News Analysis

Google created programs to make advertisers pay more for ads while paying publishers less by deliberately adjusting ad prices over a decade, a major US lawsuit alleges. Here's how US states claim the monopoly fleeced brands and publishers around the world.

The annual rate and volume tango between advertisers, agency groups and media owners is in full swing with a new front opening up from media buying groups pressing media owners on their environmental and social governance [ESG] positions and policies.

The TV networks are talking a good game as their cash cow, linear television broadcasting, faced an exodus of viewers in the past eight weeks and a return to long-term declines as NSW and Victorian lockdowns eased.

Major reform of Australia’s privacy laws appear set to clamp down on how advertisers can use location data, a change that would have profound impacts on the mobile and Out of Home industries. It’s early days, but first movers are already moving – JCDecaux is looking closely at how location data changes would bite, and others are turning to anonymous “pings” that determine location from firms like Meshh.

Mi3 has compiled a selection of Australia's top marketers and their tenure - along with some quick insights from some of them on what it takes in modern marketing to stay in the chair. It's not exhaustive, yet, but we'll expand and update quarterly. The top four? Leading the league is Mazda's Marketing Director Alastair Doak, a former journalist, topping 14 years with the auto brand. SCA's Chief Marketing & Communications Director Nikki Clarkson follows on 12 years with the broadcast and digital media group, and Joel Goodsir, Head of Marketing at Inspirations Paint, takes third spot approaching ten years. Auto & General's (Budget Direct) Jonathan Kerr is about to clock-up nine years with the insurance firm. Check out the League Table below.  

Two airlines and a posse of Australia's top creative firms are preparing for a new battle royale next year when domestic and international borders open up and they skirmish for bums on seats - literally. Virgin Australia was acquired by US private equity firm Bain Capital last year and is positioning itself to Australians as a new mid-tier carrier sitting between Qantas and Jetstar. It has just appointed independent agency Special Group to lead the charge. Qantas, meanwhile, appointed Accenture Interactive's widely regarded creative agency, The Monkeys, acquired for $63 million in 2017, to create an international brand campaign slated to launch early next year. Game on.   

The marketing and advertising industry's wholesale adoption of cookie consent pop-ups, designed by the IAB Europe to meet GDPR compliance on privacy, appears to have been entirely wayward and about to to be outlawed, sending brand owners, media companies and tech players scrambling. The move by European regulators comes just as Australia is set to face even tougher GDPR rules proposed in the Federal government's privacy review, released two weeks ago, which has been met with ambivalence by some parts of the industry.      

Surging global interest in advertising attention measurement from marketers, media and agency networks is forcing an industry-wide rethink of legacy “tonnage” metrics like audience impressions and viewability, which give blunt but often misleading signals about how ad impact and effectiveness is landing with consumers.

Global adtech investors turned on the sector about five years ago and fled. But now VC and private equity funds are back with big investment appetites and Australian ventures which broadly fall into driving the structural shifts across advertising, customer data, demand prediction and analytics are seeing a renewed surge in investment attention.