News Analysis

News Analysis 11 Sep 2024 - 5 min read

‘No different to cigarettes and alcohol’: Government cites rising mental health, angst, screen addiction among teens for age ban up to 16 on social media

By Paul McIntyre and editorial team

Six years after a wave of warnings from former top Silicon Valley social media executives and venture capital investors about the damaging effects dopamine-tuned algorithms were having on civics, screen addiction, anxiety and mental health, the Australian government is taking action with new age bans for teen use of social media set to be legislated before the next Federal election in 2025. Led in part by a proposed bill to limit social media access for children under 14 in South Australia by Premier Peter Malinauskas, the Albanese government plans to impose nationwide restrictions on access to social media by teens – the age band is still to be decided but the Prime Minister’s “personal view” is that it should be 16. The Silicon Valley venture capitalist, Roger McNamee, an early investor in Facebook and one-time mentor to Mark Zuckerberg, was part of a long and vocal line-up of big tech identities from Google and Facebook around 2018 who started turning on the companies that made many of them impossibly wealthy. McNamee blamed advertising’s race for consumer attention and the newly discovered tech-psychology tricks that trigger the addictive dopamine neurotransmitter in the brain as a core problem. “The ad models essentially encourage this exploitation of people’s emotions,” he told CNBC at the time. “Science has figured it out – the way you keep people’s attention is you either scare them or you make them angry.” The Federal and South Australian governments are among the first to propose intervention.

News Analysis 9 Sep 2024 - 5 min read

Hidden, more diverse, and with minds made up, buyers in the complex and opaque B2B ecosystem prove more challenging than ever

By Andrew Birmingham - Martech | Ecom |CX Editor

While the memo about brand marketing seems to have finally found its way into the B2B CMO's inbox, the role of the buying ecosystems - called 'buying committees' by Dentsu and 'buying parties' by Green Hat in their respective reports - continues to evolve. The days of the Warrior God B2B buyer in whom all purchasing authority resides are long over. Cue newly empowered millennial executives, who are bringing more than just their newly found purchasing authority to negotiations.

News Analysis 22 Aug 2024 - 5 min read

Galloway and Ritson on CMO extinction and how to avoid it; why TikTok is about to usurp Meta, one streamer will collapse, and looming AI litigation

By Nadia Cameron - Editor - Marketing | Associate Publisher

Scott Galloway says big tech is about to get broken up, Bytedance will usurp Meta within two years and that at least one big streaming service will soon go pop. Meanwhile, he stands by last year's cheery prediction of the death of the CMO by 2025 and, alongside Galloway's keynote at ADMA's Global Forum, virtual professor Mark Ritson offered some clues as to why: Only a third know what marketing's foundational four Ps actually stand for, and just one in six know how to calculate return on ad spend, per a poll he conducted with ADMA. But Galloway offered some tips to CMOs looking to survive his oft-prophesied extinction event – and likewise for publishers now getting fleeced by large language models.

News Analysis Library

News Analysis 28 Oct 2020 - 3 min read

What happens next if Facebook, Google pull from Australia? Think tank says prepare for possibilities

By Paul McIntyre - Executive Editor

Facebook and Google are doing all they can to resist regulation – and their threats to pull news services are rated as “likely” outcomes by two think tanks. While taking the nuclear option and pulling out entirely appears far-fetched, Australia must plan for life without the duopoly in their current form.

News Analysis 26 Oct 2020 - 3 min read

SMI demand signals: Ready meals, snacks, political ads, lottery and consumer electronics suggest ad market growth for October and November

By Josh McDonnell - Senior Writer

Forward ad bookings into the December quarter from Standard Media Index (SMI) suggest the Australian ad market may be set for a decent return in the final quarter of the calendar year. The biggest year-on-year spend increases reflect the national mood as brands more heavily promote ready meals, snacks, lottery tickets, consumer electronics, furniture and insurance. While travel is down, paused product launches are starting to resume and new brand entrants are seeking opportunity to capitalise.

News Analysis 22 Oct 2020 - 6 min read

Catch-up TV: Seven targets 11m user IDs by 2022, woos second party data partners, ‘pauses’ MKR and keeps lid on next cooking show at Upfronts

By Josh McDonnell - Senior Writer

Seven’s first party data catch-up requires it to capture more than 90,000 new user IDs every week from here to February 2022 to hit its goal of 11m signed-in Australians. To bridge the people-based marketing gap, it’s also wooing second party data partners; a credit card provider would be ideal. From a data perspective, the network’s Upfront plans are refreshingly honest. As for programming, with MKR ‘paused’, what does Seven still have cooking?

News Analysis 21 Oct 2020 - 3 min read

Vodafone-TPG: $15bn telco picks indy agency This Is Flow for first post-merger launch with eco-brand Felix

By Josh McDonnell - Senior Writer

Independent media agency This is Flow has won the media account for the new digital-only mobile service Felix. A competitor to Telstra's own budget telco brand Belong, but pushing digital eco credentials, Felix is the first major business to launch following the $15 billion merger between TPG and Vodafone.

News Analysis 21 Oct 2020 - 3 min read

$17bn game face on: Tourism New Zealand GM and ex-Red Bull marketer on turning to Amazon’s Twitch to make gamers virtual tourists

By Josh McDonnell - Senior Writer

Tourism was New Zealand's largest export, representing $17.2bn annually. Covid has brought international tourism spend down to almost zero and left Tourism New Zealand with the daunting task of keeping global travellers engaged in a product that is currently unavailable. Australian GM and former Red Bull marketing boss Andrew Waddel found a winning solution in the online gaming community.

News Analysis 20 Oct 2020 - 3 min read

McDonald’s names new CMO: former DDB Australia chief executive Chris Brown takes over as marketing boss

By Josh McDonnell - Senior Writer

Six years after leaving Australia for New York, former DDB Australia CEO Chris Brown is stepping into his first brand-side role as Vice President and CMO of McDonald's Australia. Two decades with the agency responsible for the brand's creative special sauce should serve him well as McDonald's backs creativity to drive growth.

News Analysis 15 Oct 2020 - 4 min read

28 days later: Why Facebook’s flip-flop on attribution should make advertisers question everything

By Josh McDonnell - Senior Writer

Facebook appears to have pulled the plug on a switch to a seven-day attribution window from its default 28 days. But the tectonic plates of search and social are undeniably shifting – and advertisers and agencies think the whole “arbitrary” equation of who and what contributed to an outcome - and when - requires a fundamental rethink.

News Analysis 14 Oct 2020 - 3 min read

Lowest point in 30 years: Nine's Drive to insert itself into car sales with major e-commerce push as auto brands pump dollars into digital

By Josh McDonnell - Senior Writer

Volvo's marketing boss Julie Hutchinson last year said she had shifted money out of "bottom end of the funnel" media channels like Carsales, CarAdvice and Carsguide to invest more in brand building efforts but the CEO of Nine's auto sites Alex Parsons says a new Covid switch is on from car marketers which are back investing heavily in digital. He's flagged a merger of CarAdvice into Drive next year, focusing squarely on new cars and a bid to insert the revamped Drive platform into the transactional aspects of e-commerce - Parsons argues a "material opportunity" for disruption is on. Market leader carsales.com.au will be watching closely.

News Analysis 12 Oct 2020 - 3 min read

Recruitment returns: Agencies scramble for digital and mid-tier talent after aggressive Covid “housekeeping“

By Josh McDonnell - Senior Writer

Recruiters say agencies are scrambling for digital skills as the market attempts to recalibrate following Covid cuts that may have been too deep. Some are hiring via Zoom and Teams without actually meeting in person and there is a particular need for mid-tier talent with both traditional and digital expertise. Meanwhile, media owners are also beefing up sales departments in anticipation of growth.