#RebateGate. The Advertiser-Agency Disconnect. Conflict of Interest. Part 3: Transparency and AdoptoMedia Platform

As we have previously covered here and here, the 2016 “RebateGate” proved to be a wake-up call for the advertising industry enshrouded in non-transparency, and uncovered the disconnect between the advertisers and their agencies in regards to the very nature of their relationship. The Association of National Advertisers, which commissioned the renowned K2 Intelligence Report, was quick to lend a helping hand to advertisers who found themselves at a loss as to how to cut their losses and recuperate. Published in July 2016 and updated to version 2.0 in July 2018, ANA’s template Master Media Buying Services agreement is part of the overall set of ANA’s Guidelines for best practice and is meant to serve as a blueprint for transparent regulation of the Advertiser-Agency relationship, ultimately aimed at rebuilding trust and confidence between the two parties. The advertiser-agency media management practices require full disclosure as their cornerstone principle. Seeing how many agencies have blurred the lines, the contract between the parties has to precisely define the nature of their relationship. Whether it be that the agency acts as the client’s agent or the principal in its own right, there should always be a contractually prescribed ability for the advertiser to… Read more »

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#RebateGate. The Advertiser-Agency Disconnect. Conflict of Interest. Part 2: Nature of Relationship

The 2016 research on media transparency in the US market by K2 Intelligence and the Association of National Advertisers was fundamental in shedding light on the status quo as pertains to how advertisers and agencies see their respective roles in their relationship. On the advertiser’s part it would seem quite natural to expect the agency to act in their former’s best interests. As outlined in the “Transparency Guiding Principles of Conduct” issued by 4A’s in January 2016, “The default principle in all client/agency relationships where the agency is agent and the client is principal is full disclosure and full transparency in media planning and buying, unless there is an exception that the client has agreed to in advance and is covered by a separate agreement. Further, the client/agency agreement should specify that the client is the principal and the agency is the agent. However, the same Guiding Principles also make mention of the agency’s ability to also act as principal: “The agency should always ensure that the client clearly understands the nature, implications and benefits of any opt-in products and services, including disclosed and non-disclosed models. These should be documented with an opt-in agreement, with a clear explanation of any… Read more »

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#RebateGate. The state of non-transparency. Part 1: the K2 Intelligence report.

In 2016 the marketing industry community was shaken by a major event with potentially massive and all-encompassing repercussions. Aptly named “RebateGate”, the cataclysm was caused by an eye-opening report on media transparency in the advertising industry. The independent research behind it was commissioned by the Association of National Advertisers (“ANA”) and conducted by K2 Intelligence LLC (“K2”), leading the fact-finding part of the study. Addressing the study’s results, Ebiquity/FirmDecisions (“Ebiquity”) partnered with K2 to develop specific applicable advice and recommendations to help advertisers adjust to this newfound information and address the potential blind spots. Throughout the process, K2 put out requests for interviews, reaching out to 281 sources, finally conducting 143 interviews with 150 separate sources, which amounted to a cross-section representation of how the United States’ media buying ecosystem operates. Throughout the study, all of the interviewed participants’ identities were kept secret from both the ANA and Ebiquity, including all the individuals and corporate entities named in the sources’ accounts. Additionally K2 held full authority over the methodologies the study team applied, also having editorial control over how the report was eventually presented. What K2 realized was that within that sample they studied, there were pervasive non-transparent business practices. Out of the 117 sources… Read more »

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Visiting StartUp Day

StartUp Day is a major Baltic business event that unites the business community and the start-ups. Here, experts from various fields and emerging entrepreneurs can discuss business at its different stages. Visiting miscellaneous seminars, talks and workshops included in the event’s primary line-up allows young businesspeople to gain inspiration and experience from the strongest and most established companies. Investments, smart production, cutting-edge technology are all major topics discussed at StartUp Day. AdoptoMedia did not just take part in StartUp Day but ranked in top 10 best projects of the Baltic region. At the event’s final section, the company CEO Alexey Kuznetcov talked to international experts and investors from Finland and Estonia about AdoptoMedia’s flagship product, a software suite for allocating budgets among different advertising channels. It can calculate an optimum marketing budget depending on the client company’s goals or financial capacity, as well as the current economic situation. The talk briefly touched on  AdoptoMedia’s existing achievements, major clients, technology in-use and the upcoming plans.”2017 was all about preparing for expanding internationally, handling all that pertains to intellectual property, localizing the product and forming partnerships with representatives from Italy, Germany and Israel. Entering those markets will allow the company to increase capitalization over… Read more »

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Visiting Content Israel

Content Israel is a conference aimed at researching content marketing technologies. Among its participants are international and local agencies, start-ups and major brands. The conference discusses various content marketing strategies, hosts workshops based around case study results and provides a venue for the best speakers from international companies such as SodaStream, The Guardian, Cisco, 3m and Linkedin, among others. Content Israel itself encourages participants from different countries, such as the US, Israel, the UK and others, to share in the experience and gain knowledge needed to expand their businesses.  AdoptoMedia was also represented at Content Israel in the fall of 2017. AdoptoMedia is an international start-up company with branches in Israel and Estonia. The company’s primary area of expertise is advertising budget optimization based on various technologies that include attribution and econometric modeling. At the Content Israel round table, AdoptoMedia executives discussed with other participants the matters of content influencing overall advertising efficiency, and in particular, the impact of creative materials. The abovementioned econometric modeling approach employed by AdoptoMedia, allows for baseline use of creatives as an efficiency-impacting factor. The influence of creatives is evaluated using specific metrics, focus groups and neuro kit-based research being the most popular. Focus groups are best applied when a creative approach is… Read more »

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Digital Out-of-Home Advertising for a Shopping Mall Network

Digital out-of-home advertising (DOOH) has long since become a part of the urban infrastructure. Having gone a long way from their humble beginnings as lightboxes to today’s interactive media, DOOH screens are now superstable. The owner of a network of shopping malls in Croatia wanted to expand his offer and strengthen the power and value of its coverage. To that end, it was essential to set up high-quality and low-end outdoor displays with the options of purchase cost estimation, comprehensive remote health status supervision and tech support. On the initial stage it was crucial to establish a critical-mass network of 23 large-format all-weather outdoor digital screens. Most of the units are double-face totems, while the rest are wall-mounted 75” screens. All of units were placed at the most frequent passerby areas all across the country, covering all major Croatian city centers. This was important to access ATL (Above the line) advertising budgets and attract big brand advertisers. Three different types of units were chosen to cover all the districts and satisfy the local municipalities — primarily double-side screens with ultra-high-brightness 2,500-nit LCD panels. These unique HVAC driven units were expected to deliver many years of high-quality performance and minimal downtime…. Read more »

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AdoptoMedia besuchte Smau Milano

Im Oktober 2017 versammelten sich in Mailand über 250 Unternehmen aus verschiedenen Ländern, die im Bereich der Innovationen tätig sind. AdoptoMedia war auf der Smau Milano 2017 mit CEO Alexey Kuznetsov und Marketingleiterin Kristina Pustovit vertreten. Smau ist eine internationale Ausstellung für Informations- und Kommunikationstechnik, die 1964 ins Leben gerufen wurde. Ihr Ziel ist es, neueste digitale Lösungen der Öffentlichkeit zu präsentieren. Anlässlich der Smau erzählte Kristina Pustovit mehr über das Unternehmen AdoptoMedia, seinen Tätigkeitsbereich und seine Teilnahme an der Ausstellung.   Guten Tag, Kristina! Geben Sie uns doch bitte zunächst einen Einblick in das aktuelle Thema der Smau Milano und Ihr Produkt, welches Sie dort vorgestellt haben. Die aktuelle Smau Milano wurde der Digitalisierung des Marketings gewidmet. Das Hauptproblem bei der Arbeit mit Offline- und Online-Kanälen ist die Komplexität ihrer Messung. Wir wissen, wie man Online-Kanäle bewerten kann, es gibt dafür spezielle Metriken und Analysetools. Wenn es jedoch um Offline-Werbung geht, ist nicht immer klar, wie man solche Messungen durchführen und deren Wirksamkeit auswerten kann. Die technologische Lösung CheckMedia Solution, die von AdoptoMedia entwickelt wurde, ermöglicht es, Budgets zwischen Werbekanälen zu verteilen. Die Hauptaufgabe unseres Produkts ist die Vereinigung der Offline- und Online-Kanäle in einem einheitlichen Modell, deren Vergleich… Read more »

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Case Study: Automating the Work of an Ad Agency

Major ad agencies operate an extensive number of ad projects. A client’s single ad campaign can include upwards of 10,000 ad media. Large-scale campaigns require smart planning with account for all the nuances pertaining to the purchase of ad inventory, and proper gathering of all reports and documents once the placements expire. Characteristics of a major ad agency How do major ad agencies operate, specifically? Many clients: the agency managers service over 100 clients; Ads are bought in more than 100,000 media units annually; The agency has about 70 employees; The agency works with more than 870 contractors; Ads are placed in more than 650 cities, while different employees handle the buying in different cities; The overall process of media planning, buying, placement and closing of an ad campaign involves employees from different departments: – client service managers handling client support; – buying managers handling the media buying; – the document control or accounting department responsible for the closing of deals. This results in the following difficulties: the approval process takes a long time, since all matters are discussed and handled via email, both internally and when operating with clients and contractors; the launch of an ad campaign consists of multiple… Read more »

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The Case of Universal Pictures

Advertising is what drives commerce, prompting even the widely established companies to think about how better to communicate their new products to the audience. Good advertising is not necessarily expensive — even the simplest media can often have a strong impact. One of such is the poster. Universal Studios, also known as Universal Pictures, is a film-producing subsidiary of the NBC Universal media group and one of the largest and oldest US film studios. In 2013 and 2015, Universal Pictures promoted numerous feature films through a variety of channels. In order to establish the impact media has on film audiences, the media agency Mindshare compiled a comprehensive econometric modeling. The goal was to evaluate the influence of different media formats (poster, TV, online, print, infoscreen + public video, radio, ambient) on the number of viewers of the advertised Universal feature films, establish the efficiency of these ad formats and determine the return on investment (ROI). Advertising posters and billboards were placed on public streets, main passenger stations, motorways, the subway and its vicinity. The analysis was based on the following modeling approach: 1. Elaborate models for each specific film: verification of the dependency between Google's search index of various UPI films and media use. 2. Visitor count:… Read more »

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Visiting SMAU Milano 2017

Smau is an International Exhibition of Information and Communication Technology that has been held since 1964. The idea behind it is to present cutting-edge solutions in digital technology to a wide audience. Smau Milano took place in October 2017. More than 250 innovative international companies presented their products in a space of 22,000 square feet. At Smau Milano 2017, AdoptoMedia was represented by CEO Alexey Kuznetcov and marketing director Kristina Pustovit. Kristina will now tell more about the company, its field and on taking part in the exhibition. Kristina, good afternoon! First off, could you please tell about the theme behind Smau Milano and the product you were presenting? Discussions at Smau Milano mainly had to do with marketing digitalization. The main issue with operating offline and online channels at the same time is how difficult it is to measure them both at once. Performing estimations for online advertising, on the one hand, is a rather streamlined process, since there are dedicated metrics and analysis tools. However, when working with offline ads, there is no one clear method for doing such measurements and estimating efficiency. An advanced solution, developed by AdoptoMedia, enables you to allocate budgets among advertising channels. Consolidating offline and… Read more »

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