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Q&A With Greg Jackson, Chief Data Officer, Everyday Health Inc. on Cross-Platform Advertising
This Q&A is part of OPA’s “Three on Three” series where we ask three industry executives the same three questions on a topic to uncover actionable insights… If you want to learn more, keep an eye out on our site for more interviews. Today’s Three on Three interview is with Greg Jackson, Chief Data Officer, Everyday Health Inc. on the subject of cross-platform advertising.
Q: What is the biggest hurdle in creating, selling and delivering cross-platform advertising initiatives?
A:The biggest challenge in cross-platform communication is the accurate and timely linking of users’ attributes across devices. Many publishers have the capability to personalize an experience or target advertising to specific segments within a single platform. However, without a mechanism to identify the same user as they migrate between devices, the continuity of content and advertising messaging, as well as, measurement is lost.
At Everyday Health, user registration provides the foundation for our cross-channel attribution. With over 65 million users and a third of all US physicians registered on our properties, we are able to bring together an individual’s activity and interests to provide a seamless targeting platform for content and marketing.
Similar to Pandora personalizing a music experience, Everyday Health personalizes health content. An Everyday Health registered user specifies their initial health interests, and our content personalization engine begins customizing their experience on site and in newsletters, regardless of the access device. As a user provides feedback into what they like or don’t like, the targeting algorithm becomes further refined for a better, more relevant experience that delivers higher engagement.
The same applies to the user targeting capabilities we provide our advertising partners. As a user migrates between devices, our registration data and shared ad serving platform, facilitate the continuity of a marketer’s campaign. More importantly, we are able to measure the impact of those campaigns on a user’s offline behavior for true ROI measurement.
All of this is made possible by a singular data platform that provides a holistic view of a user’s interests and activities and a capacity to leverage that information in real-time across platforms. At Everyday Health, we have invested well over $100 million to aggregate and engage our registered audience with personalized content and marketing because relevancy matters.
Q: Describe one of your recent or forthcoming cross-platform advertising campaigns that you think is particularly innovative or successful.
A:We believe that every digital campaign is a cross-platform campaign regardless of whether it’s intended or not. Users will access content whenever, wherever and on whatever device they want and it is our job as digital publishers and marketers to migrate our messaging across these platforms. We deliver most campaigns to the target user agnostic to platform, instead optimizing for engagement and offline impact.
Everyday Health has been delivering cross-platform solutions in digital for over ten years, and are now beginning a new cross-platform integration between digital and TV. We have matched our health audience to set-top box data to better understand the TV programming that specific user segments are watching. We are now working with a major pharmaceutical company to concentrate their TV marketing to those stations and programs where their target audience over-indexes. While 1:1 addressable TV at scale is still developing, this new audience-centric approach across TV and digital platforms will amplify the media dollar impact of both channels and deliver ROI improvement.
Q: How do you approach the cross-platform sale organizationally?
A:Our sales team is solution oriented, not aligned by channel. We understand that a marketer’s key objective is to inform and motivate their target audience to take action. It’s our responsibility to know our audience, provide engaging solutions across devices, and then optimize delivery based on the real behavior impact each is having. To be successful at this, we cannot be constrained by channel silos but instead leverage the best delivery mechanism for driving consumers to take action.
As audiences become more mobile, marketers are beginning to acknowledge the need for cross-platform buys. The channel specific agencies, budgets, and strategies are beginning to converge and our investment in audience, data and platform will insure we can successfully support their objectives for the future.
Greg Jackson is the Chief Data Officer for Everyday Health. As CDO, Jackson is responsible for establishing data acquisition and utilization strategies for the firm and he is directly responsible for the company’s Precision Health Data Institute. Jackson also oversees Health Reach, the company’s off-portfolio targeted media solution. Prior to joining Everyday Health, Jackson served as President and CMO of Fathead. He has 20+ years’ experience in operations management and direct marketing, with a focus on cross-channel marketing, user engagement and lifetime value optimization, and audience monetization.
Note: This Q&A is part of OPA’s “Three on Three” series where we ask three industry executives the same three questions on a topic to uncover actionable insights.
Also in this series:
Q&A with Rachelle Considine, President Future US, on Cross-Platform Advertising
Forbes Brand Licensing is Upwardly Mobile
Brand licensing might seem like a no-brainer in the media business. However for others to want to hitch their idea to your brand, you need to have one that is recognizable for all the right reasons. You also need to make smart decisions about which licensing deals will work for you in more than just the financial sense. Forbes Media COO Mike Federle says that while he was brought into the company two and a half years ago to do the usual operational stuff expected of a COO, his “primary focus is on business development and leveraging the brand to develop new, non-advertising revenue.”
And he’s been doing just that. His latest licensing deal grants Lotaris SA the rights to the name Forbes Digital Commerce, which provides mobile payment-based services and solutions to various industry sectors. Announced at Mobile World Congress, this arrangement associates the Forbes brand with mobile payments, which is a win on all counts according to Federle. In addition to the up-front licensing payment and annual royalties based on the total revenue of Forbes Digital Commerce, he says “On the brand level, we think this is a great place to be, given that mobile is such an important business tool.”
There are three primary questions in Federle’s litmus test for analyzing potential brand-licensing deals:
1. Does it fit the brand?
2. Is this a reputable partner?
3. Can this opportunity scale?
It is essential to develop a solid criteria for maintaining hard-won brand equity. The issue of scale is also significant, “We turn down a lot of opportunities because they aren’t big enough. We are focusing on bigger plays. Mobile is a much bigger business.”
As is Real Estate, which Federle points to as another example of brand-licensing that passed his litmus test. Last year, the company worked with Century Properties group in the Philippines to build the world’s first “Forbes Media Tower.” That move heralded the “beginning of a Real Estate Play in Asia,” which associates the brand with booming markets and high-end business developments.
As Forbes magazine might council its readers, Federle says Forbes Media must “align with where the future is going.” And the future is undoubtedly mobile. “What is happening at Forbes and throughout the industry, is that our digital business has grown very large. And over the last year, we see approximately 30% of our traffic at Forbes.com coming from Mobile devices, up from about 25% the previous year. We know that in media, and business in general, there’s huge and rapid transitioning over to mobile.”
However one particularly appealing aspect of the Forbes Digital Commerce deal was its association with mobile payments. “Mobile is already big. Where the real takeoff will be is when we get rid of the friction that is in the system now, and we want to be part of a solution that helps create a seamless flow—across carriers, currencies and borders.”
Q&A with Peter Longo, CEO IDG TechNetwork & CDO IDG Communications, on Premium Programmatic
This Q&A is part of OPA’s “Three on Three” series where we ask three industry executives the same three questions on a topic to uncover actionable insights… If you want to learn more, keep an eye out on our site for more interviews. Today’s Three on Three interview is with Peter Longo, CEO IDG TechNetwork & CDO IDG Communications on the subject of “Premium Programmatic” advertising.
Q: How would you define premium programmatic as it compares to what we’ve come to know as “programmatic advertising”?
A:Quite honestly, the definition is constantly changing. What we thought was programmatic two years ago, and what we thought it was six months ago, and where it is today are all very different. As advertisers continue to experiment, this definition is going to keep shifting. Ask me in a month what it means.
When we talk about premium programmatic at IDG Communications, part of it has to do with how the inventory is positioned and structured, and part the advertisers we deal with. At IDG TechNetwork, premium programmatic actually competes with our direct-sold inventory. However, while our IDG owned and operated brands such as Computerworld and CIO still have brand-specific reps, for the IDG TechNetwork, we have combined teams so that advertisers can deal with the same rep much of the time.
We position premium programmatic the same way we do all of our sales: What is the audience you are trying to reach, what are the campaign parameters, and how can we best deliver results? The conversation starts the same way we’ve always approached it. We talk about their objectives, who they are trying to reach and what they are trying to achieve.
Q: Describe the way in which your organization handles programmatic?
A:Five years ago, we decided to create our TechNetwork, which includes more than 500 publisher sites, as a way to provide scale to our owned and operated business. Three years ago, we decided to go into programmatic because, as a network, we had a lot of programmatic at our disposal and wanted to deal with it effectively.
The way we use premium programmatic gives us the ability to create micro audiences at scale. For example, say an advertiser wants to reach people interested in cloud computing at companies with more than 500 employees. With data and programmatic, you can build a sizeable audience even for something really targeted. Now we’ve got our owned and operated sites and the network inventory combine that with first-party data, and that gives us a demand-side platform so we can buy programmatically, as well increase the size of these audiences.
The data makes a big difference. It allows us to create this micro audience and use creative rotation to deliver the most value. When an impression is served, we factor in what we know about the person behind the impression: Have they visited our sites? Have they read any articles that are part of our product suite? Have they visited our shopping cart? This information lets us figure out where they are in the buying cycle so we can serve the right ad, be that one that is for someone just starting to research or someone ready to make a purchase decision.
The ability to use first-party data also keeps us from undercutting display. The advertiser can be specific about who they are targeting. So, we build value back into the chain programmatically. At the end of the day, it is a very specific way of doing advertising. If there is value, we’ll maintain our CPMs because, with programmatic, there’s not a lot of places to hide.
Q: What types of marketing initiatives lend themselves best to leveraging programmatic, and what advice would you give publishers weighing programmatic pros and cons?
A:We’ve done a ton of direct response in premium programmatic. It goes back to the very specific audience, a very specific individual or group—those are the ones that work best. We don’t see it used much for general branding campaigns.
The value of programmatic always comes back to reaching a very specific profile at scale. Marketers are looking for efficiencies and results. One of the great things about programmatic is that you know almost instantly how something is performing and, as a publisher, you have a lot of flexibility to adjust the audience you are targeting.
I realize there’s still some hesitation on the part of publishers to incorporate programmatic into the mix but I would encourage them to continue to test it and to evaluate pricing models as well. The biggest fear among publishers is that programmatic is going to devalue pricing. Do some testing around performance. You can build a lot of value back into the pool with data mining.
Keep in mind that programmatic can dramatically expand the audience you offer your advertisers, and it can put you back in control because you can be the arbiter of what is good on the web.
Peter Longo is the CEO of IDG TechNetwork Chief Digital Officer of IDG Communications. Longo, who joined IDG six years ago, has built IDG TechNetwork into the leading tech vertical ad network and exchange and has defined and led IDG’s data-driven strategy. In 2013, Longo assumed added responsibilities as IDG’s first Chief Digital Officer. In that role, Longo oversees all digital operations in IDG’s U.S. media subsidiary, IDG Communications, including ad operations, development of creative systems and functionality, demand generation, branding, video, and mobile. Longo brought to IDG a 20 year career in media sales and senior management. He began his career at CMP Media but in 1991 moved to Ziff Davis Media where he held several executive positions. Longo rose from associate publisher to publisher, group publisher, and executive vice president with titles such as PC Magazine, PC Week/eWeek, and Computer Shopper. In 2003, he joined Zinio, first as executive vice president and then rose to president at the digital magazine provider.
Note: This Q&A is part of OPA’s “Three on Three” series where we ask three industry executives the same three questions on a topic to uncover actionable insights.
Also in this series:
Q&A with Neil Johnston, Cox’s EVP of Strategy & Digital Innovation on Premium Programmatic
Q&A with Chip Schenck, VP/Programmatic Sales & Strategy, Meredith on Premium Programmatic
Q&A With Jeff Misenti, Chief Digital Officer, Fox News on Cross-Platform Advertising
What do Travolta, Weiner and Romney Have in Common? Good Smart Fun.
Covering everything from political scandal and civil unrest to technology and pop culture, Slate satisfies its audience with its highly intelligent and wholly irreverent perspective on just about everything. Slate is a go-to for an insightful take on the topics du jour. But it feels a lot more like a friend who finds humor in almost any situation than a dogmatic professor. Apparently you can discuss Romulans and the Big Bang on the same page as The Poetry of the Cosmos and Putin’s Invasion of Ukraine. Who knew?
Slate editor David Plotz, for one. In fact, he says Slate makes a conscious effort to hire staff who “are serious about their subjects, but also witty. It is core to our brand to be smart, analytical and funny.”
Funny is exactly the right word to describe John Travolta’s Oscar night name-mangling of Broadway singer Idina Menzel as “Adele Dazeem.” We’ve all mispronounced names, though generally not with 43 million ardently-engaged viewers watching. Jokes were bound to ensue. But back at the Slate office, Monday morning joking turned into Monday afternoon pageview gold.
According to Plotz, Slate video producer Jim Festante came up with the The Adele Dazeem Name Generator and Slate interactive editor Chris Kirk, “a coder with journalistic DNA and a good wit” brought it to life — to the tune of nine million page views and counting. In fact, it is Slate’s most-viewed content to date. The widget, says Plotz, “blew up like nothing we have ever seen.”
While it can be tempting to look at the success of the name generator and try to mimic it, and equally tempting to enter the names of anyone you know (which will likely extend well beyond your lunch break), not every story needs a widget. One size does not fit all. Nor, it seems, does any set formula. The fact that Slate was “born digital” affords it unprecedented editorial flexibility. Likening his decision-making process to Michelangelo’s (tongue just barely in cheek) Plotz says, “I cut away all the pieces that don’t look like David.”
Sometimes, that takes the shape of an award-winning article. And sometimes, of a wildly-popular widget. The trick to knowing how to tackle a Slate story, it seems is “treasuring the relationship with [its] audience, which is very devoted and very smart.”
It is also about the relationship between technology and journalism. “Journalism, for a digital publication,” says Plotz, “is intrinsically an interaction between the words and the medium. Sometimes that means an 18,000 word story and sometimes that means a generator.”
Like Slate “generators” before it — which include the Carlos Danger Name Generator (“Get a name like Anthony Weiner’s alleged sexting pseudonym”) and the Mitt Romney Income Generator (“How long would it take the GOP candidate to earn what you make in a year?”) — The Adele Dazeem Name Generator leverages editorial wit with digital agility and technological acumen to create interactive experiences that are naturally social. This latest widget success has already garnered five million referrals from Facebook and 43,000 tweets.
“Our Oscars coverage was extensive, with a dozen or maybe 20 stories coming out of it. Like the rest of the audience, we saw this super funny moment and sometimes you need to do something quick. Fish gotta swim, right? It just seemed so natural.”
Discovery Digital Networks Growth Fueled by Staff Superfans
Discovery Digital Networks is feeling the love from its audience more than ever. The web-native portfolio, which is made up of four original video networks – Revision3, TestTube, Animalist and the DeFranco Network – has increased views and audience 400% since Revision3 joined the Discovery Communications family in May 2012. An increased focus on video has been a key factor in the growth. Today, fans across these four digital networks are consuming, on average, 160 million video views each month and, in social circles, the communities are stronger than ever – with 35 million followers and 14 million Facebook fans.
Discovery’s digital-native portfolio has driven its growth the ‘Discovery way,’ with highly curated, premium content. Content that Discovery owns. Great storytelling is at the heart of the programming, led by show hosts who are as authentic as the content itself. It’s the relationship between the show host and each community that drives engagement.
In fact, according to the latest Discovery Digital Networks’ Audience Survey, the most compelling driver of views and social interaction is the fact that Discovery hosts are, themselves “superfans of their brands, the network and its content,” according to Suzanne McDonnell, SVP of Sales Strategy & Client Solutions at Discovery Communications.
According to Discovery’s research, the authenticity of its hosts is at the core of why its content resonates with fans and advertisers alike. As McDonnell puts it, “our hosts are experts not actors. They are born of the communities that they represent.” This affinity between the shows’ fans and the equally engaged hosts has inspired the programming.
Comments from survey respondents made this sentiment clear: “The Rev3Games team comes across as honest professional[s] that actually play and enjoy games…You are critics, yes, but you also have a love for gaming.” Of Hak5, a respondent said “I think it is the personalities that make it top notch. They really seem to be enjoying themselves.” And one DNews viewer said “I feel just like I’m listening to a friend talk.”
Discovery Digital Networks found that 97% of viewers are very/somewhat satisfied with the host’s personality and 92% with the host’s expertise. This fact, says McDonnell, keeps the network focused on “a hosted-show model around which we build passionate communities.”
The power of highly curated, premium programing, led by authentic hosts, extends itself to advertisers as well. Discovery’s research found that 64% of respondents feel that brands featured within the network programs are usually a good fit with the show/channel, and 50% have more confidence in brands featured within the programming. “Viewers trust Discovery Digital Networks to feature brands that are relevant to them. Viewers’ highly favorable opinions of our content adds a halo effect to brands featured within the content,” says McDonnell. “That presents unparalleled opportunity for advertisers to join the conversation and become a member of these communities.”
Video Convergence: Buying, Selling and Trusting Across Platforms
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Q&A with Chip Schenck, VP/Programmatic Sales & Strategy, Meredith on Premium Programmatic
This Q&A is part of OPA’s “Three on Three” series where we ask three industry executives the same three questions on a topic to uncover actionable insights… If you want to learn more, keep an eye out on our site for more interviews. Today’s Three on Three interview is with Chip Schenck, VP/Programmatic Sales & Strategy, Meredith on the subject of “Premium Programmatic” advertising.
Q: How would you define Premium Programmatic as it compares to what we’ve come to know as “Programmatic Advertising”?
A:Premium Programmatic is a combination of both a change in sales process/dialogue and packaging of inventory, vs what we have seen previously as standard programmatic. Standard programmatic can be defined as machine to machine buying/selling automation. Where previously, standard programmatic inventory had various shades of transparency with little differentiation in available inventory and no real human interaction—what we call “dials only”—as part of the selling and transaction process, programmatic premium is typically direct sold, human negotiated, uniquely packaged and made up of limited availability inventory, with much greater levels of transparency between buyer and seller.
The simple answer? Programmatic premium is directly sold/personally negotiated but programmatically executed. For buyers, the opportunity is higher value inventory, depending on how you define “higher value.” This might mean earlier look, higher in the frequency curve, specific inventory, audience enriched, etc. It could mean a better environment versus the open exchange, better brand performance, etc.
Q: Describe the way in which your organization handles programmatic?
A: We are approaching the market with a unified sales vision, and a focus on leveraging data in all of our sales channels: Ideally, programmatic and sponsorship dollars working together to support a creative idea will drive better consumer engagement for a client’s campaign, and so we want our sales efforts to be unified where possible. However, not everyone is buying that way, and so will also be able to service parallel paths—sponsorship only and programmatic only—until such time as planning/buying is more holistic.
When more than half of the Advertising Trading Desks s in the market have built a ‘transition’ or ‘liaison’ team between the traditional digital agency and the programmatic agency/ATD to bet better aligned, that is a signal that buying methodologies will change. We look at this as a positive trend for the industry because it moves the conversation towards total value for the client and the publisher, and understanding how each channel can benefit a client’s plan, rather than a focus on price sensitivity or efficiency alone.
Q: What types of marketing initiatives lend themselves best to leveraging programmatic and how can the premium approach better deliver?
A:Programmatic has been used to deliver a lot of direct response campaigns in the past because it was so price driven. However, leveraging the incredible targeting capabilities, the transparency of placement, contextual adjacency when desired, the halo effect from a strong consumer media brand, and the benefits of efficient media, any form of communication can work programmatically. It can successfully drive KPI’s including awareness and reach for the upper funnel; inspiration and intention for the mid funnel; and trial and transaction for the lower funnel. Premium programmatic offers the best mix of pricing efficiency, targeting, reach and scale, while still getting the safety and engagement of trusted contextual environments.
Charles “Chip” Schenck is the VP of Programmatic Sales and Strategy at Meredith Corporation and responsible for helping clients leverage data and insights across Meredith’s Digital Network, for execution across all platforms and channels. Schenck joined Meredith Digital from PubMatic where he served as VP/Publisher Development. In addition, Schenck has held senior leadership positions with a diverse range of media companies including serving as VP/Integrated Sales & Development for American Express Publishing; Associate Publisher for In Touch Weekly; and Managing Director of Sales and Marketing for Hearst-Stratosfera.
Note: This Q&A is part of OPA’s “Three on Three” series where we ask three industry executives the same three questions on a topic to uncover actionable insights.
Also in this series:
Q&A with Neil Johnston, Cox’s EVP of Strategy & Digital Innovation on Premium Programmatic
FreeWheel Video Monetization Report Q4 2013
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AccuWeather Makes Another Social Connection With Launch of BBM Channel
AccuWeather has launched a branded BBM Channel to extend its social connection to weather fans. The company, which has a longstanding relationship with Blackberry, has joined the ranks of brands such as Time and Disney in creating its own dedicated BBM Channel. The new AccuWeather BBM Channel will offer a range of breaking weather information, including severe weather updates, breaking stories, local weather images, radar and more, which Blackberry Messaging (BBM) subscribers can access across mobile platforms.
AccuWeather timed its Channel release to coincide with last week’s expansion of BBM when Blackberry announced an update to BBM for all users as well as making Blackberry’s private social network available to iPhone and Android smartphone users. AccuWeather’s Coordinator of Social Media Jesse Ferrell says that the move made sense to extend the brand’s mobile and social reach, “BlackBerry has a huge audience who is always connected and online, and we are thrilled to be able to interact with that audience through this Social channel.”
BBM Channels is Blackberry’s social engagement platform that works within BBM. It allows people to connect with the businesses, brands, celebrities and groups of interest. It also lets users engage in in conversation around content in a similar fashion to Twitter and Facebook while providing brands with integrated monitoring and measurement tools.
“Social Media in general helps AccuWeather inform its audience about inclement weather, while reinforcing the brand,” says Ferrell. Though the audience may overlap with other social channels on which AccuWeather is already active, Ferrell says that delivering content within the context of Blackberry Messaging will extend the reach of its weather related information to an audience that might not yet be as familiar with what the AccuWeather brand offers. And, as Ferrell points out, “Because of its real-time and local nature, weather is always a win on Social Media.”