecting to multiply the revenues by 10x in 2020.
• In the next five years, it aims to be among the top ad tech marketing companies in India, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia.

“We provide app marketers with 100 direct in-app traffic sources with transparency so they get device ids on each and every click and have a clear knowledge about where the app is running. In terms of impact, the advertisers can use these device ids to run their re-engagement campaigns and make sure the users are coming back to the app and ultimately spending more within the app.”

-Bhavesh Talreja

Founded:2017

Headquarters:Singapore (With offices in India and UAE)

Company:mCanvas

Founder:Vishal Rupani

Category:Mobile Advertising, Video Interactive ads, Programmatic Advertising

What they do:mCanvas is a subsidiary of Affinity and is the brainchild of Vishal Rupani, from vision and inception to revenue generation and scalability. mCanvas is a storytelling mobile ad platform that uses phone sensors to create compelling and interactive brand narratives.

How it’s changing adtech:mCanvas is the first and leading Indian company that has addressed critical issues of mobile marketing:Banner Blindness, Poor Viewability, Accidental Clicks, and Lack of Storytelling.The mobile advertising platform uses four kinds of advertisement formats: Scrollers, Stickers, Spotlight, and Streambox.

• The company recently integrated with Adobe advertising cloud that will enable advertisers to buy experiential rich media content and interactive video ads.

“鉴于稳步增长的需求make ads programmatically available, we are happy to integrate with Adobe Advertising Cloud DSP. We have spearheaded programmatic advertising in the rich-media mobile ad industry, and we will continue leveraging its power to offer our innovative solutions.”

-Vishal Rupani

• The company has a reach to at least 60million Indian smartphone users and follows the cost per video (CPV) model for videos and cost per engagement(CPE) for rich media. Sensory Rich media content is produced for VR and AR as well.

“Augmented reality (AR) has become a buzzword in the online tech space. It has shown great promise even in the mobile ad space, and brands have been quick to incorporate AR into mobile-led ad campaigns that have proven to enhance user engagement.”

One of the best examples is ofFrooti – #TheFrootiLife

Challenge:To build a brand recall with its primary target audience -Millennials around the drink during summertime.

Solution:Usingface detection technology, the rich media campaign encouraged users to start the front camera and catch the falling mangoes in the augmented environment. This campaign created a massive impact on the users with this ‘WoW’ ad experience.

• Another segment that has been strongly transformed by brand experiences in the mobile ad industry is voice-enabled interactive mobile ads that have created a lasting impression.

“Personalization of marketing & advertising messages is not a luxury but a necessity.,”

-Vishal Rupani

Here is another case study ofMercedes-Benz GLCthat has usedspeech and sound recognition technologyin mobile ads. To promote their latest feature, Mercedes -Benz User Experience (MBUX) used a smart multimedia system and in-car voice-activated assistant.

ThemCanvas interactive mobilead uses real-time speech recognition technology, and the voice bot in the ad would respond to the questions, recreating the actual experience a user would have in the car.

Founded:2014

Headquarters:Mumbai

Company:Streamlyn

Founder:Naveen Kumar & Raja Chakraborty

Category:Programmatic Advertising, Brand Safety/ Verification

Geo-markets:Asia, Europe, MiddleEast, North America, MENA, APAC, and other 25+ countries.

What they do:Streamlyn works for both publishers and ad buyers to sell and buy ad space respectively. It works as an agency as well as a supply-side platform.

How it’s changing adtech:The one-stop advertising solution provider, a publisher focused media agency connects advertisers with the target audience via the right publisher.

“The aim was to help online publishers, particularly small and medium-sized ones, grow their revenue and the audience.”

-Naveen Kumar

• Streamlyn has an in-house ad server and algorithm to help analyze and optimize the monetization depending on the solution provided by the team to assist the client with high ROI and eCPM and uses cutting edge technology –POE (Programmatic Optimization Engine) and Anti-Fraud algorithms.

• Streamlyn offers its proprietary product‘ BidsXchange,’a smart advertising portal deploying machine learning for small and medium-sized advertisers that allows them to upload ads and select their desired publishers based on the target audience interest.
• Another additional revenue source for publishers isIn-image advertising, a novel concept that helps achieve an edge over competitors with Streamlyn’sHeader bidding wrapper tags.
• It generates content in regional languages and is known as thebest optimization partner for vernacular publishers.It has partnered with Google to support vernacular publishers and increase their revenue.

Founded:2015

Headquarters:Singapore (With offices in India and U.S)

Company:Tarsan

Founder:Tarun Nayyar

Category:Mobile Advertising, Affiliate Marketing

What they do:Tarsan is a leading performance-based Mobile media agency that caters to top-level clientele globally like Airtel, Paytm, M&C Saatchi, CyberAgent, to name a few and delivers performance & branding campaigns and SMS/email/voice/solutions. It is known for the execution of marketing plans on mobile.

How it’s changing adtech:

• Tarsan has an in-house platform, AdMenu, that gives clear and quantifiable value to each advertising avenue, enhancing the ROI on ad spends as well as boost transactional value. It provides transparent information regarding the placement of ads on various platforms via GAID or IDFA.
• Many transactional campaigns are carried out on E-commerce platforms, but the company charges only for lined traffic by experienced customers, whereas the payment depends on CPR, CPT, and CPI.
• Transparency and accountability are their top priority, and with the unique capability to gather information about mobile devices, it has been successful in creating a database of publishers and marketers.
• It maintains a five-layered security policy for data protection. The company aims to become a 360-degree performance-based mobile marketing agency and enhance the AdMenu platform and convert it into a revenue generation opportunity.

“We never store data; we just identify people according to their device id. The information given to us is all in concurrence from the publisher and advertisers.”

Founded:2012

Headquarters:Delhi

Company:UrPopular

Founder:Siddharth Sinha & Kumaresh Bhatt

Category:Micro-Influencer Marketing, Measurement and analytics

Geo-markets:India, Southeast Asian countries, MENA countries, Australia, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore.

What they do:UrPopular is India’s largest network of micro-influencers who are paid to post on Facebook, Instagram, Youtube, and Twitter with 240 million+ organic reach across these platforms. They have a pan India reach of 240 million+ and creators in 11 languages.

How it’s changing adtech:

• The tech firm is democratizing organic marketing in India and helping brands to create ROI based campaigns.
• 它增加了新的方法来驱动品牌的ROIcost per view and cost per reach micro-influencer campaigns. The tech company has developed algorithms to understand the outcome of the campaigns and brands can acquire efficiency and measurability in their campaigns.
• 他们的口头禅是“创建、放大和措施。”This case study ofMcDonald’s‘A ful-filling campaign’is a perfect example to understand it.

Challenge:McDonald’s wanted to destress students from exam fever, and their McSaver Meal + Free French fries exactly intend to do.

Solution:UrPopular got their 11 young and enthusiastic influencers to cheer up and whip off the post-exam chronicles within the outlet by creating Insta stories, videos, fun boomerangs, and before/after stills.

These custom creatives pushed organically delivered,

• 1 million + reach with a 17% engagement rate.
• Rs.1.9 cost per engagement.
• 1.4 million impressions.

“UrPopular brings measurability and scale to the campaigns by working with India’s largest pool of microinfluencers and nano influencers.”

Founded:2017

Headquarters:Mumbai

Closing Words

“In this industry, tomorrow is never the same as today. To gain long-term success in AdTech, you have to play fair, don’t be afraid of experiments, and never stop trying”

-Anton Ruin, Epom

广告技术不是火箭科学,但它是明显的cant advantage to brands as it allows integrating various tools in a single system. It is an amalgamation of advertising, creativity, technology, and innovation. The automated process and joint workflows enable more precise target marketing resulting in relevant and compelling ads. The new norms, tried and tested solutions along with reliable platforms helps to keep information safe and avoid any ad fraud. With significant changes and improvements over what advertisers and publishers used to have earlier, adtech is growing as an industry. However, it still requires more work and expertise to handle the challenges and resolve for good.

Read more:Evolution of Digital Advertising: Happy 25th Digital Advertising And Many More To Come

The Impact of M&A deals in AdTech Amidst COVID-19 Pandemic

The year 2020 is facing global problems like pandemic, race riots, or recession. In the early days, many advertisers have pulled back in many areas because of the fear and uncertainty but surprisingly the projected slowdown on the ad spend is minimal, pointing towards a stable and steady growth in the future. The stock performance of adtech and mar-tech companies have performed well despite the crisis. Adtech is witnessing a consolidation phase but how effective will be dealmaking in this pandemic is the next obvious question. Read here to know more.

Dealmaking In Pandemic

Luma Partners’ Terrence Kawaja, ad tech’s top investment banker pointed at Adweek’s NexTech 2020 Virtual Summit that dealmaking dropped to almost half in the pandemic where many of them were legacy deals which were already in pipeline pre-COVID. The dealmaking was substantially down in Q1 and Q2 and is expected to further reduce in the third quarter due to short-term lack of confidence owing to the current crisis. However, dealmaking activities have picked up again and will see more toward the end of 2020. Kawaja also said,

“Based on our pipeline and what we’re seeing in the marketplace, buyers are back in and looking for deals.”

Where are we seeing these new activities coming from?

Kawaja provides key insights on a potential impending wave of industry consolidation and 5 market segments that are driving M&A deals –Connected TV, Identity, Mobile App, Audio, and what he termed ‘Programmatic End Game Consolidation’and further elaborated on it.

1.Connected TVs:CTV is over a USD 100 billion market that is growing rapidly and by next year it will be 50% addressable. CTV viewing was up in the pandemic and there is a shift in consumer viewing from linear to streaming mainly due to the loss of live sports. USD 70 billion ad spend from linear is shifting towards OTT channels. Major companies are keen to take advantage of the changing scenario with the right technology. With an accelerated shift to streaming, CTV deal activities are picking up.

2.Identity:The core to 360-degree marketing witnessed many privacy regulations and data restrictions from big tech likeGoogle Chrome turning off cookieto Apple’s IDFA deprecation, presenting challenges like limiting targeting in the open-web and measurement. At the same time, there are opportunities likefirst-party dataand resurgence of contextual targeting. Large companies position for privacy-centric data capabilities and predict strategic opportunities in consumer data deal activities.

3.Mobile App:Mobile advertising continues to take share with substantial gains over the last 5 years. A lot of in-app is driven by gaming. A spike in gaming will be witnessed during COVID with 1.2 billion weeklymobile gamedownloads with people having more time in hand in the lockdown. The latest challenge that companies are trying to sort out is the IDFA deprecation in the iOS 14 update. Deal activities will continue in mobile apps provided there are new opportunities.

4.Audio:Podcast has undergone tremendous popularity in the last 5 years with 104 million monthly podcast listeners. The monetization has grown even faster and is still in the early years that has the potential to grow further. The rise in podcasting is driving many more audio deals. Many substantial deals have already happened mainly bySpotifyand are expected to continue.

5.Programmatic End Game Consolidation:每一个行业经历了三个通用的阶段:new company formation, maturity, plus rationalization and consolidation. However, in the adtech industry, the process is “on steroids”. Thousands of companies initially flood the adtech market with an abundance of venture capital and easy market entry, and with early successes follows a rush of IPO’s. Large consumer data companies take advantage of the large, matured, and growing market for scale and profitability. Kawaja says the net consolidation in ad tech started in 2015 and further adds,

“We’ve been on that rationalization push for the last five years.”

He sees this is the final phase -the end-game-of consolidation soon which will be accelerated by the pandemic which will get to fewer players with larger spend and lower-tech rates.

“This will clean the ecosystem with fewer players that are more sustainable with a better market cap. Consolidation on DSP side – Trade desk with 20 billion market cap is the evidence for the final phase.”

If his projection comes true then there will be some activities after a long pause in the deals. Following that, the M&A sprint is likely to exit the industry.

Read more:A One-stop Guide On All You Ever Need To Know About AdTech In 2020

Innovation In Google During The Tough Times Of COVID

While most of the brands are struggling to survive during the tough times of pandemic, Google has set its goals right for the whole year. It is innovating itself without any trouble. Every month Google targets to enhance itself, according to the growing demand of the society. Google makes sure, that it fulfills the need of its users by providing them with exactly what they desire.

Recently, Google introduced two new features for its search portals. One of the features is designed, and dedicated to the Black community. The feature will help in the upliftment of the community in society and will aim to end the injustice against them.
Due to the rise of anger in the community against the centuries-long injustice experienced by the community, several brands came forward to show their support towards the community. Google was amongst them.

#BlackLivesMatter!

To fulfill his promise, the CEO at Google, Sundar Pichai recently added a feature to the map and Google search listing.

This feature is launched toempower the Black community. The feature will highlight businesses owned by the Black community helping them grow. However, only those members can avail of the benefit whose business has verified profiles in the US. Also, the business must be owned by a member of the black community.

Those businesses highlighted under this feature will be marked by an image(as shown below). The symbol will signify that the business is owned by a member of the Black community.

It is said that the step was taken to provide a financial boost to the community. It is a foreseen step to finally end the orthodox discrimination towards the community. Google is also partnering with U.S. Black Chambers, inc. To provide better features like Analytics helping the businesses groom and blossom.

In a statement regarding this following statement was issued by Google:

“As part of our$300 million commitmentto support under-represented entrepreneurs, we’re integrating the attribute into the digital skills training programs we offer Black business owners through Grow with Google Digital Coaches. And through Google for Startups Accelerator for Black Founders, we’re starting our work with the first cohort of 12 startups.”

Google is keen to develop the feature even more and is seeking ideas internally. According to the management, they have already received more than 500 creative ideas to get this model to develop more brilliantly.

The company is also working on better and much strict“Policies against hate and harassment”

“About this ad”- More power tothe user!

With a more transparent approach towards their users, Google has launched a new feature popularly known as “About this ad”.

To implement this feature Google will belaunching new tools.It will help theusers gain informationabout theadvertisementthey are receiving.Itwill helpenhancesecurityand willincrease user privacy on the digital platform.

According to Google spokesperson,thevision isdesigned for a“thriving internet where people around the world can continue to access ad-supported content, while also feeling confident that their data is protected”.

“But in order to get there, we must increase transparency into how digital advertising works, offer users additional controls, and ensure that people’s choices about the use of their data are respected not worked around or ignored.”

Google Ends All Gossips: Revealed Fee Structure For Advertisement Tools

For a long time now, tech giants like Google are have faced a lot of criticism. Most of those were linked to their explicit behavior when it comes tomoneyand user privacy. After being criticized and called upon several times by different government authorities for blind approach in the business during the usage of advertisers’ money, Google has finally decided to be more transparent with its business policies and proposals.

Therefore,Googleshared alist of pricingfor its tools used by advertisers for the advertisement.It was a huge step by Google, since before this release, advertisers were kept in the dark about the spent of their share of the money, and the profit earned by Google.

The tools for which Google revealed the prices include, DV360, Google Ads, ad manager, and its publisher tech.

The revealed prices are as follows:

These prices were revealed by Google in a series of articles and blog posts.

The prices are in the ratio of percentage for a $1 amount spent by an advertiser on an advertisement, divided between the publisher and Google.

• Google tech:Publishers – 69%, Google – 31%
• DV360:Publisher – 87%, Google – 13%
• Ad Manager:Publisher – 82%, Google – 18%
• Google Ads:Publisher – 86%, Google – 14%
• Ad sense by Google:68% share taken by Google of the total spent by the advertiser.

Google has never been so transparent in regards to its prices, the sources say that this new transparent face of Google is due to the ongoing legal hearing conducted by the state attorney general and the Department of Justice.

Google Updated Its Demand-Side Platform With DV360!

Innovation has always been the motto of the company. To make sure that the advertisers at Google are equipped with the best tools available in the market, it recently launched its new self-service toolkit known as Display & Video 360.

The tool is launched to change the landscape of the advertisement.Display&Video 360isa gift to its advertisers by Google.

Earlier, advertisers used the tools to make a hypothetical projectionwhile running an online marketing campaign. The most crucial question that bothered the advertisers wastheamount ofaudience that theywillreachwith the campaign. To make sure it’s no more a hit and try show for the advertisers, Google launched DV360.

With the DV360, the advertisers can now create a new campaign and check its reach to the audienceas the tool provides a duplicate view of the campaign.The duplicate view will help the advertisers view the exact or say a more accurate number of audiences that they will reach with the campaign. Hence, no more blind bets!

The toolhas better forecastingcapabilities, giving the advertisers a glimpse of the future for their campaign.It is also a better solution for the media planners as it provides them with a large proportion of benefitsas better access to the tool as they always have a larger role to play.

The most crucial answer answered with the tool is,“how many unique people can I expect to reach with my overall campaign across any open auction display and video inventory as well as YouTube?”

According toAnudeep Pedditi,Programmatic Manager, OMD NZ:

“Once we commit to a reach objective, neither underachieving nor overachieving is an option. Display & Video 360 gives media planners the accuracy they need to effectively plan across all our programmatic campaigns.”

The Tools main aim is to provide the following features to its advertisers:

• • • • Focus

      • Options For Buying

      • Optimization And Reporting

      • Security

      • Conclusion

How Google’s Page Experience Will Change the Face of SEO in 2021

Googlewilllaunch a new algorithm for its page experience and design.Thenew modelwill be basedon user experience.

The new algorithm will surely affect SEO andwebtraffic. Therefore, to make sure that the advertisers are not affected by the changes, Google has announced that they will apply the changes in 2021.They have promised toinformupfront,at least six months beforehand.

An early reminder will helpadvertisersto preparethemselves for thechanges.

However, Google made it clear that the new algorithm will be even stricterinranking the web pages. If the user experienceof aweb-pageis poor, Google will not rankthepage on to the top list.

Google has also published a detailed document dedicated to the page experience criteria.

The new algorithm will consist of some core vital features. This feature includes the following:

• Largest ContentfulPaint (LCP):Measures the loading performance of your webpage.
• First Input Delay(FID): Measures the user interaction with the page.
• Cumulative layout Shift: Checks the stability factors of your webpage.

The Accelerated Mobile version (AMP) will also play a major role in the ranking of your page, as will be a metrics for the page experience.

Also, good content will always playalead role in the page ranking.

Asper a statement:

“While all of the components of page experience are important, we will prioritize pages with the best information overall, even if some aspects of page experience are subpar.

A good page experience doesn’t override having great, relevant content. However, in cases where there are multiple pages that have similar content, page experience becomes much more important for visibility in Search.”

Hence, entrepreneurs, startups, and businesses should be well prepared for the new changes.

Every 2020 Google SERP Feature Explained: A VisualGuide

Haveyou ever imagine the amount of traffic Google experience in a minute, month, or year?

Well, here are some fun facts, every second there is an approximate of63,000 search queriesentered on Google search.

Also, near to 2 trillion searches are conducted every year!

Isn’t it amazing? However, you might ask,whydoes it matter?

Let us understand!

Google holds an approximate72% market share of search engines.确保你的网页上列出p of the list of Google search results you must have an understanding of Google SERP (Search Engine Result Page).

What is SERP? And, what all it provides to the advertisers on Google?

The Search Engine Result Page of Google has gone through a lot of changes according to the user view. It has become much more dynamic, relevant, personalized, and helpful.

Now the search engine of Google is equipped with several enhancements that usestructured data.The search page consists of visual enhancement, better index, and optimization for the website. You must be aware of all these changes if you are planning for a better organic ranking for your website.

Here is the new enhancement for the search page of Google:

• Direct answer Box
• Rich Snippet
• Rich cards
• Knowledge Graphs
• Knowledge Panels
• Local Pack
• People also ask
• Image Pack
• Site Links
• Twitter
• Newsbox

You must be equipped with the knowledgeoftheseforbetter resultsinorganic ranking.

Rejoice Small Retailers: Selling Products is Now Free On Google Shopping

MSME’s got adversely affected due to the widespread of COVID-19. Several small and medium scale businesses have lost their source of income due to the sudden breakthrough of this epidemic.

Therefore to make sure that these businesses sustain the effects of the crisis, Google is allowing small retailers to list their products for free on Google Shopping.

Explaining this decision,Bill Ready, President of Commerce at Google citesthe fact that it is difficult for struggling businesses to pay for Google shopping listings at this time.

“And as consumers increasingly shop online, they’re searching not just for essentials but also things like toys, apparel, and home goods.

While this presents an opportunity for struggling businesses to reconnect with consumers, many cannot afford to do so at scale.”

Earlier, Google charged its customers as Pay per click (PPC). It can also be seen as a tactic by Google to compete with Amazon in the market of e-commerce.

Privacy Sandbox By Google Shows Backdoor To The Third-Party Cookies.

Two years ago, Google announced that it will discontinue the usage of third-party cookies in its browser, which is Google Chrome. Since the announcement, several speculations surfaced, to understand its effects on internet traffic and advertisement. However, Google seems determined about the elimination, and this year Google announced “Privacy Sandbox” a step towards the replacement of third-party cookies.

It is developed to provide a secure browsing experience to its user.

According to a spoke person from Google, “This is an early-stage concept, and we don’t have more details to share right now, We plan to publish updates and progress in GitHub as part of the process.”

The concept uses a new algorithm designed by performing“Bit Request Signal Experiment”.

Privacy Sandboxwas launched in August. The idea was to innovate ad recurrence and behavioral advertising. It aimed to help them work on the web without using third-party cookies. A mega event was organized, 163 giant tech organizations like Apple, Facebook, Axel Springer, The Washington Post, Criteo, The Trade Desk, and even Google participated. All are requested to share their views via. World Wide Web Consortium or GitHub to help the project succeed.

然而,根据谷歌开发者,它是still in its initial stage and there is a lot of work that is needed to be done in this field.

Google pledges $800 million to coronavirus relief, including Ad credits

Google CEO Sundar Pichai explained:

“As the coronavirus outbreak continues to worsen around the world, it’s taking a devastating toll on lives and communities. To help address some of these challenges, today we’re announcing a new $800+ million commitment to support small- and medium-sized businesses (SMBs), health organizations and governments, and health workers on the frontline of this global pandemic.”

The commitment includes:

• WHO and other health organizations will get $250 million for advertisement.
• MSME’s and NGO’s will get $200 million.
• An additional $15 million in cash will be granted by Google.org to non-profits to bridge the gap between SMB’s.
• Those small businesses that are already active for a year with Google advertisement will get the help of a total of $340 million in Google ad. They will receive the credit in their accounts and can spend it by the end of 2020.
• The academic and research institutions in the field of COVID research will get $20 million.
• Financial support will be provided to the organizations to increase the production capacity for life-saving equipment.

However, not everything went great for Google during this tough time of COVID:

Google Cuts Marketing Budgets by 50%, Freezes Hiring.

Key Points

• Budget cuts and hiring freezes across marketing and across Google.

• For the second half of 2020, Google is cutting its marketing budget to 50%.

• The cut is due to the reduced expenditure on advertisement by the brands during the time of the crisis.

• The development comes in less than a week from where Google is scheduled to discuss Q1 2020 results on 28th April.

According to a statement released by email:

“There are budget cuts and hiring freezes happening across marketing and across Google…We, along with the rest of marketing, have been asked to cut our budget by about half for H2.”

A company spokesperson said in an emailed statement toCNBC,

“As we outlined last week, we are re-evaluating the pace of our investment plans for the remainder of 2020 and will focus on a select number of important marketing efforts….We continue to have a robust marketing budget, particularly indigital, in many business areas.”

…we continue to invest, but will be recalibrating the focus and pace of our investments in areas like data centers and machines, and non-business essential marketing and travel.”

Google Withhold Programmatic Data, Advertisers Pulls Back Ad Spend

As quoted by Digiday, the Head of Display at the U.S based retailer said,

“Google’s ad exchange didn’t make the list primarily because they’re not willing to give us any transparency or data around not only their take rates on our media sped but also anything we could already pull from our demand-side platform.”

“We’re seeing Google’s ad exchange become slightly less of the total pie,” said Jay Friedman, president at programmatic agency Goodway Group to DigiDay.

”I don’t have a percentage but it’s less but not significant.”, he further added.

The advertisers registered their doubts and raised concerns regarding the non-transparent behavior of Google. However, this must have been resolved after the release of the price list for itsadvertisingtools by Google.

Google Is All Prepared To Compete with Amazon In E-commerce Market.

Google is all set to reveal itsnew initiativeto fight the dominant Amazon in the e-commerce business.

After a series of serious attempts made by Google, to end the monopoly of Amazon in prior consecutive years, that is in 2013, 2014, 2017, and 2019. 2020 seems to be severely crucial as more customers are turning towards the online market every day, due to the COVID virus spread across the world.

Googleannouncementwas a clear indication in the direction of its plans to spread its roots in the online market. Google has declared to charge lesser sales commission from the sellers on its platform and will also let third-party sellers like Shopify to use its platform.

Currently, the commission rates of Google’s online sales platform range from 5 percent to 15 percent depending on thecategoryof the product.

Google might dominate the field of knowledge and information when trying to search for information. But, when it comes to searching and buying goods online, Amazon is the first choice of consumers. Due to consumers’ first choice as e-commerce, Amazon is spreading its wings in the advertisement market, which is a clear threat to Google’s core source of earning.

Google has taken several hits during these years while competing with Amazon. In a seven-year-long battle with Amazon, Google introduced several products to compete with Amazon. However, none of them succeeded. One such attempt at Google wasGoogle Shopping Express! Theservicelaunched in 2013, offered one-day delivery for groceries. The users can take an annual membership for $95 and can avail of faster service. However, Google ended up shutting down the project.

After its failed attempts with Google Shopping Express, Google decided to convert it intoGoogle online Mall. The Google online Mall included retailers like Best Buy and Target. In 2017, Googlepartnered with Walmart.This deal was supposed to bring many fortunes to the Google onlinemarket, but unfortunately, the partnership ended too soon.

However, never giving up Google, added a buy button to its search engine. Theonline-buttonallowed the users to directly purchase the search engine, with the help of their credit and debit cards.

For an effective competition strategy with Amazon, Google brought in Bill Ready. Bill Ready was a former executive at PayPal.

4月宣布之际,一片幸福news for the retailers. Now, retailers can list their products for free on Google online market listing. However, early the sellers had to buy theadsto get their products listed with Google. By this step, Google is expecting to attract hugeaudiences!

Mr. Ready, in an interview, described the position of E-commerce across the world. According to him, there is a wide range of audiences who are shopping online for their needs. Although, there is just a handful of platforms entertaining all of them.

“We want to make sure selling online is easy and inexpensive,” said Mr Ready. Follow

According to Google spokesperson, the changes will be visible to the people in the USA. Those who are already listing products on Amazon can use the same listing on Google, that is, without making any changes to the format.

The aim of Google is to take over Amazon, or at least, for the time being, be the biggest competitor. However is a 20 minutes long conference, Mr Reddy shy out to take the name of their competitor, even for once.

Even when asked the question to name the largest rain forest in South America, Mr, Ready decided to dodge the question.

Although, he stated:

“Consumers benefit from a diverse and thriving ecosystem of sellers.” Adding that, “There is no one player that can serve all the needs of consumers.”