Tag Archives: Spotify

Next to Now for October 21

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NEW SPOTIFY VERTICAL VIDEO ADS

Spotify announced a new product — Vertical Video Ads — which allows advertisers to sponsor playlists. Users agree to watch the full video in exchange for thirty minutes of free listening. These kinds of ads are wins for the advertisers, the users, and the platform. At launch, the branded moments are based around six categories: chill time, workout, party, dinner, focus and sleep—each of which could work well for books from novels (chill time) to cookbooks (dinner) to lifestyle (workout). As with any newly launched ad product, the initial minimums are too great for any but the largest brand budgets. But with time, costs will come down, making this an initiative to watch.

#spotify #audio #streaming

SNAP TO UNLOCK: A NEW FUTURE OR THE NEXT QR CODE?

The first outdoor ads targeting Snapchat users for movies are running now in subways in NY and DC:

“Universal Pictures, a longtime Snapchat advertiser, is among the first to test the Snap code marketing for its new movie ‘The Girl On the Train.’ Mysterious billboards will be showing up around subways in New York and Washington, D.C., and in parts of Los Angeles, according to Doug Neil, exec VP of digital marketing at NBC Universal.”

While the premise may induce a painful deja vu for marketers who went through the great QR code marketing hype of a few years ago, the fact that Snapchat is already being used and recognized by a sizable audience makes all the difference. For genres such as YA, a Snap to Unlock campaign could make a delicious teaser.

#snapchat #outdoor #YA

 

WHAT MAKES A GREAT MOBILE AD FOR TEENS AND TWENTIES?

A new study of teens and people in their twenties shows that users in this age range care about content that can be saved and accessed later and expect ads to be relevant to their interests. Here’s more from eMarketer on the survey. 

216997 #mobile #millennials

 

WHAT’S THE BEST TIME TO SHOW ADS?

A new study suggests that more users are inclined to engage with an ad in the middle of the day than at other times during the work week. While ad exposure is valid throughout the day, mid-day is when more users are taking breaks from studying or working and so more apt to click on an ad.

#time #engagement

 

 

Apples at Union Square Market (c) 2016 Martha Otis

Next to Now for July 28

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NATIVE ADVERTISING BEST PRACTICES

Smart, clever, informative native ads are one of the most exciting growth areas in advertising. Digiday walks us through the process that has brought significant improvement to Slate’s native efforts. In addition to bringing a more Slate-style voice to the content, the new native ads are more transparent about the sponsorship. This is very important point with native advertising, and it’s worth underscoring: don’t try to trick the reader, be upfront about your sponsorship and s/he will be more open to the content of what you’re saying:

“Most people spend their time trying to avoid ads, but Slate found that on its more explicitly labeled ads, the click-through rates were three times higher than the previous units (though Slate wouldn’t disclose the CTR). The publisher also contends that average time spent on the new units doubled, to 4 minutes, 15 seconds.”

#native #slate #transparency

 

SPOTIFY INTRODUCES PROGRAMMATIC

With over 100 million users worldwide, Spotify is the leader in a battle for listeners among Pandora and Apple Music. As advertisers, we have found that Pandora’s deep sets of user data and targeting mechanisms, not to mention their flexibility on price, has made them our go-to for book advertising. But with Spotify’s latest announcement, it might be time to reconsider Spotify for book ads. As reported in Adweek:

“The music streaming service announced today it will start offering programmatic advertising for the 70 million people using the free version of its platform. The Swedish company launched private marketplaces in partnership with AppNexus, Rubicon Project and The Trade Desk for buying both 15- and 30-second audio spots.”

More good options are always better for book advertisers. We are happy to have some new ways to target the Spotify audience.

#spotify #streaming #audio

 

HOW TO CATCH THE WAVE OF “SURGING NEWS”

The Guardian debuts a “surge news” ad product that’s similar to surge products from the New York Times and Washington Post. Given that surging news could be everything from the weather to a terrorist attack, it’s good that they are allowing advertisers to set keywords for any topics they don’t want to appear against. But for the right title, it could be a great way to be adjacent to the most relevant stories of the moment.

#targeting #guardian

 

WIRED ON NEWSLETTERS

The long tail of the weird, the wild,  the passionate, the hand-made is alive and well on emails thanks to services like Tiny Letter. With 100% opt in subscribers and open rates greater than 70%, these are audiences advertisers should reach for niche products—and there’s non nichier than most books. In the old days of the Internet we reached this audience via blogs through channels including the Verso Reader Channels. Now we get them via emails.

#emails

 

Hudson riverfront photo (c) 2016 Tom Thompson

Next to Now: On Streaming, Targeting, and Cheating

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NATIVE AD PERFORMANCE

Commenting on a study of native advertising click-through rates, Media Post is surprised to see that native ads do better on mobile. We are not. Mobile remains the best platform for high engagement—and not just because of mistaken clicks:

“The research found that click-through rates (CTR) for premium native ads were highest on smartphones, at 0.38% in 2015, while tablets saw an average CTR of 0.33%. Native ads on desktop computers saw CTR rates of 0.16%.”

#native #mobile

 

SNAPSHOT: SPOTIFY LISTENERS

72% of Spotify listeners are Millennials, and they’re listening mostly in the afternoon. Here’s a link to Adweek’s infographic on the Spotify audience and its listening habits.

#streaming #spotify

 

GENIUS STEALS?

Creatives should have their eyes and ears wide open, looking everywhere for inspiration, including Reddit. Just remember, that if you’re using someone else’s idea (especially when you use it word-for-word), you should pay them. Ask Axe.

#creative

 

DEMOGRAPHICS ARE NOT A BLUNT INSTRUMENT

A little reminder from Google that easy assumptions about demographics—such as, “only men are interested in video games” or “only people with babies in the house buy baby products”—are often overturned when you look at the data.  

#data #demographics #targeting

 

FACEBOOK LIVESTREAM COMMERCIALS

Digiday reports that Facebook is testing commercials in their live stream.

#facebook #livestream #video

Next to Now: The Music of Advertising Edition

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DOES PODCASTING SELL?

Podcasts don’t provide traditional reporting for ads, but a recent study suggests that it does sell products (well, underwear anyway). Mack Weldon reports that doubling-down on humorous podcasts has doubled their sales. According to Digiday:

“Podcast advertising now represents 25 percent of Mack Weldon’s overall ad budget per month, 100 times more than a year ago. The medium has become more effective than display ads for the company, because when people listen to podcasts, they are fully engaged and they can continue listening while making a purchase.”

#podcasts

 

THE UPSIDE OF BEING POSITIVE ON FACEBOOK

Huffington Post has found that “feel-good” videos far out-perform hard news stories on Facebook. Of course, this tells you more about what the Huffington Post audience is looking for than other audiences. But it’s worth keeping in mind.

#facebook

 

SNAPCHAT BILLBOARDS

The hot social platform that’s about as digital and evanescent as they come recognizes the power of an old-school, well-placed billboard in real space. A new Snapchat billboard campaign manages to go both mass and hyper-local at the same time. Well played.

#snapchat #billboards

 

SPOTIFY UPS ITS MOBILE AD GAME

The music streaming service is popular with listeners but has under-performed Pandora for Verso clients. We’re glad to see they’re paying more attention to their mobile ad product, and look forward to trying it out:

“Starting today, the music streaming service is bringing Billboard—one of its most popular desktop ad formats—to mobile. The feature, dubbed Overlay Mobile, lets advertisers buy display ads for both iOS and Android mobile devices. It serves as the “Welcome Back” ad, and only plays when a user has the screen open, which Spotify says provides 100 percent viewability.”

#spotify #music #mobile

 

INSTAGRAM TOPS FOR MUSIC FANS

In a new Instagram-commissioned study (worth noting, not neutral), Nielsen found that Instagram was the buzziest social network for the most avid music fans:

“According to a new Instagram-commissioned study by Nielsen of more than 3,000 self-described Instagram users, the photo- and video-sharing platform is the most-used social network for music fans, festival attendees and artists during live events. The study also provides insight into what fans like, listen to and buy.”

Worth thinking about for the next music book.

#music #instagram

 

TEENS VOTE UP WISHBONE

Ad Age reports on the new tap-to-vote app, Wishbone, that’s proving a hit with teens, and inspiring creative engagement from brands who want to reach them–in both content and paid advertising plays.

#teens #wishbone

 

THE NEXT BIG THING

Salesforce CEO Scott McCorkle makes the case for “layered marketing”—marketing across different platforms and media, playing to each one’s strength—with an essay in Ad Age that points out how the wonders of the next big thing do not necessarily mean the death of what came before.

#layeredmarketing

NEXT TO NOW: AD RESEARCH EDITION

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ARE BUY BUTTONS ON SOCIAL MEDIA A GOOD IDEA?

Marketers are very excited by social media buy buttons, but consumers? Not so much. This survey of user habits on social media is a useful reminder that just because an idea looks good on a marketing plan doesn’t mean it’s something that serves our customers well.

#social #media #adtech

 

DATA REVEALS SURPRISING, UNCOMFORTABLE TRUTH 

According to Spotify, the number one zip code for playing Justin Bieber’s “Sorry” is Williamsburg, Brooklyn.

#data

 

HUBSPOT ON THE BENEFITS OF NATIVE ADVERTISING

This HubSpot article on the benefits of native advertising is well-argued and cites a wealth of links to relevant studies. Of interest:

—Consumers look at native ads 52% more frequently than banner ads:.

—Native ads receive two times more visual focus than banners: 

—Native CTR performance can be 85% higher than banner ads. n.b. This data point is from a Stackadapt study that uses an “average” banner CTR of .06%. Since Verso’s average is more like .1%, the percentage improvement is not as high for our campaigns, but it’s still significant.

—Avg CTR for banner ads is .08%. n.b. This links to a useful tool from Google for identifying benchmark rates, that identifies the average click-through rate as .08% (.05% for Flash, in case anyone’s still using that format!). It’s important to keep saying this: we expect—and see—better average CTRs for Verso campaigns.

#native advertising #data

 

DIGITAL ADS ARE GETTING SMARTER. ARE ADVERTISERS?

A professor at the University of Chicago looks into advertising spend on search, email and mobile. Among his surprising discoveries: most sales do not result from users who click on ads:

“In fact, 78 percent of the increase in sales in the Yahoo experiment was from users who never clicked on the ads. ‘Even though clicks are a standard measure of performance in online-advertising campaigns, we find that focusing only on clickers leads to a serious underestimate of the campaign’s effects.’”

#research #search #email #clickthroughs

 

OLDER USERS RESPOND BETTER TO DIGITAL

Two former Yahoo researchers show that the effect of online advertising on sales increases with age, with the top performing group over 65. So maybe book publishers shouldn’t worry about Snapchat so much right now.

#research #sales

 

CREATIVE PERSISTENCE

A report from professors at the University of Chicago’s Booth Business School and Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management details the importance of persistence when it comes to creative breakthroughs.

#creative

 

NEW LUMA REPORT

Here’s LUMA’s new report on the state-of-the-art of digital marketing. The number one new trend is mass-personalization across channels. This of course requires very smart “identity” data. Slide 31 points to developments on this score. The second largest trend, content marketing, requires traditionally siloed departments such as advertising, PR, web development and email to work in concert. (Via BusinessInsider)

#adtech

 

IS THE VINE EXPERIMENT OVER?

Two years ago it was one of the hottest new marketing platforms, but AdWeek reports that today Vine accounts for just 6% of video marketing using advertiser-produced video (compared to 64% YouTube and 24% Facebook). That said, it’s still a viable platform if you use it right and partner with social media stars:

“Vine still shines when social stars are involved. Instead of brands posting their own content, Burns said that clients are looking to team up with top influencers who have amassed massive followings to create sponsored content.”

#social #video #vine

 

MOST MOBILE AND DESKTOP VIDEO ADS SERVED AGAINST SHORT FORM

Emarketer reports: “Q3 2015 research from FreeWheel found that 69% of digital video ad views served by its platform to smartphones occurred while users watched content shorter than 20 minutes.” Perhaps more surprising was the revelation that desktop video watching is still twice that on mobile and tablets:

“In 2015, US adults will spend an average of 12 minutes per day watching digital video on their smartphones and an average of 14 minutes on their tablets. Time spent on desktop and laptop is higher, with US adults spending an average of 24 minutes per day watching digital video.” 

#video

 

AGAINST BAD ADS

And by “bad,” we mean a bad experience for the user. As this NYT article says, there are far too many digital ads right now that try to work up the engagement numbers through forcing you to click on the content when you were just trying to get the ad out of your face. It’s a little ironic (but only a little), since the NY Times website is not immune to these kind of ads (this cat owner is looking at you, Purina dog chow video). But this might be the kind of culture we create when every marketing job is numbers based—judging a campaign by how many people clicked on the ad, rather than to how many people responded to what you were advertising.

#creative

Next to Now: Start-of-Summer Edition

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Got some time on your hands as you head into the long weekend?
Here’s a list of good, quick reads on book-related advertising. This week featuring video on Spotify, new ads on Pinterest, thoughts on why calendars suck, & more . . .

 

Looking to sell directly? YouTube gets an upgrade to allow for shopping within videos.

When “Listen up” cross-fades into “Take a look”: Spotify moves into video.

ALL ABOUT PINTEREST:

Benedict Evans shows how the roles of PC and Mobile computing have switched:

“…We should rather think of the PC as having the basic, cut-down, limited version of the internet, because it only has the web. It’s the mobile that has the whole internet.”

Should you develop an app or a Web site? It all comes down to your relationship with the consumer.

When a debate about calendars turns into a debate about workflow, creativity, and getting things done:

“All calendars suck. And they all suck in the same way. Calendars are a record of interruptions.”

Tips on retargeting and why it’s important:

“Only 2% of traffic converts on the first visit to a website. I repeat, 2%.”