Steve Ellwanger

Giving more power to audiences has helped to build the female-focused Refinery29 while building a trust that benefits brands. But some marketers need to adapt their messaging in order to leverage that trust. “They’re the boss of me,” Chief Content Officer Amy Emmerich says of the company’s audience, which Refinery29 says represents a global footprint […]

When Time Inc. was strictly a magazine publisher, it wasn’t exactly Dunkin Donuts’ cup of tea from an advertising standpoint. But when the quick-serve coffee and baked goods giant wanted to promote its drinks to a younger, more female demographic in the most integrated way possible, Time Inc.’s digital offerings were a great match. Time […]

Not many companies these days compare themselves to the cable television network pioneers of the 70’s and 80’s. Awesomeness is one of them. Using digital pipes instead of coaxial wiring, Awesomeness picked up early funding and set out to capture Gen Z—youths 12 to 24. Just as cable TV networks “erupted out of the new […]

If you’re between the ages of 13 and 34 and love sports but have a short attention span, Whistle Sports was created with you in mind. The global sports media company doesn’t do live sports per se but “everything else,” says Founder and CEO John West. “We provide content that we think is really authentic. […]

Condé Nast has decided that while text and images will remain at its roots, video storytelling is the publisher’s path to the future. “Video has to be the core medium by which we tell our stories,” says Jim Norton, Chief Business Officer and President of Revenue. Given its significant investments in premium video to date […]

One big takeaway from the 2017 Digital Content NewFronts on which both buyers and sellers can agree is that “What we’ve been calling digital video has now become a completely mainstream consumer medium,” notes Randy Rothenberg. “The industry is at a complete inflection point. We know that this is big not in the future but […]

If anyone could discern a possible sea change in the formerly one-day event called the NewFront it would be Michael Kassan. The Chairman and CEO of strategic advisory and business development firm MediaLink witnessed its birthing by Digitas and has become an integral player as the event morphed over the years. And so it is […]

While some news organizations struggle for credibility and survival, Bloomberg Media keeps investing in and growing its portfolio of products across all platforms. These include its impending, 24/7 news service with Twitter, the Bloomberg Lens offering, Bloomberg Trigger for advertisers and its OTT presence in Apple TV. “Personally I think there’s never been a more […]

Twitter’s first-ever NewFronts presentation, in which a raft of new live-streaming and premium original programming deals were unveiled, takes the company further along a particular path: taking two-screen experiences to one screen “in a way that no one else can,” according to CMO Leslie Berland. The company announced a dozen new collaborations for hundreds of […]

If you’ve ever dressed like a Ninja Turtle or a SpongeBob character, you know what it’s like to be a passionate fan of a television show. Viacom spends a lot of time studying what its fans do online and offline and uses the data to best connect them with brands. “Fans are at the heart […]

Twitter’s new partnership with Bloomberg for 24-hour, live news reporting gets a big thumbs up from Bank of America. “I really believe that this is as good as a combination of chocolate and peanut butter. This may be the Reese’s peanut butter cup moment for the media industry,” says the banking giant’s SVP, Enterprise Media […]

As skinny television bundles proliferate, so does Awesomeness, which on May 20 kicks off an original series in a deep, multilayered partnership with youth-oriented retailer Hollister. “We think that it is an amazing time to be a premium content provider,” says Awesomeness Chief Business Officer Kelly Day. Given that many brands are looking to connect […]

The OpenAP linear television audience-targeting consortium of Fox, Turner and Viacom will spend the next several months reaching out to other national TV sellers, educating the buy side and working toward a rollout in the fall. While the second phase of OpenAP is a work in progress, it will involve digital media as well. The […]

LAS VEGAS — While there’s lots of people populating video content, it takes too many others to screen and label it. That’s where artificial intelligence can provide a big assist. While “it’s early days” in such use of AI, “it’s an exciting solution to bring to market,” says Scott Braley, GM, Advertising Platforms, Ooyala, which […]

From its vantage point in the digital cloud, Adobe has a unique view of video publishers around the globe. Lately it’s been seeing a shift in emphasis from cross-screen reach to monetization. Concurrently, U.S. video viewing has bifurcated along two lines: mobile devices during the day and living room big screens at night, with many […]

LAS VEGAS – How can traditional television broadcasters survive in a world of digital disrupters like Amazon, Apple and Google? By using data to drive user engagement, in the process adopting more of a direct-to-consumer than business-to-business model. This is easier said than done in a world marked by the proliferation of skinny programming bundles […]

Lyle Schwartz isn’t known for sitting back and letting things happen at their own pace, particularly when it comes to television and video audience measurement. GroupM’s President of Investment for North America feels he’s at “the 50-yard line” in his company’s push for the industry to be able to measure commercial impressions across screens, despite […]

AT&T AdWorks chose to go vertical in 2017 with what it calls the industry’s first-ever Addressable Upfronts. Its 100 events across the country are tailored to specific industry product and service categories and clients with a focus on the attributes of both television and cross-platform addressable advertising. “Instead of a one-size-fits-all, one big event, we […]

Discovery Communications’ Discovery Engage audience targeting offering has been well received from a mix of product and service categories going into the 2017 TV Upfront. And the company is always open to new ways to standardize audience targeting beyond traditional age/sex demographic targets, says Ben Price, President of National Ad Sales. Having pushed its content […]

LAS VEGAS — It’s not Google TV’s second coming, but the tech giant’s new integration with WideOrbit will make it easier for marketers to buy inventory from more than 600 local television stations. The deal means Google joins 14 other demand-side platforms to essentially “connect $7 billion of programmatic digital video spend back into linear […]