Read this interesting article on how media companies and retailers are exploring the role smartphones play in consumers’ path to purchase items in store.

Find out all the latest statistics and new findings here: https://www.marketingweek.com/2016/12/20/connect-mobile-store-sales/

Originally posted by inspirationmobile

The IAB (Internet Advertising Bureau) are partnering with AIMIA, I2C, MTM and using Nectar card data to understand the impact digital advertising is having on both online and offline sales.

The first research measured five different FMCG brands both on desktop and mobile and as done by accessing sales data from exposed and control groups. Brand surveys and sales data were used to demonstrate the impact on brand metrics and product sales from digital advertising.

The five brands: Nescafe, Magnum, Haagen-Dazs, Maille & Persil ran between April and August 2016. Initial findings show that the advertising had a positive effect on brand metrics such as awareness, favourability and recommendation, as well as online and offline follow up intentions. Return on advertising spend for the five programmatic campaigns on Sainsbury’s purchases only was £1.47 for every £1 spent (robust methodology). Some of the campaigns were also served on Yahoo.

The IAB is planning to do more research with 20-25 brands in 2017, and also plan to include mobile app, as the data only covers desktop and mobile web. There will be a focus to understand better the halo effects of ads featuring retailers’ logos on sales in other retailers.

2016 has been a big year. And we want to wrap it up by sharing with you some of the achievements we’re most proud of!

Valued clients

1. Important partnerships have played a key part in driving our revenue growth in 2016. We have developed true partnerships with some major new brands as well as innovating with our long standing partners such as Paramount, by developing trusting relationships and really getting under the skin of their business challenges.

Storytellers

2. This year we launched Yahoo Storytellers, to support marketers in building custom brand experiences. It leverages Yahoo’s editorial expertise, extensive data, content marketing on Tumblr and native advertising through Yahoo Gemini.

Data

3. We’re in a better position than ever before to help you put Yahoo’s knowledge into action when it comes to real data insights that drive campaign success. With new tools to put our data to work for you, we’re better placed than ever to make the difference to your campaigns.

Data partnerships

4. This year Yahoo partnered with Nectar, enabling us to bridge the gap between online advertising and offline sales. This offers you improved insight and less wastage on your campaigns.

Cross-device

5. Yahoo can now verify 89% of its users, no matter what device they are using.

Native growth

6. On mobile, more than anywhere else, we believe in a seamless ad experience for the user. And with Yahoo Gemini Native Ads we have been able to help facilitate this and as a result our native business now accounts for nearly 50% of our UK revenue.

Programmatic

7. 2016 has been the first year that all Yahoo display inventory is available to buy programmatically.

Thought leadership and research pieces

8. We’ve launched some ground-breaking research studies this year, most notably Receptivity, which looks at how a consumers’ mood impacts their interaction with an ad.

Enhanced personalisation of content

9. In the past year we’ve made investments in our consumer experience and products, redesigning our whole content offering to deliver a uniquely personal experience. The new redesign of the Yahoo homepage is a great example of enhancing the user experience. 

Gaining recognition 

10. One of Yahoo’s proudest moments was the IPA results this year. We were the only digital business to show a positive improvement in every category including “Ease of contact with sales team”, “Understanding of our products” and “Quality of response to brief”. 

Mick Loizou is Director of EMEA Native Ads Solutions at Yahoo

Yahoo’s resident native ads expert discusses the importance of context for the future of online video.

Back in 1983, screenwriter William Goldman claimed that “nobody knows anything. Not one person in the entire motion picture field knows for a certainty what’s going to work”. While this may well have been true of the Hollywood film industry at the time, in today’s data-driven world of online advertising, it could be argued that we have the opposite problem: now we have the power to know everything, but we still don’t seem to know exactly how to capture our audience’s imagination.

The film and TV that Goldman was talking about, or ‘video content’ as we’d probably call it in a marketing meeting, has been forced to evolve as consumer habits have changed. We know that our audiences are using a raft of different devices to consume news and entertainment, and we have to reformat our ads to reach them in the right way. It’s not enough to simply post TV content online –we need to think bigger than that, from image orientation to where the video will appear and the content itself. With online advertising and social media, we have all the customer insights we need at our fingertips. Once we understand what makes our target audience tick, we should be able to make ads that resonate perfectly with them.

Often the successes of big budget TV ads debuted in highly-coveted commercial breaks have been surpassed by simple, ingenious online videos that have caught the imagination of the general public. Delivering creativity in the right context, at the right time, has been proven time and again to be the winning formula for captivating consumers. This was clearly demonstrated by Always in its #LikeAGirl campaign, which spawned a series of online videos and a phenomenal buzz on social media.

But while a whole new generation of teenage bedroom video stars have cracked what people on online video platforms want, for many brands their own viral hit has continually eluded them – though not for want of trying.

Some advertisers, of course, have managed both. John Lewis, for example, has just released a Christmas TV ad, which at the time of writing also had almost 19 million views online. Apart from being a lovely piece of creative work, they’ve got the context just right – tapping into the emotional themes of acceptance and goodwill that we value so much at this time of year, and arguably need more than ever.

But not all brands have the luxury of a hugely anticipated Christmas advert, or the TV budget needed to build up that reputation. And when everyone is competing for the clicks and eyeballs of increasingly time-poor, savvy Internet users, getting seen can be hard . In all honesty, not all brands really need to create a viral video sensation – rather than mass reach, why not think about achieving maximum relevancy?

This is the beauty of native advertising. Whatever your product, and whatever emotions you want to appeal to , you can not only ensure your message chimes with your audience’s interests at that exact moment, but the actual look and feel of the ad won’t interrupt their overall experience.

At Yahoo, that’s why we created our Gemini ad platform, which enables us to seamlessly deliver highly targeted branded content within our range of publications, on our homepage and in our apps. And it delivers results: we’ve seen that after audiences are exposed to a native ad, they’re 3.6x more likely to do a brand search and up to 56% more likely to notice a search ad. Of course, positive performance isn’t just about the ad format, but the content itself, so we’ve launched Yahoo Storytellers, our full service content marketing studio for brands and agencies , to help them create branded content that drives results.

The fact is, not all brands can rely on an audience sitting through a full 60-second video online. Audiences are used to scrolling down past autoplay videos in their newsfeeds, and the time you have to grab their initial attention grows ever-shorter – these factors must be considered when creating a video for online. The traditional TV ad storyboard, with a clear beginning, middle and end, may actually work better flipped on its head when delivered natively – why not try having the pay - off right at the beginning?

Personally, I’m excited about the future. With the emergence of virtual reality experiences, which by the way the Yahoo team can produce for you, you don’t just watch a story unfolding, you’re in it. Making seamless and highly engaging experiences in AR and VR is the next big challenge for brands – and something I notice John Lewis has already experimented with by producing a 360° video version of their ad. Now I come to think of it, virtual reality is something filmmakers of the 80s definitely knew a great deal about.

Dora Michail, senior director for programmatic and audience solutions, EMEA at Yahoo explains why BrightRoll DSP differs from rival products on the market in an interview with M&M Global. 

Read the rest of the interview here: http://mandmglobal.com/brightroll-dsp-complete-data-total-transparency-and-results/

Sales Director at Yahoo, Dan Durling, discusses the importance of building long term successful client relationships. 

Even with the growth of programmatic in the tech industry, Dan believes that ‘the ability to gain a client’s trust is as important as ever’ and lists three main characteristics needed to build client relationships. Dan argues that reliability, credibility and sensitivity are key ingredients when dealing with clients and building long lasting relationships, regardless of whether you’re a management consultant, media sales graduate or agency planner. 

If you want more tips on how to effectively work with clients read more here: http://www.ipa.co.uk/blog/agency/the-winning-formula-for-successful-client-relationships/12821#.WEUy56KLSL4

This year’s Global Conference organised by the Marketing Society was focused on promoting bolder leadership and how businesses can achieve their goals. Senior Director EMEA Marketing at Yahoo, Jean-Christophe Gombeaud has written a piece about the event and how marketers can apply the advice to their own business. 

If you were unable to attend, then this is a great recap on how you can achieve your ambitious goals for 2017. 

Read the article here: https://www.marketingsociety.com/the-clubroom/can-do-just-do-attitude

Last week, Yahoo supported the annual Omnicom Pelican Awards in Amsterdam. At the event we announced the winners of 14th Yahoo Pelican Award who will be travelling to Sunnyvale, California with Yahoo. 

Here are a few photos from the awards: