Identity: Topics silver lining, NewsPassID passes pilot phase, and LiveRamp-Pubmatic solution

An article from Digiday this week highlighted the potential silver lining of Topics API, including the power of publisher first party data, specifically served via publisher-provided IDs.  Whilst publishers tend to keep their PPIDs within their own systems to avoid data leakage, Google is offering to be the middleman to make them more usable across programmatic though some are apprehensive:

Once that data starts flowing into other parts of Google’s ad tech stack like the demand-side platform or ad exchange then the worry is it gets harder to control — especially for a business that makes most of its money outside of open auctions.

Digiday

Meanwhile; in the US, NewsPassID passed its pilot phase with the Local Media Consortium’s initial results suggesting that their use of the ID in open programmatic auctions led to higher CPMs and up to 25% more inventory being sold.  For instance; NewsPassID impressions sold at CPMs 90% higher than control ones in cookieless environments such as Safari and AMP; as well as 45% higher in environments where cookies are still accepted.  The next phase will be to scale the ID across more publishers.

Another boost to publisher monetisation has been found with PubMatic and LiveRamp.  According to the latest results their post-cookie partnership boosts eCPMs 101% with increased fill rates, yield and overall revenue using LiveRamp’s ATS and PubMatic’s Identity Hub.

Privacy: PETs working group and TCF fallout

This week it was announced at the IAB’s ALM that IAB Tech Lab was launching a new Privacy-Enhancing Tech (PETs) working group.  The group will draw on tech employed by financial industries – such as advanced cryptography – and build upon data use cases such as ‘seller defined audiences’ and other ‘aggregated attribution’ methods, in a bid to find the balance between privacy whilst still deriving value from data.

TCF fallout: mixed bag of reactions

IAB’s ALM was likely to be dominated by conversations regarding TCF and last week’s ruling by the Belgian data protection watchdog that the framework fell short of GDPR.  There’s been a mixed bag of reactions from marketers but generally the response seems to be that the decision will likely put us on a journey to compliance with TCF:

We might therefore have a more robust, fraud-proof framework in place. In the meantime, it’s vital publishers and developers keep on top of evolving regulations as they happen. Moves like these have the potential to impact consent rates.

Alexander Azarov, CEO of Clickio

Criteo ads at the Super Bowl

Whilst the SuperBowl will be dominated by B2C brands, perhaps no ad will be more important to our industry than Criteo’s.  Criteo will make its Super Bowl debut with an ad – and associated microsite – championing the open web; with this just the start of a campaign that will reportedly extend to other events and geographies over time.

More adtech and pubs should follow suit. No lack of unsold impressions and print inventory – nothing to lose and everything to gain. Educated consumers, as part of the privacy conversation has to be where we all really work out what’s possible? https://t.co/VOKWotVlr2

— Pete Danks (@petedanks) February 8, 2022

And here’s the ad:

Big Tech: Amazon, SSP rankings, and Facebook threaten to pull out of Europe

The past few weeks have seen Amazon become the biggest advertiser in history whilst on the flipside their own ad sales hit a combined $31.2bn in 2021 – 58% up on 2020 and approx 250% up on 2019.  Amazon now ranks 5th by global ad sales behind Alphabet, Meta, Alibaba and TikTok owner Bytedance; with Alphabet, Meta and Amazon on course for 50% of ALL ad spend.

In other rankings; Amazon ranks 2nd for SSPs according to the latest Programmatic Intelligence report from Advertiser Perceptions.  The research also found that publishers use 5.4 SSPs on average, and with identity & privacy top-of-mind for many in the industry, SSPs are being looked on for guidance.

Meanwhile; the company at the top of those SSP rankings Google faces a $2.4bn fine after PriceRunner brought a lawsuit following a European court’s ruling that the internet giant breached EU antitrust laws.  On the other half of the duopoly; whilst Meta threatened to pull Facebook and Instagram from Europe it seems the threat was more a way of highlighting the issue of organisations that rely on data transfers between the EU and the US in order to operate global services.

📱TikTok’s growing dwell time and generational convergence?

According to WeAreSocial’s latest Digital 2022 report TikTok averaged 27.3hrs per month for time spent, versus just 15.5hrs for Facebook though TikTok’s userbase is much lower.  Whilst most 55+ may not be regular TikTok users, the pandemic has driven them towards more digital media:  The new IPA TouchPoints report reveals a surprising increase in similarities between media usage habits of older & younger generations specifically comparing 16-34s with 55+.

📻UK radio ad revenue hit new peak

Figures from Radiocentre show radio ad revenue hit £718.7m in 2021, up 25% year-over-year, with digital ad formats the fastest growing element.  With nearly 90% of the adult population tuning in to the radio weekly – and the strong growth of other audio formats such as podcasts as well as growth in smart devices – it’s no surprise to see a growing interest in first party data for audio.

📰News media to embrace web3 innovation?

A forward looking piece from Jarno Koponen in Techcrunch makes the case that news media needs to embrace web3 and the metaverse to avoid missing out on future opportunities.  Koponen makes a number of recommendations around rethinking content, distribution and monetisation; though given that web3 & the metaverse aren’t “guaranteed bets” it feels like more of a research & watch brief for now.

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