A CYNOPSIS MESSAGE FROM NEXSTAR DIGITAL

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Elon Musk on Friday said he was “still committed to acquisition” of the social platform, just hours after he tweeted that his $44 billion takeover was “temporarily on hold.” The tweets came a day after the ouster of Twitter GM Kayvon Beykpour and GM for revenue Bruce Falck, as well as hiring freeze “to ensure we are being responsible and efficient,” said a spokesperson. “The truth is this isn’t how and when I imagined leaving Twitter. This wasn’t my decision,” tweeted Beykpour, adding, “While I’m disappointed…I’m INSANELY proud of what our collective team has achieved.” Falck also thanked his Twitter colleagues, noting, “Building and running these businesses is a team sport.”

Why would a lame duck CEO make changes right before an acquisition? Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal pointed to “a very challenging macro environment – right now,” tweeting, “I won’t use the deal as an excuse to avoid making important decisions for the health of the company.”

TikTok is expanding its partnership with Foursquare, which had already been TikTok’s exclusive location provider. The new integration with Foursquare Attribution will enable advertisers on TikTok to determine how many incremental visitors TikTok drives to their stores; how much it will cost to drive someone to a real-world business; and which audiences are driving the most value for a business.

Facebook is closing its Nearby Friends service, effective May 31. Also discontinued in this more privacy-cautious world will be Weather Alerts, location history and background location. Facebook said it will continue to collect users’ location information for things like personalized ads, Facebook Events and more.

At Google’s I/O developer conference last week, the company introduced new subscription capabilities and a new Console UI to help developers grow their businesses. For each subscription, developers can now configure multiple base plans and offers, allowing the sale of subscription in multiple ways, reducing operational costs by removing the need to create and manage an increasing number of SKUs. Google also announced a Samsung partnership for easier data sharing, live edits in Android Studio, and a new Google Wallet app, among other updates.

YouTube announced the launch of “Green Screen,” enabling YouTube Shorts creators to use up to a 60-second video segment from an eligible YouTube Video or YouTube Shorts as the background for their new Shorts video. A video created with Green Screen will include a link back to the original content creator for attribution.

RIP, iPod. Apple is discontinuing the iPod Touch, the latest version of the music player first introduced in 2001. “Music has always been part of our core at Apple, and bringing it to hundreds of millions of users in the way iPod did impacted more than just the music industry — it also redefined how music is discovered, listened to and shared,” said Greg Joswiak, Apple’s SVP of Worldwide Marketing.

The U.S. residential broadband outlook is increasingly dominated by market share battles amid surging investment and technological advance, according to analysis by Kagan. The media research unit offers this outlook:
· Cable — Hybrid-fiber coax networks continue to dominate residential broadband alongside aggressive buildout plans. Kagan estimates the segment is positioned to limit market share loss amid intensifying competition with 61.9% through 2026.
Telcos — Fiber upgrades offer a broadband makeover, but legacy copper-limits upside. The forecast: The segment can reverse the pattern of declines but is positioned for share to slip below 25% by 2026.Wireless — Verizon Wireless and T-Mobile are ramping up fixed wireless networks and targeting both rural and non-rural areas. Kagan expects wireless-only homes are poised to grow from 8% to 12.6% of broadband subs by 2026.Satellite — The next generation of satellite broadband offers more room for optimism, but unfavorable cost and speed comparisons limit growth expectations. A niche service for the residential space, its slice of the pie is expected to hold at 1% through 2026.

Kantar has entered into an agreement for the sale of Kantar Public to Trilantic Europe, a private equity firm focused on mid-market transactions. Under the agreement, Kantar Public would establish itself as an independent global specialist evidence and advisory business.

While different generations of consumers engage with each social platform for different reasons, more than half say they seek out funny or entertaining content to share with friends and family, including ads, and about a quarter of them actively engage in short form creator content to learn more about products or services they are shopping for, according to a survey from Channel Factory. “Consumers are turning to short form creator content to chill out and be entertained,” said Sara Luckow Callanan, Sr. Director, Global Strategic Marketing & Research at Channel Factory. “The strong majority of adults having positive or neutral experiences on the platforms is an opportunity for advertisers to further contribute to elevating the consumer social video experience.”

A CYNOPSIS MESSAGE FROM NEXSTAR DIGITAL

NEXSTAR DIGITAL
We Deliver What Matters Most

Audiences + Content + Solutions = Results
Advertise with the #1 local broadcaster in the U.S.
Reach 100+ Million highly engaged digital consumers
Get national advertising solutions designed to deliver
National scale with local expertise
Digital + OTT + TV

LEARN MORE

ADVERTISING

Podcast advertising grew two time faster in 2021 (+72%) than the total internet ad market, according to IAB’s U.S. Podcast Advertising Revenue Study, with revenue expected to hit $4 billion by 2024. The study identified three key factors helping to drive podcast ad revenue growth:
* More listeners and more content: A continually expanding user base that is consuming a growing library of content.
* Increased use of automated ad tech: The share of ad revenue served via Dynamic Ad Insertion (DAI) has almost doubled in two years to 84% as now both host-read and announcer-read ads are largely being served with this functionality (84% and 85%, respectively).
* Growing investment across more ad categories: The share of ad revenue generated within categories with lower spend volumes has more than tripled in just two years from 8% to 28%“
Everything right now is aligned to drive growth. There’s more engaging and diverse podcast content than ever, and that is translating into larger, more attractive audiences,” said Chris Bruderle, VP, Research & Insights, IAB. “But more than anything, podcasting has proven that it can deliver beyond direct-to-consumer advertising to support brand-building and drive business outcomes.”

Coming up is a Cynopsis special report that will explore the latest tools and opportunities for a business that shows no signs of slowing down.

Vistar Media, provider of software for digital out-of-home, announced the acquisition of Sage+Archer, a European buying platform for DOOH. “At Sage+Archer, we’ve been fortunate to establish strong partnerships with Europe’s leading media agencies and have built a team of experts in delivering value through programmatic out-of-home,” said Diederick Ubels, CEO & Co-Founder of Sage+Archer.

NBCUniversal launched its fifth-annual slate of Commercial Innovations, including new ad products and formats like Retro Ads, AR Portal, commerce-enabled activations via the Shop Drop, and more. “For NBCUniversal, the ad experience is the user experience,” said Josh Feldman, Global Chief Marketing Officer, NBCUniversal Advertising & Partnerships. “Over the last five years, we’ve been committed to making the viewer experience just as enjoyable as the way viewers consume, engage with, and are impacted by brands on our platform.”

As mobile marketers shift from targeted ad campaigns to contextual advertising, how have brand apps performed? Digital Turbine and Apptopia created the BRAG (Brand Relative App Growth) Index to find out by measuring the UA strategies of mobile apps delivering above average app install volume relative to the prior quarter’s brand funnel (based on consumer awareness and install intent). The BRAG Index measured performance across seven app categories: Retail, Streaming Video, Health and Fitness, Music and Audio, Finance, Food and Drink, and News. In the past six months across all categories, lesser-known apps outperformed an average of 46% of leading brands. Lesser-known Retail apps outperformed 33% of leading retail brands, and lesser-known News apps outperformed greater than 66% of leading News brands. In the Streaming Video category, Tubi topped the BRAG index, followed by HBO Max and Peacock.

Sequent Partners has launched a customizable consulting suite of performance accelerating tools for brands, agencies and publishers to help them leverage data and analytics to drive sales and sustainable growth. The first two offerings now available are the Capabilities Gauge and Operations Audit. “Over the years, we have seen many companies exhibit dissatisfaction and impatience with the current state of their data and analytics. They share common problems, such as worrying they are not operating with the best-in-class solutions, but aren’t sure what to keep, fix or discard,” said Alice K. Sylvester, Partner at Sequent Partners. “Seeing these universal issues led us to create our Performance Accelerating Tools for Data & Analytics, which are completely tailored to the unique needs and capabilities of an organization, based on our best-practices and aligned with rigorous industry standards.”

Cinema advertising network National CineMedia has moved into programmatic with a partnership with Place Exchange. Through NCM’s Lobby Entertainment Network, advertisers can purchase the lobby screens in movie theaters across the country programmatically. “NCM’s expansion into programmatic marketplaces is a key enhancement of our efforts to help advertisers reach the ‘unreachables’ – our highly valuable, young, diverse cinema audience,” said Mike Rosen, Chief Revenue Officer of NCM.

Vibrant Media has launched new deterministic and search-intent audience targeting capabilities through its Quintesse platform, enabling Vibrant Media to categorize all relevant pages available on the global bidstream. The platform sorts pages into more than 740 categories to identify the ideal contextual environments at scale for its advertisers. “Advertisers who are preparing for the cookieless future now have the opportunity to get ahead,” said Doug Stevenson, CEO and co-founder of Vibrant Media. “The sophisticated methodology of our cookieless audience targeting solutions can be seamlessly combined with our custom contextual targeting to ensure your marketing is relevant to your audience without trackers.”

Integral Ad Science announced additional services to its partnership with TikTok. IAS will now be able to measure viewability, invalid traffic and app-level brand safety, allowing brands and agencies to more effectively monitor the quality of their media buys on TikTok’s platform.

Ad platform Infillion launched ShopX, its shoppable advertising product that delivers cross-publisher and cross-platform campaign activation, as well as consumer opt-in, creative direction and actionable measurement.

STREAMING

Netflix is mulling launching live-streaming capabilities on its service that it potentially could use for perks like live voting and feedback across unscripted shows and specials, as well as to air in-person events like its just concluded Netflix Is A Joke festival on the screen.

Comcast and XUMO announced the launch of the Xfinity What to Watch channel on the XUMO app. The 24/7 linear channel comes as XUMO unveiled new data to underscore the importance of editorial to drive consumption of the programming available on FAST services. In 2021, programming that was included as part of XUMO’s editorial stunts and promotions saw a 5x increase in viewing compared to the pre-editorial average.

Chicken Soup for the Soul Entertainment has struck a deal to acquire Redbox, creating a direct-to-consumer media platform for value-conscious consumers. “Today marks a transformative moment for Chicken Soup for the Soul Entertainment and an inflection point for the ad-supported streaming industry,” said William J. Rouhana Jr., Chairman and CEO of CSSE. “Our acquisition of Redbox will accelerate the scaling of our business as it combines complementary teams and services to create the streaming industry’s premier independent AVOD.”

Cinedigm Corp. announced that the company’s connected television advertising business grew more than 192% in 2021. Cinedigm began launching hybrid advertising and subscription services in 2017 and launched the company’s FAST digital linear business in 2018. “We had the best year in terms of revenue growth in the history of the company,” said Erick Opeka, President of Cinedigm Networks and Chief Strategy Officer of Cinedigm. “While many companies talk about adding advertising to their subscription offerings, we were prescient to move in that direction years ago, and the foresight is really paying off.”

TelevisaUnivision has entered into an agreement with HMTV DTC, a subsidiary of Hemisphere Media Group, to acquire streaming platform Pantaya. “The acquisition of Pantaya, which includes renowned content titles such as ‘Señorita 89’ and ‘A La Mala’, is an exciting opportunity to build upon our strategic growth plan as we continue to redefine the global streaming landscape,” said TelevisaUnivision President and Chief Transformation Officer Pierluigi Gazzolo.

Cynopsis Team