CANNES – Uber Technologies in the past year has diversified into advertising sales, building on its relationships with consumers who have used its apps to hail a car-ride or to order food for delivery. The data the company gathers about people’s destinations and their buying habits are a key resource in helping to provide brands with targeted ads across Uber’s platforms.
“It was a natural progression from having a global community of monthly active platform consumers, to then serving them messages when they wanted to see them,” Megan Ramm, global director and head of consumer-packaged goods partnerships at Uber Technologies, said in this interview with Beet.TV contributor Jon Watts.
CPG marketers such as Procter & Gamble, Unilever, Nestle and PepsiCo have an opportunity to reach consumers in Uber’s ride-hailing app when they express their intent to buy something by requesting a ride to a store or restaurant, or when they’re looking for something to order from Uber Eats. Uber also has installed tablets in cars that show advertising.
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“Some CPGs come to us because they know that we can drive conversion for them on grocery and convenience,” Ramm said. “We can reach you in a car when you’re going to Target, to Walmart, to a concert, to an event. We know the mindset that you’re in.”
Uber collaborates with companies such as ad-tech firm Criteo to help build scale quickly. The company also works with audience-measurement and consumer-data companies.
“We’re saying, ‘who is the best-in-breed that we can bring together with our offering to build as fast as we need to build to be a billion-dollar business by 2024 or 25, right?” Ramm said. “Criteo is one major partner that we’re utilizing. They’re best-in-breed in what they do.”
You’re watching coverage of the Global Retail Media Summit at Cannes Lions 2023, presented by Criteo & Habu. For more videos from Beet.TV’s Cannes Lions 2023 coverage, please visit this page.
