130 Marketing Trends found for Corporate / Mergers/alliances/demergers

... communications.

Added Mr Rangaiah: "We are particularly interested in blockchain's potential to solve many of the issues facing programmatic buying today."

By design, blockchains are inherently resistant to modification of the data. Once recorded, the data in any given block cannot be altered retroactively without the alteration of all subsequent blocks and the collusion of the network. Functionally, a blockchain can serve as "an open, distributed ledger that can record transactions between two parties efficiently and in a verifiable and permanent way. The ledger itself can also be programmed to trigger transactions automatically."

A blockchain is typically managed by a peer-to-peer network collectively adhering to a protocol for validating new blocks. By design, blockchains are inherently resistant to modification of the data. Once recorded, the data in any given block cannot be altered retroactively without the alteration of all subsequent blocks and the collusion of the network

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... address the growing challenge of cross-channel identity and attribution in marketing.

The program brings together top level marketers, agents and data professionals across the full spectrum of the advertising ecosystem in a bid to address common issues related to measuring and tracking consumer behavior and interaction.

Addressing the Identity Council’s kick-off workshop Jacob Ciesielski, Vice President of Data Technology Solutions at FCB/SIX said: “We are now at a point where technology has surpassed our expectations as marketers.”

According to Mr Ciesielski, “Marketers are trying to leverage everything that is available to connect identities across platforms, create seamless user experiences, and personalize experiences.”

As mobile device usage continues to increase and consumer attention fragments from screen to screen, tracking the customer journey, online and off, is considered to be one of the biggest challenges of our time.

The DMA’s Identity Council bridges the gap by bringing diverse companies together to produce solutions that they may not have been able to develop themselves.

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... "annoying experiences."

Google's move, anticipated since word got out in April, will impact the entire advertising ecosystem because Larry and Sergey's Chrome is the world's most popular web browser for desktop and mobile users alike.

According to Sridhar Ramaswamy, senior VP of ads and commerce at Google: "We've all known for a while that the ad experience is a real problem, that has confused and angered users".

"We realised that solutions such as ad blockers punish everybody, including publishers who develop great content and are thoughtful about the ad experience they put on their site."

However, Google isn't calling its technology an ad blocker, instead classifying it as a "filter" that removes the ads that consumers hate most.

The hate list include pop-ups, ads that flash quickly, change colors or force people to wait ten seconds before accessing content on a publisher's page.

The plan to install such software on Chrome is a result of work by the Coalition for Better Ads, whose members include Google, Procter & Gamble, Unilever, WPP's GroupM, Facebook, Thomson Reuters and The Washington Post along with the Interactive Advertising Bureau and the Association of National Advertisers.

Read the original unabridged Adage.com article.

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...  big data and artificial intelligence, aiming to drive better performance and deeper intelligence for advertisers and marketers.

Amnet will have access to iFlytek’s expertise in machine learning, voice recognition and big data analytics, while iFlytek aims to use the deal to expand its services beyond AI technology to incorporate data-driven advertising.

iFlytek, which was founded in 1999, is one of China’s leading tech companies specialising in intelligent speech and language technologies. It has 70% of China’s speech technology market, having created the application largely referred to as 'China’s Siri' and also created China’s first AI project, iFlytek Hyper Brain.

According to Lawrence Wan, managing director of Amnet China: “With our iFlytek strategic partnership, we are exclusively co-developing breakthrough products that will fundamentally evolve advertising to a new level. This includes tapping into their marketing leading connection into China’s intelligent TV’s smart homes and intelligent cars, amongst others.“

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... seamless system spanning the two titans. 

The partners announced the deal yesterday (March 21) at the annual Adobe Summit, and emphasised the importance of using open source technology and software to de-silo the information they have at their joint disposal.

They went on to explain how this joint approach will help marketers more easily compile customer insights across various channels, creating a single view of the customer that can be used to personalize experiences across marketing touchpoints.

Extolling the sweetheart deal Scott Guthrie, executive vice president of Microsoft’s cloud and enterprise division said: “It’s going to enable to customers to go beyond the current (software) silos they have to navigate today”.

Data sharing between the twin titans  aims to provide businesses with better services by enabling crossover of users from one business to the other, expanding their pools of prospective customers.

Read the original unabridged The Drum.com article.

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...  "is the best outcome marketers could have hoped for in the industry".

The acquisition puts AOL on solid ground as the third platform CMOs must take seriously in the wake of Google and Facebook.

However, rivaling Facebook and Google is no easy task. Effectively integrating the myriad businesses into a single Verizon entity will be vital.

The deal's benefits to both Yahoo/AOL and the global advertising industry are legion. Speaking to MediaPost's Jay Friedman, Goodway Group's COO explained to Real-Time Daily via email: “This is the best outcome marketers could have hoped for in the industry. This acquisition puts AOL on solid ground as the third platform CMOs must take a meeting with behind Google and Facebook".

Verizon intends to compete with Google and Facebook in an industry where “scale is imperative.” And scale is the name of the game given that Yahoo brings with it an audience of one billion active worldwide users - including 600 million active mobile users, a host of influential consumer brand partnerships, a powerful programmatic advertising and data platform and a robust editorial team.

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... growth of ad blocking software.

The WFA, which represents marketers at major brands who collectively represent circa 90% of global adspend, made the announcement in response to recent research into ad blocking on mobiles.

According to a new study by ad blocking solutions company PageFair there are at least 419 million people worldwide blocking ads on their smartphones.

The WFA has responded to PageFair's findings by attributing the growth of ad blocking technology to consumers who lose patience with online ads. A solution to the problem, the WFA suggests, is better quality ads.

The trade body also proposes that all representative parties in the advertising chain - marketers, publishers and ad tech companies - form a global coalition to regulate ads.

Commenting on the news of the proposal, Jed Hallam, head of digital strategy at WPP Group's media arm Mindshare, said: “The WFA should be applauded for its proposed creation of a global advertising watchdog”.

He warned, however, there are “some gaps in the WFA's proposition which need to be addressed.

According to Mr Hallam: “Firstly, at the end of every ad is a human, so the interests of consumers need to be represented in order to cater to their needs and wants. Secondly distribution isn’t the only concern with online advertising – content also needs to be improved. People don’t block ads solely because they’re invasive or high frequency, they also block them because they are annoying and contain what they deem to be irrelevant content.”

Read the original unabridged TheDrum.com article.

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... self-initiated tasks to a two-way "conversation".

The Chatbots are about to be launched by a raft of big names, among them Kik Messenger, Microsoft and Facebook. The mighty trio will virtually guarantee that the bots go mainstream virtually overnight.

According to Mike Roberts, head of messenger services at Kik:"Every major messenger is in [the chatbot space], and I can't remember the last time we've all made a bet together. It's only going to drive more interest."

Moreover, Facebook is expected to introduce a bot store. It has been trialling a service with six US retailers and last week announced a partnership with Dutch airline KLM, enabling Messenger users to automatically receive their itinerary, flight updates, check-in notifications, get their boarding passes, rebook flights when needed, and communicate with the airline "all from one contextual, canonical thread".

"Human language is the new user interface," hypes Microsoft ceo Satya Nadella, adding "Bots are like apps and digital assistants are like meta apps, or the new browsers. Intelligence is infused into all of your apps."

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... to make a shopping list.

This means it will be becessary to embed chips in your sofa, your wallet and your refrigerator to enable them to communicate with the rest of the world. And those chips will need power to run their communications.

In some cases this power will come from the electricity grid or a battery, although this is not always convenient. However scientists at the University of Washington in Seattle believe they have at least part of an answer to the problem: to reconfigure a chip’s communications so that they need almost no power to work.

Most conceptions of the internet of things assume that the chips in sofas, wallets, fridges and so on will use technologies such as Wi-Fi and Bluetooth to communicate with each other - either directly over short ranges or via a base-station connected to the outside world for long range connectivity.

However, for a conventional chip to broadcast a Wi-Fi signal requires two things. First, it must generate a narrow-band carrier wave. Secondly it must impress upon this wave a digital signal that a receiver can interpret.

Following Moore’s Law (that the number of transistors in a dense integrated circuit doubles approximately every two years) the components responsible for doing the impressing have become ever more efficient over the past couple of decades. However, those generating the carrier wave  have not done so.

Not having to generate its own carrier wave reduces a chip’s power consumption ten-thousandfold, because throwing the switch requires only a minuscule amount of current. Moreover, though trial prototypes do still use batteries, this current could instead be extracted from the part of the carrier wave that is absorbed.

Read the original unabridged Economist.com article.

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... the next two years.

The most controverisial issue the SmartLabel is intended to address is the use of ingredients made from genetically modified organisms [GMO], crops whose DNA is engineered to produce traits such as pest resistance.

The US government currently allows production of multiple GMO crops and many science groups deem them safe. However, some consumer advocacy organisations claim that  GMOs potentially harm the environment and human health, and urge that products containing them be labelled.

However, food industry officials argue that mandatory labeling would be confusing and costly, and that companies should not be compelled by law to label foods containing GMO.

The SmartLabel—which allows but doesn’t compel companies to reveal GMO ingredients—is a step toward doing that. The GMA estimates that by the end of 2017, companies will disclose information on GMOs via SmartLabel technology for some 20,000 products.

Read the original unabridged WSJ.com article.

All data sources are attributed with links to the original insight. The insight is then summarised and, where appropriate, enhanced with additional information.