Winter 2016 State of Media

STATE OF MEDIA
WINTER 2016
PLUS!
Emoji Marketing
Digital Influencers
What’s Next for Magazines
The Future of Advertising
Social is the New Search
Unbundling Cable
Sports Update
President
Letter from the
WINTER 2016
State of Media
Contents
The new year… It comes with a mixture of excitement over fresh
possibilities, while also offering valuable time to reflect on the past
year’s learnings.
When looking back for this edition, we took a moment to recap the
2015 holiday shopping season’s top trends by pitting KSM’s fall survey
predictions against the latest numbers (page 8). I think it provides a
concise overview for those looking to sift through the jumble of postholiday articles.
But as many of you know, 2016 is going to be a very busy year for
media and marketing professionals. The presidential blitz is now in
full swing, and will only continue to rev up in the coming months.
With this in mind, KSM once again partnered with research firm
ORC International to run a custom study, this time focusing on how
political marketing influences voters (page 20). Our findings offer
valuable takeaways for both political marketers and those looking to
avoid the noise.
Sports marketing will also be a hot topic in the coming year, with the
Olympics and new U.S. league branding opportunities both in focus.
And it seems we can never go a day without reading some interesting
yet often contradictory headlines about the evolving media landscape.
Our team boils down what you really need to know about cable, along
with the newest developments in online media.
On a more seasonal note, I’ve always felt there’s something special
about a glaze of freshly fallen snow across the city. Hopefully wherever
you are, this winter continues to bring you some beautiful scenery
before the spring’s eventual, and welcome thaw.
’s
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WHAT’S NEW
Joni Williams
President
312.621.9230
[email protected]
04 l Emoji Marketing
Marketers in the digital
landscape have a new
language to learn. Find
out how emojis can
be utilized to better
connect with digitallysavvy audiences.
06 l AI and Advertising
What do new
automated capabilities
mean for the future of
advertising?
LAST WORD
08 l Holiday Recap
We revisit the 2015
holiday shopping
season’s top trends.
10 l Cable Update
Find out how cable
providers intend to
defend their future grip
on the contested format.
14 l Social Search
Word-of-mouth on
social is now more
important than ever.
16 l Digital Influencers
Discover the new faces
of the digital red carpet.
19 l Olympics
Five elements to watch.
27 l What’s Next for
Magazines?
With sluggish
subscription and ad
revenue numbers, is a
RESEARCH FOCUS Netflix-style platform the
20 l Political Marketing solution for magazines?
KSM’s latest research
30 l Sports Corner
Recent discussions might
study explores what
bring jersey advertising
voters think about
to the four major U.S.
political advertising
leagues.
and its influence.
State of Media l 3
i
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E eting
k
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By Kelsey Maciejewski
4 l Winter 2016
There is no doubt that the popularity of emojis is here
to stay. What started as a silly add-on to text messages has
now become a universal digital language of its own. With the
rise of this new mode of communication, brands and agencies
are consciously making the effort to leverage emojis to connect with their consumers in ways that have not been possible
in the past.
Just as people use emojis to add personality and
charm to their texts and social media posts, brands are following suit. With the use of an emoji, brands and consumers
alike can express more complex ideas through one-character
pictures. Some brands have even created rich-media campaigns around emojis.
This past year, Taco Bell launched a petition on
Change.org to convince Unicode Consortium (a non-profit
that has a hand in identifying new emojis) to create a taco
emoji. The campaign received 33,000 virtual signatures, successfully convincing Unicode to add a taco into the emoji catalog in July 2015. Taco Bell then leveraged this win by launching a creative social campaign, where the fast-food restaurant
invited Twitter users to tweet a taco emoji aside any additional emoji to the @tacobell handle in order to receive an
illustrated response. More than 600 variations of possible
responses, some animated and others stagnant images, encouraged large volumes of tweets. For example, by typing
in a taco emoji next to a lightning bolt emoji, users received
a tweet from Taco Bell that included an animated video of a
taco-headed Zeus throwing lightning bolts at objects to turn
them into tacos. Another variation allowed users to tweet the
taco emoji next to a smiley face, which generated an image of
a taco emoji wearing sunglasses. Taco Bell branded the campaign with the #TacoEmojiEngine hashtag to generate buzz
and awareness.
A recent study by Instagram showed that brands are
increasing their focus on creative engagement with audiences as more advertisers move to this platform. Creative use of
branded hashtags, emojis and even emoji hashtags (where
the emoji replaces text usually included next to a hashtag)
have been proven to help brands pop amongst their competition. Instagram revealed that 35 percent of brands are now
utilizing emojis in their posts in order to connect with audiences. While this study also shows that emojis in posts open the
door for more audience engagement, advertisers now need
to go the extra mile to deliver a creative message, rather than
just placing an emoji at the end of a post.
Millennials and post-millennials have quick thumbs,
short texts and are very emoji-savvy. For brands to stand out
amidst the digital clutter, it’s imperative that they stay on top
of emoji messaging trends. For instance, Bud Light recreated
an American flag made entirely out of three emojis: the flag,
a star and a beer. The beer company then tweeted this emoji
“collage” to its followers on the Fourth of July, including the
trending #4thofJuly hashtag for added visibility. Although this
tweet only lasted a day, it resonated well with their Twitter
audience in a timely and creative way, garnering more than
145,000 retweets.
Likewise, Chevy adopted the emoji tactic by issuing
a press release made up entirely of emoji characters to which
they explained, “Words alone can’t describe the new 2016
Chevrolet Cruz.” Chevy generated buzz around the release
of their new 2016 model by challenging users to decode the
message and share their results using the hashtag #ChevygoesEmoji. This campaign resonated well with Twitter users and has been applauded by digital marketers as well.
Such campaigns make it clear that advertisers
must accept emojis as a form of communication, and more
importantly, learn to speak this new illustrative language.
State of Media l 5
ARTIFICIAL
INTELLIGENCE
AND THE
FUTURE OF
ADVERTISING
By Omer Fazal
Professor Stephen Hawking recently
warned the world that “the development of full artificial intelligence could
spell the end of the human race.” While
this may bring images of a Terminator-style apocalypse to the mind, it is
still farfetched based on existing technology. “Full artificial intelligence” or
machines that match or surpass human
intelligence do not yet exist. However, artificial intelligence (AI) working
in collaboration with humans is more
common now and has impacted many
industries, including media and advertising. It’s exciting to be able to get a
sense of the future by looking at some
of the ways AI has already and will continue to impact marketers and the
advertising landscape.
Perhaps the biggest impact
AI has had on advertising is in digital
media via programmatic buying and
planning platforms that utilize complex
algorithms to perform a variety of functions. Connecting ad buyers with sellers
to serve individual users with ads at
the optimal price can now be achieved
with little or no human intervention.
While bidding for an ad, these complex
decision science systems also utilize
machine learning to decide which ads
should be served to which consumers.
Systems like this take into
account multiple factors such as how
often users are online, their browsing behavior, what types of ads they
respond to the most and what types of
ads they ignore. To determine cost, the
data informs the bid model and determines probability of success in serving
an ad to the right type of consumer.
The higher the probability of success,
the higher the bid will be. This happens
billions of times a day for thousands of
advertisers, all in a fraction of a second.
However, if this is what machines can
do for us now, where does it go from
here? In short, the answer is simply
that there will be a higher volume of
programmatic across all formats. Programmatic technology has the potential
to encapsulate all media buying and
planning across every channel, including TV, out-of-home, print and radio,
but the infrastructure isn’t yet ready
for this. As trade activity increases in
scale, it is certain that one of the future
technology giants vying for the largest
volume will launch a universal planning
and execution system that can merge
all forms of offline and online media.
Advertisers will not be able to ignore
the tremendous benefits of an interface
like this. What’s more, the increased
cross-channel measurement and
real-time insight possibilities will make
ads more relevant and targeted
than ever.
Last year the biggest U.S.
magazine publisher, Time Inc., started
selling the inventory of its print magazines programmatically. The thought
behind this move was that the ability
to buy print programmatically might
U.S. Programmatic Digital Ad Spending,
by Transaction Method, 2013-2016
billions, % change and % of total programmatic digital display
ad spending
2013
Real-time bidding (RTB)*
—% change
—% of total programmatic digital
display ad spending
Programmatic direct**
—% change
—%of total programmatic digital
display ad spending
2014
2015
2016
$4.16
$9.19
$11.01
$11.84
106.6%
121.1%
19.8%
7.5%
98.0%
92.0%
74.0%
58.0%
$0.08
$0.80
$3.87
$8.57
317.5%
842.0%
383.9%
121.6%
2.0%
8.0%
26.0%
42.0%
Note: includes advertising that appears on desktop/laptop computers as
well as mobile phones and tablets; *includes programmatic ads that are
transacted in real time, at the impression level; **includes all
programmatic ads that are transacted as blocks of inventory using a
non-auction-based approach via an API
Source: eMarketer, March 2015
help attract ad budgets to the medium.
Although it is a far cry from the algorithmically targeted digital ads, since Time
Inc.’s offer covers just 18 demographic
or interest-based groups, it is still a
groundbreaking effort that points out
new opportunities for programmatic
buying.
Katz Radio Network, one of
the biggest in the U.S., has also started
to sell radio spots on its programmatic exchange. The exchange does not
include real-time bidding, but is more
focused on automating the buying
process, which is currently extremely
labor intensive. However, most of the
research and development in offline
programmatic is happening around TV.
IPG Media Brands’ programmatic arm
Cadreon, has partnered with TubeMogul to build a TV automation platform.
This marks one of the first examples of
a proprietary, and inventory-agnostic
demand-side platform for TV. A panel of
buy-side and sell-side experts at comScore’s industry summit on the future
of audiences and advertising agreed
that this isn’t just an isolated test; TV is
indeed going programmatic. According
to a recent report by IPG MediaBrands’
Magna Global, programmatic TV will
reach 17 percent (or $10 billion) of global
TV budgets by 2019. Reliable figures on
programmatic spend for offline formats,
such as magazine and radio, aren’t yet
reported. However, continued growth
in automated buying for those formats
is inevitable and tied only to the speed
at which infrastructure and systems can
be upgraded.
On the creative front, AI is now
being tested to develop creative assets
and ad copy based on real-time learning. Last year a partnership between
M&C Saatchi, Clear Channel and Posterscope created “the world’s first ever
artificially intelligent posted campaign,”
at least according to their words. The
program reads audience reactions and
changes its behavior depending on that
interaction. It starts with a broad set of
photos and copy, and from there, 22
ads are created for each test run, with
the program determining the overall
success of each ad. Ads that work then
move on to the next round, and those
deemed unsuccessful are removed.
David Cox, chief innovation officer of
M&C Saatchi told the Guardian last July,
“It’s a Darwinian algorithm; it’ll evolve
to be more and more effective.” As of
that month, 1,540 ads had been automatically served. The first set of results
State of Media l 7
showed that shorter copy seems to be most popular, and
images of hearts were used more frequently.
If a machine is able to write copy and employ decision sciences to continuously improve ads in real-time,
what implications does this have for the future of creative
ad work? As it stands now, the human touch is still required
to fine tune the final ad and the machine generated ads can
be chosen and signed off on before they are served. In fact,
human touch will be necessary for the foreseeable future, at
least prior to the point where a machine surpasses human
“intelligence” or intuition. Still, interesting examples of this
increased automation are popping up in other sectors of the
media business as well.
On the editorial front, the Associated Press (AP) partnered with Automated Insights and now uses their “Wordsmith” technology to publish quarterly earnings reports written entirely by this AI platform. Before this implementation,
AP estimates it was doing 300 reports each quarter. Now it
generates 3,000 such reports every quarter. Obviously if this
kind of technology is successful and eventually made widely
available to newsrooms across the country, the industry can
expect staffs to be trimmed even more down the road. Of
course, continued efforts by IBM with its Watson program
will eventually bring many beneficial decision science services to not only media companies, but those in practically
every industry imaginable.
Another big storyline that marketers will be watching
in the coming months is Adobe. At Summit Europe in April
2015, Adobe announced the company acquired Tumri advertising technology to extend its programmatic advertising
capabilities. The technology enables dynamic creative optimization based on website behavior, audiences and context
in real-time at the last millisecond of marketing. Surely if a
vendor of this size continues to make these kinds of acquisitions, it will have some wondering if Adobe might become
the first big player to unite all media formats into one programmatic system.
The ability of machines to analyze vast amounts of
data to learn, adapt and create has the potential to unleash
insights that may have been beyond the realm of human
imagination and that is why tech giants like Google, Microsoft, Facebook and Adobe are investing heavily in AI. Advertising will undoubtedly be impacted by automation technology, and both media and creative agencies will be leading
automation research, design and implementation. The job
market will inevitably evolve too, but it will also liberate many
from doing menial tasks, allowing them to spend more time
focusing on innovation and strategy. Advertising professionals and brands alike will have to be progressively savvy with
digital and comfortable learning about the inner-workings
of programmatic technology since it will eventually become
one of most important keys to creating successful
ad campaigns.
Prog
ram!
Execute!
De
liv
er!
UNBUNDLING
CABLE
By Elizabeth Kalmbach and Luz Lopez-Montera
Linear pay TV has received a lot of bad press this year in light
of continuous streaming success stories for properties like
Netflix, Amazon Prime and even Hulu. Most trade publications
tout the unstoppable power of online streaming, and its ever-growing ability to attract subscribers and viewers away from
the world of traditional, linear TV (broadcast and cable). These
discussions are usually framed in terms of declining ratings for
all linear TV, as well as the overall pay TV subscription universe.
“Cord nevers” and “cord shavers” are increasingly considered
the norm in a more price-conscious and on-demand world.
However, don’t write off the cable companies, networks and
content producers yet. There are ever-growing challenges in
the landscape, but cable providers still hold the keys to the
kingdom, and they intend to defend their future grip on
U.S. TV homes.
Cable networks had a rocky 2015 as they adjusted
ratings and revenue projections based on the new viewing
landscape. Finding audiences through online and traditional
channels, and monetizing both based on different viewing
experiences has proven to be one of the greatest challenges
the video world has ever faced. Demand for traditional television programming is greater than ever before, but navigating
different pricing models for advertising, airing and licensing
broadcast rights to multiple viewing platforms is no easy feat.
The mid-year 2015 financial reports showed cable networks
reporting cautious downgrades to their revenue projections
and sent the entertainment market into a tailspin. Production
giants like Viacom and Disney seemed to be acknowledging
trouble ahead in the television marketplace. Viacom ended the
year with declines over 2014, but Discovery Channel, AMC and
FOX News all experienced year-over-year gains due in part to
hit original programming within younger demographics and
surprisingly popular live current-event shows like the
Republican debates.
It has been estimated that around 2 to 3 million TV
homes (approximately 2 to 3 percent of all U.S. TV homes) have
reduced the number of channels they receive or cut the cord
completely since 2012. The overwhelming demand for cable
still exists, but networks are preparing for a decline in subscriptions over the next five years. How fast that decline could
10 l Winter 2016
accelerate in the next
few years is up for debate, but it’s
clear that pay TV providers need to
evolve with consumer demand. Approximately 85 percent of U.S. households currently subscribe to traditional
pay TV services. Financial services firm SNL
Kagan has estimated that by 2020 this total
will be down to 82 percent if current trends
continue. Though this decline might not
be defined as a “mass exodus,” it’s clear
that general displeasure with cable companies and their services may drive viewership down further, and competition has
opened the door to alternative content sources for
disgruntled consumers.
The major cable multiple-system operators
(MSOs) have spent the last two years aggressively
addressing their weaknesses in an effort to retain
their subscriber bases. According to Nielsen the
average consumer receives 194 channels in
their cable subscription, of which they regularly
watch only 17. That number hasn’t changed despite the growing number of cable networks
over the past two decades. The most popular
channels have always been packaged with
less popular networks, which over time has
created consumer discomfort in the face of rising cable costs and “wasteful” channel lineups.
Cable bills have been steadily rising to
a current average of $99 a month and roughly 40
percent of that cost has been added over the
last five years alone. In light of these sharply
increasing costs, and the plethora of online,
free (or far less expensive) viewing alternatives, consumers are looking for adjustments
while cable companies are attempting to
evolve in a new, more competitive world.
To address cost sensitivity among
consumers, cable MSOs have developed
“skinny bundles,” or slightly smaller channel
packages in order to maintain subscribers
and appeal to unique channel preferences.
Lower-cost subscription offerings from Verizon, Charter, Comcast and satellite providers hit the market in 2015 amidst lackluster
reviews. Though priced lower, consumers
responded with less interest than originally
expected. Most packages do not offer true
freedom of choice to subscribers due to
standing network carriage agreements requiring cable providers to deliver contracted
subscriber numbers. In fact, ESPN is currently
suing Verizon for releasing arguably the most
flexible skinny bundle on the market today
because they say the offering directly violates
Verizon’s agreement terms with the network.
Verizon’s package allows customers to swap
channels in and out of their bundle every
month, presenting a risky proposition for a
network like ESPN, which relies on consistent
“
subscriber numbers to fund its extremely
high-priced sports broadcasting rights.
Poised to create more challenges
in the linear pay TV landscape are over-thetop (OTT) facilitators who intend to capitalize
on cable providers’ contractual issues and
expand their services. As networks and cable
providers fight it out in court, trend-setting
OTT players like Apple TV, Sony PlayStation
Vue and Netflix are preparing to release more
well-rounded services that include subscription video-on-demand (SVOD), as well as live
streaming from major stations like ABC, FOX,
FX, ESPN, HBO and more. Sony PlayStation
Vue has rolled out packages ranging from
50 to 85 channels and will be positioned as
an alternative option to cable subscription,
touting an excellent overall user experience.
So how can cable providers compete
in an increasingly fragmented world with the
limitations created by network subscriber requirements? One way is through maximizing
pay TV video-on-demand usage. Upgrading
set-top box (STB) technology and the user experience through recommendation menu interfaces and more sophisticated guides help
consumers find what’s airing and experience
a more smooth viewing experience in a linear
world. At the same time, these new menus
,
33 875 VOD
movie and TV
programming
titles [are]
available to the
average pay TV
subscriber versus
Amazon s
17 309
, ’
”
Share of Viewership Among Age Groups
56%
VOD
TV
VOD users are younger
29%
27%
23%
19%
11%
13%
8%
9%
4%
Age:
K2-11
T12-17
A18-34
A35-49
A-50+
Cable operators have a wealth of STB
data on every household in the U.S.
and taking these viewership learnings
and applying them to VOD content
can enhance the overall effectiveness
of pay TV advertising.
offer suggestions for VOD programming, which helps keep
viewers on the pay TV platform. Cable providers can flaunt
an extremely deep library of content due to their access
to network programming via carriage deals. Most importantly, VOD content is ad-supported, making the cable and
broadcast networks happy to supply the additional viewing
platform with nearly unlimited programming.
Nielsen recently found that pay TV VOD is currently
available in about 62 percent of U.S. households and offers far greater variety of viewing titles than Netflix, Hulu or
Amazon. In fact, as of 2014, SNL Kagan reported that 33,875
VOD movie and TV programming titles were available to
the average pay TV subscriber versus Amazon’s 17,309. As
the deepest library in the SVOD landscape, Amazon came
nowhere near pay TV VOD offerings.
According to 2015 studies conducted by DigitalSmiths and Ericcson ConsumerLab, the three major issues
cable providers face in the current complex video marketplace are price, customer service and over-abundance of
choice. Consumers cite rising pay TV costs as the number
one reason they consider thinning or cutting the pay TV
cord. Depending on the study, 30 to 50 percent of those
considering cutting the cord say it is primarily or secondarily
due to poor response time, old technology or inconvenient
calls provided by their cable service. And more choice hasn’t
exactly been a good thing. Consumers still say that too many
channel options within a rigid linear schedule makes for an
inconvenient viewing experience. A recent study by Ericsson
Consumer Lab found that about 50 percent of consumers
watching linear TV say they can’t find anything to watch at
least once a day. That number rises to 62 percent for consumers 25 to 34 years old. A DigitalSmiths 2015 study found
similar complaints from consumers struggling to find content.
Among households considering cutting the pay TV cord, 44
percent said they would consider keeping pay TV if their provider released new functionality that made it easier to find
something to watch.
As pay TV VOD provides user interface upgrades
and greater content libraries, time spent with their platform
12 l Winter 2016
increases and viewers get younger. In third quarter of 2015,
Nielsen reported that pay TV VOD users are primarily 18 to
49 years old and their share of audience exceeds that of
traditional TV. Pay TV VOD enjoys a nearly 30 percent share
of 18- to 34-year-olds as compared to the 13 percent traditional TV captures. HUB Entertainment Research found that
only 29 percent of millennials watch time-shifted TV in order
to skip ads and instead cited convenience and “catch-up TV”
as their primary reasons for delayed viewing. These findings
would seem to indicate that the platform isn’t necessarily the
driver for time shifting. If given the choice between an adfree viewing experience on Netflix and a forced ad-viewing
experience on most pay TV VOD platforms, this audience
will follow the content and a convenient user experience.
This is certainly good news for advertisers trying to find
time-shifted audiences increasingly fleeing the traditional
TV space.
Even more important though, are the data applications of the pay TV VOD space. Cable operators have
a wealth of STB data on every household in the U.S. and
taking these viewership learnings and applying them to VOD
content can enhance the overall effectiveness of pay TV
advertising. Unlike Netflix’s proprietary user information that
can only be applied to future streaming rights purchases,
pay TV is taking steps to publish and capitalize on viewer behaviors from a marketing standpoint. New technology built
into the user interface can recommend VOD programming
(similar to Netflix), as well as live TV and will likely be further
enriched by product placement and video advertising based
on household information. Expect pay TV VOD to attempt
to catch up to the technology touted by OTT landscape over
the next 12 months. Advertisers will rejoice, but only time will
tell whether it’s too little too late to justify the high cost of
pay TV subscriptions.
Soc|
social
100,000 people talking about this
social media
50,000 people talking about this
Search engines aren’t the only way consumers are
discovering brands these days.
Like
social is the new mantra
8,308 people talking about this
Social is the New Search
Popular Search- 100,000 people talking about this
Article by Sara Brown
W
ord-of-mouth has always been a powerful
tool for finding and choosing new products
or services. Even with advances in digital technology and new ways to reach consumers, word-ofmouth continues to be one of the top consumer influencers.
In a MarketingSherpa poll from August 2015, 57 percent of respondents cited word-of-mouth as one of the best
ways to discover new products, beating out a multitude of
other sources including search engines, offline and online advertising. However, advances in technology over the past few
years have provided word-of-mouth recommendations and
reviews a new mass platform: social media. The Internet has
infused new reach and power into word-of-mouth and accessing it has never been easier thanks to new search capabilities.
The word “search” automatically evokes the names of
Google or Bing, but when it comes to finding word-of-mouth
recommendations online, the big players often fall short. Social media platforms, where digital word-of-mouth typically
lives, have a variety of privacy controls and firewalls that make
it hard for search engines to access them, and due to privacy issues, integrating personal social interactions into search
engine results never took off. Twitter has resisted access from
Google, using technological barriers to block its content from
being ranked on the engine. Facebook also resisted integrating its content into search engines, and instead partnered
with Bing to power their own internal search technology called
Graph Search.
14 l Winter 2016
In the absence of data from major players like Facebook and Twitter, Google created its own network called
Google+, but few users were motivated to add yet another
platform to their list for the simple benefit of having socially
integrated search results. This means that established social
networks are still the vaults of personal opinions and reviews,
and it is not easy to pry that data free and match it up to billions of web pages.
Users have adapted to the lack of social search. Rather than scouring the big search engines and later asking their
social channels about the results, they’re going straight to the
source and searching their own social networks. This has lead
to the rise of powerful new search tools integrated directly
into social media platforms. Fragmented data across millions
of posts on Facebook is now easily sorted and accessed via
an ever-evolving search algorithm powered by the Bing Graph
Search partnership. Twitter’s Advanced Search tool lets users
quickly see the latest posts from a particular person, place
or topic. Yelp reviews of everything from dog groomers to
cocktail bars are easily accessed and sorted by time, rating or
language. Even music platforms such as Pandora now allow
users to access curated playlists created by friends
and celebrities.
L’Oreal has taken advantage of these developments,
targeting users scouring Twitter and Instagram for red carpet looks during the 2015 Golden Globes. The brand created
Comment
Share
shoppable images with its products and included the event
hashtag, #GoldenGlobes. The how-to GIFs matched stars’
looks with L’Oreal products and garnered
21 million impressions.
Starbucks also took advantage of social chatter in
2014 with the “real PSL” campaign, which capitalized on the
pumpkin craze that takes over social media every fall. By replying to fans on Twitter and driving them to a branded Tumblr
contest, the coffee-making giant was able to spark engagement for its pumpkin spiced lattes and drive a 22 percent increase in sales over the previous fall.
Search engines are and always will be a powerful
tool for finding information, but when it comes to the power of word-of-mouth, social media reigns. When an individual wants to know what restaurant to eat at, he or she turns
to Foursquare or Yelp. When someone wants to know what
music to listen to, that person turns to Spotify. What video to
watch? YouTube. Where to go on vacation? TripAdvisor. What
breaking news to read? Twitter. These networks have the
kinds of recommendation answers that users are looking for
on such a wide array of topics that they have now become a
new type of search engine.
Today the dream of social search filtering through one
central engine has largely been halted, as social networks are
expected to continue resisting the major engines’ access to
necessary content. However, searching on individual social
platforms is expanding rapidly and getting better each day. If
brands aren’t present and engaging on social media through
original content or partnerships with fans and influencers,
they’re missing out on a whole new world of word-of-mouth.
Users are searching their networks for recommendations, reviews and more, so brands must ensure their content is included in the mix.
Ways of Discovering
New Products from
Brands and Retailers
According to
U.S. Internet Users
% of respondents
In-store browsing
59%
Word-of-mouth from friends, family and collegues
57%
Using a search engine
47%
Articles in print magazines/newspapers
34%
Through offline advertising
27%
Through online advertising
26%
Customer reviews on the comany’s site
22%
Professional reviews through social media accounts of friends,
family, colleagues
20%
In-store recommendations from a salesperson
18%
Through online content directly from the company
16%
Through outside online content
15%
Automated personalized product recommendations on an
ecommerce site (e.g., “you might also like”)
10%
Talk with a customer service representative at an ecommerce
site
10%
Other articles
14%
Other
5%
Note: ages 18+
Source: MarketingSherpa as cited in Adweek, Nov 1, 2015
State of Media l 15
W
hile Hollywood has always been synonymous with
the stars, a new breed of celebrity has risen to power in a
world far beyond California. Online influencers with massive audiences now live and thrive on platforms such as
Facebook, YouTube, Instagram and blogs. They were once
average social posters with big personalities who eventually
amassed large and loyal online audiences through original
content. Their ascensions caught the interest of brands,
eventually leading to paid partnerships. While teaming up
with online influencers is not a new concept, these potential
ambassadors are now giving traditional celebrity spokespeople some tight competition for marketers’ money. Given
the increasing focus toward valuing engagement over
reach, this shift is happening with good reason.
Before diving in, it’s important to note the origin of
the social media influencer phenomenon: people love to
share. For the millions of consumers born into the digital
age, creating and sharing content is second nature. Zeroing
in on Instagram for some perspective, more than 60 million
photos are uploaded on Instagram every day, according
to WeRSM. In other words, the blog recently stated that
the height of photos uploaded to Instagram every 12 hours
would reach Mount Everest (8,848 meters), and every six
days would reach the outer edge of the earth’s atmosphere
(100,000 meters). Clearly the amount of content shared
online is mind-blowing and is only continuing to grow.
Online influencers emerged alongside this explosion of content. These unique personalities have built large,
16 l Winter 2016
loyal communities through original content and serve as relatable, trusted sources for consumers. They have become
celebrities in their own right and proven that the biggest
names in Hollywood are not necessarily the best fit for any
given brand, nor always the most influential or valuable.
Forbes recently released its first-ever ranking of
top-paid YouTube stars, basing data figures from Nielsen
and IMDB, as well as from interviews with those connected
to the stars including agents, managers, lawyers and industry insiders. The top 13 stars have attracted millions of fans
and a pretty penny from brands. Topics include baking and
makeup tutorials, pranks, comedy acts, videogame commentary, violin dancing, reaction videos and even live-action skits based on Pokémon games. The top YouTube earner of 2015, PewDiePie (whose real name is Felix Kjellberg),
raked in $12 million. In July 2014, his “playing videogames
with your bros” channel collected more than 10 billion video
views, surpassing RihannaVEVO and becoming the most
viewed channel of all time. Also in 2015, PewDiePie was
included on Time Magazine’s list of the 30 most influential
people on the Internet. Although PewDiePie has partnered
with brands such as Mountain Dew, he conducts very few
promotions and works with few brands by choice.
According to a 2014 survey by Variety, PewDiePie is
not only more influential but also more popular than mainstream celebrities among U.S. teenagers between the ages
of 13 to 18. Defy Media makes a case that online influencers,
specifically those on YouTube, rival traditional celebrities.
Among U.S. teenage Internet users polled in November
2014, 54 percent followed YouTubers on social platforms
compared to 42 percent who followed TV and movie stars.
Making millions from YouTube may seem crazy, but it’s not
so unreasonable when taking into account the massive fan
bases and unprecedented engagement statistics. A recent
study by software maker ZEFR found that not only do influencers often have follower counts on social media that rival
traditional celebrities, they boast greater engagement in
many instances too.
One example is ZEFR’s comparison between
Connor Franta, a popular YouTube star, and Jimmy Fallon,
currently the most popular TV host in the U.S. The results
indicated that while Fallon’s average reach across social
platforms was 207 percent higher than Franta’s (38.4 million
for Fallon versus 12.5 million for Franta), Franta’s engagement was 66 percent greater (2 million for Franta versus 1.2
million for Fallon). Another compared Grace Helbig, who got
her start on YouTube and Kelly Ripa, a traditional star who’s
been on TV for more than 20 years. Not only did Helbig
achieve 60 percent greater average reach across social
platforms (4.1 million for Helbig versus 2.6 million for Ripa),
she also scored a whopping 721 percent greater engagement (312,800 for Helbig versus 38,100 for Ripa).
Grace Helbig is a great example of how online influencers are redefining or morphing into mainstream celebrities. Helbig parlayed her success on YouTube into her own
talk show on E! called “The Grace Helbig Project” and wrote
a book that eventually topped the New York Times Best-
seller list called “Grace’s Guide: The Art of Pretending to be
a Grown-up.” Not to mention, she was nominated this year
for “Choice Web Star” on FOX’s Teen Choice Awards. This
award in and of itself is proof of the blurring lines between
online and traditional celebrities, and Helbig is just one example of many who have taken Internet fame outside of
cyberspace. Others have secured roles in movies, their
own clothing lines, record deals and various other claims
to fame.
Defy Media’s study also investigated other qualitative factors which play a role in overall engagement. One
takeaway stated that 34 percent of teens say they respect
YouTubers, and the same percentage say YouTubers were
people they would like to be. In contrast, just 25 percent
said the same about TV and movie stars. Even more so,
when asked how relatable the two groups were, 41 percent
of teens said YouTubers did the things they wanted to do,
whereas 15 percent said the same about TV and movie
stars. Considering these responses, it’s no wonder YouTubers had a much bigger influence on purchase intent among
teens; 63 percent said they would try a product or brand
suggested by a YouTuber, compared to 46 percent who said
the same about recommendations from a TV or movie star.
Of course, while key engagement metrics can help indicate
the extent of fan interaction and influence, the target audience must be a good match in order for the partnership to
be successful. Not all consumers are actively engaged with
online personalities or platforms. But those who are, namely
teens and young adults, make up an extremely
receptive audience.
eMarketer’s Alison McCarthy suggests that young
consumers—especially those in their early teens—have
grown up in an era where branding and advertising have
been tightly integrated into most aspects of daily life. In
general, the wide range of marketing content this demographic has been exposed to at an early age makes them
savvy consumers and more accepting of different types of
marketing messages. For example, according to an August 2015 survey by Trendera, 40 percent of respondents
between the ages of 13 to 20 said that Internet celebrity
partnerships make them more interested in a brand compared to 18 percent of adults aged 21 to 35 and 12 percent
of adults aged 36 to 50.
Most notably, personal recommendations were by
far the most likely type of brand marketing to pique the interest of teens and millennials. Consumers are having conversations online with friends and family way before they
make a purchase. They are seeking out relevant, first-hand
information from like-minded people they trust— third-party
experts and their personal networks—which include online
influencers, in the case of millennials. Those who partner
with relevant personalities are able to piggyback on this
trusted relationship and immerse their brand in
the conversation.
By now, there are countless success stories to know
this type of influencer partnership works. In fact, a 2014
study from IZEA found 52 percent of marketers claimed
they have used social influencers in the previous year.
Engagement, generally measured in likes, comments and
shares, is higher for content that comes from influencers.
AT&T noted engagement on its Instagram feed had increased about 250 percent per photo since last fall when
the phone company partnered with Dave Krugman, a pho-
tographer who has more than 200,000 followers
on the platform.
While there are many upsides to partnering with
influencers and celebrities, it’s important to consider the
risks of extending control over how a brand is represented.
Those choosing to partner with online influencers can obviously face much of the same fallout risks as companies who
get burned by a celebrity spokesperson’s bad choices (such
as Subway). For instance, consider the controversial clips
shared in quick succession by Sam Rader, one half of the
popular Christian vlogging duo “Sam and Nia.” The couple
posted a viral pregnancy announcement and an equally
viral miscarriage video, which were both accompanied by
ads. The videos were timed and setup in such a way that
made viewers question if the pregnancy had been made up
for profit. Surely the brands whose ads ran alongside these
videos intended to align themselves with the personalities
behind the channel, not the controversy.
Then there is Belle Gibson, the 24-year-old Australian blogger and entrepreneur who for several years
claimed that a healthy diet and alternative medicine had
cured her metastatic cancer. Trusting consumers got on
board and sales for Gibson’s app and cookbook soared,
but when the truth came out that she had never been ill,
her fanbase dismissed her overnight. It’s likely that Gibson
received interest from brands looking to associate with such
a ground-breaking movement as her popularity was on the
rise, but fortunately the truth came out before anyone got
seriously burned.
Beyond potential scandals, brands must also be
acutely aware of the U.S. Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC)
regulation and compliancy rules when running an influencer
campaign. Those that aren’t can face both consumer blowback from individuals who may have felt duped by a cam-
paign, and potential fines from the FTC. Lord & Taylor was
one of many rule breakers in 2015. This retailer employed
50 popular fashion bloggers to post photos of themselves
in the same dress on Instagram to help introduce a new collection. While the dress sold out quickly and the campaign
was deemed a success, the bloggers neglected to include a
disclosure that they had been paid by Lord & Taylor to post
this content. Those actions violated the FTC guidelines for
digital advertising, which state that when people are paid
to post, they must disclose that fact in a “clear and conspicuous” way. Examples of this include adding a hashtag that
reads “#ad,” or copy that includes “sponsored by.” Given
that these rules have been published since 2009, claiming
ignorance is a questionable excuse. Although the FTC has
yet to seriously enforce such violations, disregarding the
rules can still have repercussions on brands and influencers
alike; consumers may lose trust in a brand, perceiving it
negatively if they feel like they’ve been tricked, deceived or
lied to. Consequently, they may no longer view the influencer as authentic or credible.
At the end of the day, influencers–vloggers, bloggers, YouTubers, Instagrammers–are people too, and they
make mistakes. It’s critical that brands vet their potential
partners thoroughly before establishing a relationship.
All things considered, brands have to weigh the benefits
against possible risks in their individual situations. For
those that do choose to deploy online influencer strategies,
opportunities to engage and build loyalty with captivated,
young consumers through unique partnerships await. As
long as engagement continues to reign supreme in 2016, as
is expected, influencers will too.
Internet Users Who Would Try a Product or Brand
Suggested by a YouTuber* or Traditional Celebrity
% of respondents in each group
63%
62%
46%
49%
Teens (13-17)
Young adults (18-24)
*someone who regularly creates videos on YouTube
Source: Defy Media, Acumen Report: Constant Content, March 3, 2015
18 l Winter 2016
Excitement is building as the Summer Olympics
are approaching and advertisers finalize their
sponsorship packages. Rio de Janeiro will host
the 2016 Summer Olympics this coming August,
the first South American city to host any Olympic
games. With limited major league sports in summer
months, the Olympics will capture headlines and
produce high ratings. Some storylines to watch:
Television
National cable and digital ad sales are projected
to exceed the $1.3 billion (not including local ad
spending) that was generated during the London
Olympics. While still seven months out, recent
deals have pushed the pace ahead of ad sales
from the London games. Because of the demand,
NBC Universal (NBCU) is executing fewer category
exclusivity deals.
NBCU is reportedly asking for more than $1 million
for a :30 Prime TV spot. In addition, they are requiring advertisers to commit to a minimum spend of
$7 to $10 million before allowing them to purchase
digital media. Given the surge of media consumption on mobile and tablet devices since the last
Summer Olympics, digital ad spend for Rio will
certainly surpass the London games.
Online
YouTuber*
Traditional Celebrity (TV/Movie)
By Sara Van Kuiken
Because Rio is in the Eastern Standard Time zone,
most of the key events will air during Prime in the
U.S., which is incredible for advertisers that are
trying to capture audiences with live viewing. The
London Summer Olympics were ahead by six hours
and averaged 31 million viewers per night. We can
expect that number to increase exponentially this
year with more live events scheduled to appear
in Prime.
One of the most exciting developments for the summer games is NBCU’s
partnership with TiVo Research and RealityMine to provide single-sourced,
cross-platform measurement. This research will measure viewership across
devices (TV, mobile, tablet, computers and social), identify the overlap, where
and when people are consuming coverage and the impact of social media.
Social will also play a bigger role than it did in the London games. In the Sochi
Winter Olympics, athletes and journalists took to social media to share their
underwhelming and entertaining experiences with the host city’s accommodations before the games even began. Fans and media outlets back home were
captivated by the coverage. In turn, social media provided an opportunity for
fans to engage, participate and support their country’s athletes beyond just
watching the events. NBC will again partner with social media platforms and
has added Snapchat to the roster.
Political Advertising
Given the significance of the U.S. presidential campaign in 2016, it’s also
expected to see some candidates airing positive campaign ads in Olympic
programming. In 2012, Obama’s re-election campaign aired a new television ad
during the opening ceremony of the 2012 Olympic Games. Political candidates
will certainly make use of an adjacency to the “feel-good” content of
the Olympics.
State of Media l 19
How Does
Political
Marketing
Influence Voters?
Over the past two decades, political polarization in the
United States has grown considerably. In fact, Pew Research
claims that Americans are now more polarized than they’ve
been since the Truman administration. Why the growth in
division, especially in more recent years? Some attribute
the divide to the apparent political parochialism that many
“consistently liberal” or “consistently conservative” voters
consign themselves to in today’s technologically-siloed society. With an ever-expanding amount of information sources
to consume, many can stick to reading only the media that
tends to align with their views.
So if political polarization has been exacerbated over
the past 60 years, how do marketers tap into those amplified
passions in the most effective way possible? To answer that
question KSM and ORC International once again teamed up
to conduct a consumer survey, this time to see how the general public feels about political marketing. More than 1,000
U.S. adults, 18 years or older were asked questions ranging
from their sentiments toward various types of political ads
and media formats, to their thoughts on exposure timing and
new targeting tactics.
When does the public start researching
candidates?
To craft any marketing effort, one of the most logical
places to begin the brainstorming process is with campaign
timing. Understanding the flight dates helps shape key
considerations regarding possible messaging and event
alignment. In politics, the act of researching candidates and
key issues is tied closely to the proximity of election days.
However, when analyzing this behavior across party affiliations and age groups, some interesting differences arise.
Millennials will continue to be heavily prized by
political candidates for their growing importance in upcoming elections, but the group is often criticized by some
strategists as being disengaged with traditional political and
media formats. Whether they deserve this backlash will be
analyzed later in this report, but in regard to the timing of
when certain groups begin researching political candidates,
millennials surprisingly differ from some larger trends seen
across other age groups.
When asked how early respondents begin researching presidential candidates, KSM’s political marketing survey
uncovered that millennials are actually more likely than
baby boomers to vet candidates very early on in the campaigning process. The difference is a statistically significant
38 percent of millennials who say they begin researching
presidential candidates one year or more prior to an election, compared to 27 percent of baby boomers who do the
same. Generation X nearly splits the difference at 31 percent.
In other words, millennials are 1.4 times more likely than baby
boomers to research candidates early on. In contrast, 35
percent of baby boomers (this group’s most popular answer)
and 31 percent of Gen Xers research just three to 11
months prior.
What are the forces driving millennials to start analyzing the field early on, and baby boomers to hold off until
the primaries really start moving into high gear? The casual
observer could chalk this difference up to the relative inexperience of younger voters who may not realize that names
change often during the typically yearlong process leading
up to primaries and prior to a party naming their nominees.
But it also shows that when compared to other generations,
millennials are engaged early on in the rallying process and
could mean they have more of a sense of involvement in the
campaigning process from start to finish. This might especially ring true when looking at the overall engagement millennials have with politics on social media. It’s no secret that this
age group is more open to interact with civic and political
content on social networks. In fact, a Pew research study
stated that 48 percent of 18- to 29-year-olds make the choice
to further investigate political or social topics as a direct
result of what they read on social networks, and 57 percent
claim they “engage in political activity on social media and
nowhere else.” Pair the relative ease and extremely low cost
of creating and supporting social pages with the perception
from millennials that social is a safe place to express oneself,
and it makes logical sense to infer that many users begin
their first campaign interactions on social well before
the primaries.
Interest
Levelin
in Political
Political Advertisements
Interest
Level
Advertisements
Extremely/very/somewhat interested
Not very or at all interested
18-34
Total Adults 18+
42%
58%
By Jon Christens,
with contributions from
Darrell Drake and Elizabeth Kalmbach
35-50
Millennials
51-69
Gen Xers
Baby Boomers
48%
40%
52%
60%
38%
62%
Question: In general, how interested are you in politcal advertisments?
Source KSM 2016 Political Marketing Study
State of Media l 21
When it comes to research timing comparisons
among party affiliations, the numbers also vary substantially.
For instance, about one fifth of Republicans claim they begin
the research process for midterm candidates between six
to 11 months prior to that region’s respective Election Day.
That group, representing the largest subset of Republicans
when looking at midterm researching activity, was followed
closely by the third-largest subset of 19 percent who claim
they start vetting competitors between three to five months
before Election Day. Compare this with midterm numbers for
Democrats and independents, and some stark differences
arise. The latter two groups claim they either don’t start their
research process until a couple months prior to Election Day
(17 percent for both Democrats and independents), or go as
far as stating that they don’t research midterm candidates
at all (25 percent of Democrats and 26 percent of independents). This data seems to indicate that Republicans place a
greater importance on midterm elections when compared to
members of the Democratic party or independents. A finding
like this makes sense after thinking back to the past two midterms, when Republicans were focused on gaining control of
both the House and Senate during Obama’s presidency.
Though for both presidential and midterm periods, a
surprising finding appears when going back to respondents
who claim they “usually know who [they’re] voting for without
conducting extensive research.” Overall when looking at research timing for total adults 18 or older, the highest percentages came from those who claim they conduct no research
prior to either presidential or midterm elections. A quarter
of respondents marked this answer for midterm elections,
and 23 percent did so for presidential. When breaking these
answers down by party affiliation, 25 and 24 percent of
Democrats don’t research prior to midterm and presidential
elections respectively. For independents, the numbers were
26 and 22 percent for midterm and presidential elections
respectively. All four of these subsets represented the largest percentage of respondents for their respective parties’
answers. Republicans on the other hand, while still having
high percentages of non-researchers at 20 and 17 percent
for midterm and presidential respectively, had other higher
percentages for research period habits.
Is this a sign that nearly a quarter of both Democrats
and independents feel they rely more upon emotion than
research when voting? Or do these individuals simply have
a stricter definition of “research” than other groups, and are
possibly implying that they rely upon sources like political
debates and word-of-mouth to form their voting decisions?
While an exact answer to that question cannot be made
based upon this survey’s data, political marketers should still
make a note of key research period differences between the
parties and age groups.
Most influential sources of information
Moving on to rank the most influential sources of
information to voters, 73 percent of all respondents listed
televised debates in their top three, 71 percent listed news
reports and 62 percent listed friends or family. Theatrics and
showmanship aside, findings to support the great importance of televised debates in the eyes of voters exist in numerous studies conducted in both the U.S. and U.K., and are
often cited by political experts. A recent U.S. News & World
Report article stated that televised debates are “one of the
top sources of information for voters,” and a 2015 Panelbase
survey claims that the big media outlets and debates often
“led online conversations.” Political ads on the other hand,
ranked near the bottom in terms of perceived influence for
both total respondents and across all political party affiliations, which is to be expected. In general, when consumers
are asked to choose the overall level of influence or trustworthiness between sponsored and non-sponsored content,
non-sponsored content often ranks higher.
But when asking all respondents to focus in on
ranking just the most effective advertising formats that influence voting behavior, television had the most support with
26 percent of all respondents ranking it as either extremely
or very effective. This format was followed closely by print
Most Effective
Ad Formats
Influencing
VotingBehavior
Behavior
Most Effective
Ad Formats
for for
Influencing
Voting
Gen X (35-50)
Independent
Millennials (18-34)
Democrat
% Extremely or very effective
(combined)
38%
30%
TV ad
25%
17%
10%
17%
16%
16%
22%
20%
16%
12%
Letter marketing (hard-copy mailings)
21%
16%
14%
12%
Online banner ad
22%
13%
20%
14%
9%
17%
19%
17%
Outdoor (billboard, public transit ad, etc.)
Email marketing
18%
21%
18%
19%
30%
22%
Online video ad
19%
25%
22%
20%
35%
23%
Social media ad
Radio ad
25%
26%
29%
27%
Print (newspaper or magazine) ad
Baby Boomers (51-69)
Republican
11%
17%
8%
13%
9%
15%
11%
11%
4%
10%
7%
10%
6%
9%
Question: Thinking about your exposure to political marketing and advertising, how effective are each of the following in influencing your voting behavior?
Source: KSM 2016 Political Marketing Study
22 l Winter 2016
ads (newspaper or magazine) with 22
percent and social media ads with 19
percent of all respondents placing
them in their top two most effective
formats respectively. This data not only
reinforces the importance of a solid
cross-platform presence if the specific
campaign is a good fit, but also emphasizes the need for creativity in these
integrations. For instance, aligning a
candidate’s social dialogue efforts with
key debates and thinking of ways to
generate spontaneous and shareable
content (e.g., memes, GIFs, hashtags
and reactionary posts) is
absolutely essential.
Rankings in preferred ad
formats across political affiliations
mirrored practically all of the findings
for total respondents. However, overall
percentages showing influence rankings for Democrats across the top four
“extremely or very effective” formats
(TV, print, social media and online video ads) were higher when compared
directly to those of independents and
Republicans. Democrats averaged
5.25 percentage points higher overall
in their rankings of the top four formats, and actually diverged from the
other two parties by awarding the number five spot to outdoor ads instead of
radio. Because outdoor includes ads
on public transit, taxis, buildings and
billboards, and urbanized areas have a
higher concentration of these formats,
it makes sense that liberals would
claim outdoor as more influential than
other party-affiliated respondents. After all, everything from voting behavior
to a 2014 study from the Pew Research
Center showing liberals’ preference
for living in cities and conservatives’
for the opposite, can back up these
findings. So what’s the biggest takeaway for marketers targeting liberal
voters? Once again get creative, but
this time with out-of-home efforts. For
those honing in on conservatives and
independents, TV and print are still the
most effective tools followed in order
by social, online video and radio ads.
Moving to age breakouts, a
finding that seems to contradict much
of the common rhetoric surrounding millennials presents itself again.
Surprisingly, this group feels that TV
ads are the most effective format for
politics with 38 percent stating so,
followed closely at 35 percent by social
media ads. Online video, print and
radio ads at 30, 29 and 25 percent
respectively rounded out the top five
for this group. Clearly, this throws some
water in the face of those who say millennials are not tapped in to traditional
media sources, and are only engaged
with online formats when it comes to
politics. Data from one of Nielsen’s
latest media consumption report backs
this up by stating that 78 percent of
young voters (18 to 34) watched broadcast TV in the past week. Even more
millennial myth-busting arose from
data regarding overall interest levels in
political advertising.
Power and purpose of
political advertising
Asking audiences about
their overall interest levels in ads can
produce some fairly jaded responses.
Sure, they understand how important
this revenue stream is to content providers, but when asked directly about
how well some ads hold their attention,
a range of indifference to sometimes
bitter emotions usually appears. Political advertising is no different in this
respect, with a majority of respondents
both overall and across party affiliations expressing slightly more disinterest than interest in these ads. The
numbers for total adults break out to
58 percent who claim more impassivity
than engagement. But when digging
deeper into age breakouts, unexpected data emerges.
Millennials again differed
somewhat significantly here from the
responses of other age groups, with
48 percent claiming that they are
either extremely, very or somewhat
interested in political ads. Place that
number against just 38 percent of baby
boomers and 40 percent of Gen Xers
who said the same, and the gap is put
into perspective. So if millennials say
they’re more interested in political
ads than other age groups, why do so
many sources claim that members of
this generation are disengaged with
the political process? Well, the answer
may lie in the actual content.
With the rise of social media,
younger generations have increasingly demanded more authenticity from
brands and corporations. Why then are
some of the same and often-inauthentic creative tactics still being used by
political candidates looking to win over
the hearts and minds of young voters?
A recent article by Elizabeth Wilner
appearing in the Cook Political Report
seems to chalk the status quo up to a
combination of unimaginative creatives, repetitive super PACs, quadrennial hiatuses between campaigns and
ad regulations that all drive this complacency and continuation of formulaic
spots. Essentially the big takeaway is
if politicians want to drive higher voter
engagement then more money needs
to be spent on the creative and developing an authentic brand behind
the message.
But turning the tables to
focus on candidates who target older
audiences also presents many of the
same issues. The 62 percent of baby
boomers who feel disinterested in political ads could very well be fueled by
similar complaints about formulaic ad
State of Media l 23
Attention-Getting
Political
Online
MostMost
Attention-Getting
Political
AdsAds
Online
Total Adults 18+
Democrat
Independent
Republican
Type most likely to get attention:
Social media ads
Online video ads
Email marketing
Banner ads
34%
29%
19%
18%
35%
38%
29%
29%
18%
18%
18%
15%
26%
29%
23%
21%
Question: Which of the following forms of online political advertising is most likely to get your attention?
Source: KSM 2016 Political Marketing Study
fatigue. No better evidence of this exists than to look at the
current Republican field and notice Jeb Bush sitting single
digits in most polls, even though his campaign has spent
more than $40 million on TV as of the close of 2015. Trump,
the current Republican front-runner, had spent absolutely
nothing on television during that same period. He only just
recently launched his first TV spot, saying he’ll spend about
$2 million per week on the format. True to his earned-media
form, Trump is keeping the message relevant to his most
impassioned audience by starting the format off with a spot
focusing on immigration and terrorism. While it remains to be
seen how this kind of polarizing approach will work throughout the rest of the primaries, it is most certainly authentic to
his brand.
Over on the less-crowded Democratic side, somewhat similar patterns can be found in regard to media spend
habits between Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton. While
both in the less-congested field are understandably spending far less than Republicans, Clinton has still thrown about
$14 million at TV since August 2015. Sanders on the other
hand first kicked off his TV spend three months later than
Clinton, and to-date has spent around $9.7 million since
November 2015. His poll numbers have since notched up
considerably, creating an unexpectedly tight race for the early primary states. He also faces some fairly large issues with
polarization among liberals, but so far his strategy is gaining
pace. Clearly, all four cases indicate that while TV is still
more important than ever throughout the campaigning process, prioritizing a solid brand presence through earned and
other organic grassroots formats first is absolutely crucial.
In terms of how the public views the purpose of
political advertising, some sentiments echoing the aforementioned findings are present. “Getting a candidate’s name
out” was listed as the most popular purpose of political ads,
netting 38 percent of total adults and 42, 32 and 39 percent
of Democrats, independents and Republicans respectively.
“Criticizing the competition” was the second most popular
reason chosen, with “altering perceptions of a candidate,”
“make issues more widely known” and “drive the public to
research more” rounding out the bottom-three rankings.
Independents were also more likely to see attack ads as a
24 l Winter 2016
top purpose of these spots, with 27 percent feeling this way
compared to just 18 percent of Republicans and 19 percent
of Democrats.
Put those numbers up against respondents’ feelings
about candidates after viewing various types of political ads,
and a storyline begins to emerge. By far the most popular
type of political ad for all age groups and political allegiances are issue-based ads. This ad focus made 67 percent of
total adults feel generally “more positive” about a candidate
after exposure. Digging into party breakouts, 73 percent of
Republicans and 72 percent of Democrats had the same
positive feelings. Family-focused or “humanizing” ads drew
just 42 percent of all respondents to claim more positive
feelings about candidates after exposure. Attack ads on the
other hand generated some strong responses on the opposite end of the spectrum, with 64 percent of all respondents
feeling negative about candidates after viewing those ads.
The lower percentage of positive feedback toward
humanizing ads among all adults may seem contradictory to
the notion that audiences want more authenticity, but keep
in mind that the call to action is to improve inauthentic and
outdated creative rather than its underlying intentions. In
fact, when focusing in on just millennials for this question, a
majority (51 percent) actually felt more positive about a candidate after viewing “humanization” ads. This is exactly why
more audiences, especially younger ones are feeling drawn
to social media and other online sources when vetting candidates. They’re seeking more information on who a person
really is, rather than who their formulaic and stiff family-ad
says they are.
three and four spots respectively. This breakout was true for
all party affiliations except when looking at Republicans, who
had 29 percent listing online video ads as their most “attention
getting” online format and 26 percent choosing
social media ads.
Age breakouts also present an interesting difference
from the overall picture: Gen Xers displayed the highest percentage of preference for social media ads at 42 percent, with
millennials close behind at 40 percent. Compare this to baby
boomers’ top pick of email marketing at 26 percent, and a tie
of 25 percent who feel political social and online video ads
are memorable. Again, while a solid organic social strategy
should be used as a foundation for any paid efforts, it’s still
important to note that Gen Xers are just as, if not more swayed
as millennials by political social ads. This reinforces the notion
that political marketers should devote additional budget to
creative concerns, especially when delving into online formats.
The more key audiences a campaign has available to target on
any given format, the more investment teams should earmark
towards developing unique messaging that truly resonates
with each group.
What does the public think the future holds for these
online formats? While a majority across all age groups and
party divides feel that online political advertising (such as
banner, video, social media and email marketing ads) will have
no change in impact for this upcoming election, more respondents think these formats will increase their effectiveness
rather than decrease. Overall, 31 percent of respondents think
these online ads will have “much” or “somewhat” more of an
impact, with just 16 percent saying “somewhat” or “much” less
of an impact. And what should come as no surprise at this
point is that millennials again show higher percentages in favor
of social impact, with 43 percent thinking the effect will be
greater in this upcoming election.
From an organic standpoint, overall interactions with
social political content are also up when compared to reported
activity from past elections. An 11 percent increase in social
interactions (e.g., likes, shares, comments) for this upcoming
election was reported by all respondents. Democrats claimed
the strongest levels of interaction across party groups, with a
quarter claiming they’ve already interacted with political content for the 2016 election. Even though social interaction levels
for independents and Republicans showed lower percentages
overall, both groups are reporting increased activity compared
to past elections, with a 6 percent and 29 percent
increase respectively.
When Voters Begin
When Voters Begin
Researching Candidates
Researching Candidates
Total Adults 18+
Democrat
30%
25
24
20%
10%
19
13
11
15
13
18
16
17
9
8
Midterm
election
Presidential
election
11
3
0%
>1 yr
1 yr
6-11
mos
3-5
mos
1-2
mos
Just Never
before
How long before the election
Independent
30%
26
22
20%
17
15
10
10%
7
17
12
Presidential
election
17
10
9
Midterm
election
12
10
0%
>1 yr
1 yr
6-11
mos
3-5
mos
1-2
Just Never
mos before
How long before the election
Republican
30%
20%
20
21
18
17
20
17
19
15
15
10%
Midterm
election
Presidential
election
11
8
6
6
6
0%
>1 yr
1 yr
6-11
mos
3-5
mos
1-2
Just Never
mos before
How long before the election
New formats rising?
If social media will only continue its ascension of
importance in the role of politics over the coming years,
then how does the public view advertising on this format?
According to KSM’s survey, social media ads were listed as
the most “attention-getting” source of content when comparing the most common forms of online advertising. Out of
all adults surveyed, 34 percent placed social media ads at
the top of this list, with 29 percent feeling similarly for online
video ads. Email marketing and banner ads took the number
State of Media l 25
Summary of findings
With data supporting the importance of traditional formats
like TV paired with emerging social activity, and the increasing call for candidate authenticity, a clear challenge is being
sent to political marketers for them to up their game in both
creative executions and brand building.
Best political ad formats overall: Television
advertising is the most effective in influencing
voting behavior, followed by print and social
media. In all types of political marketing, democrats are
more likely to be swayed by political ads than those with
other party affiliations. In particular, they are more likely
to be influenced by outdoor ads (public transit, billboard,
building, etc.), which would make sense given the higher
concentration of liberals in urban areas.
Branding and strong creative are the foundation behind successful campaigns: While it
may seem obvious that branding a candidate
is a key first step, the current landscape has shown that
some strategists are consigning this aspect to a secondary role. Formulaic creative and a lack of initial positioning
through earned media and organic channels will not end
well for most. Just like today’s consumers, modern voters
are increasingly demanding authenticity from the campaigns
they choose to interact with. Those who do this well through
strong media relations, organic online presence and dynamic
creative will position themselves above the rest.
Young voters are interested and engaged
with political messaging: Though voter
turnout may be low in comparison to other
age groups, millennials are the most interested
age group when it comes to political advertising (48 percent
claim some level of interest, compared to 40 percent of Gen
X and 38 percent of baby boomers). Marketers need to look
no further than Barack Obama’s 2008 run to know that campaigns which tap into this interest with authentic and targeted messaging will drive these voters to the booths.
Young voters also start researching candidates earlier than other groups: Millennials
begin researching candidates one year or more
prior to a presidential election, which is more
than any other age group, with 38 percent claiming they do
so. This percentage is 40 percent higher than the 27 percent
of baby boomers who claimed the same activity. Millennials
also have a higher “one year or more” research-timing percentage for midterm elections, coming in at a rate that was
78 percent higher than Gen Xers or baby boomers. Clearly,
this signals that political marketers should begin engaging
young audiences through organic means such as social,
blogs and online outlets early on to provide an engaging
foundation well before the bulk of ad spend revs up.
Millennials influenced most through TV? In
political advertising, traditional formats work
in tandem with online: In what may come as a
surprise to some, 38 percent of millennials listed
television as the most effective ad format for influencing
their voting behavior. Compare this to just 19 percent of baby
boomers who said the same. But the second most influential
ad format for millennials should come as no surprise: social
media captured 35 percent of their vote. Cross-platform
messaging is essential in targeting this group, but this data
shows that television should still play a key role.
Televised debates, news media and word-ofmouth are still the most influential sources
to voters overall: Across all respondents, 73
percent ranked televised debates in their top three most
influential sources for gathering information on candidates,
with 71 percent doing the same for “news/media reports”
and 62 percent for word-of-mouth from friends or family.
Nearly a quarter of voters claim they usually
know who they’re voting for without research: Across all respondents 18 or older, 25
percent for midterm elections and 23 percent
for presidential claimed they usually don’t conduct research
prior to voting. These responses represented the highest
answer percentages overall, and were driven primarily by
democratic and independent voters. So do these respondents feel they rely more upon emotion than research when
voting? Or do they simply look to sources like political debates and word-of-mouth to form their voting decisions, and
don’t consider this to be “active” research?
Voters care most about issues when watching ads: Issue-based advertising left more
respondents feeling positive about candidates
(67 percent) than negative (7 percent). This topic
also beat out “personalization/humanization ads” and attack
ads to reign as the most preferred subject matter for political
advertising. Attack ads left a majority (64 percent) of respondents feeling negative about a candidate post-viewing.
Rise of new formats: Compared to the 2012
presidential election, about a third of respondents believe online political ads will have
more of an impact on their voting behavior in this
year’s election. Slightly more respondents overall are interacting with political ads on social media for this year’s election when compared to past elections. Democrats represent
the group most responsive to political ads on social media,
and a quarter of this group is already reporting interaction
(likes, shares, comments, etc.) with ads involving the 2016
election.
*Data reflects an accurate representation of the total U.S. population aged
18 and older, with completed interviews being weighted by five variables to
ensure this objective. Full Methodology available upon request.
26 l Winter 2016
By Elizabeth Kalmbach
It’s no secret that the growth of the online content market
constricted the traditional newsprint and magazine publishing industries in both subscription numbers and overall
revenue. Though the most dramatic decline in revenue was
largely confined to the years of 2008 and 2009, it has been
widely reported that the days of the traditional magazine are
numbered. However, the content creation and management
skills of the publishing industry have been cultivated over
decades and its staying power should not be underestimated. Unlike the traditional newsprint sector, which struggled
to define their differentiating factors in an Internet-based 24hour news cycle, magazines have long relied on their special
relationships with readers and their ability to provide unique
content that sets them apart from their competitors. The
titles that didn’t (namely the newsweeklies) were some of the
first to fold in the wake of the rise of Internet news.
Those which have survived have been forced to
fight a continuous battle for relevancy in order to attempt to
maintain circulation numbers. As recent data shows some
troubling indicators for the future, it’s clear that the magazine
industry won’t have an easy road. Decreasing newsstand
sales are one of the most troubling signs of what’s to come.
If impulse purchasing is commonly thought to be a signifier
that the general public can still be enticed by the unique
content touted on print covers, it seems their appetite is
waning. For most titles, newsstand sales represent only
about 7 percent of total revenue, so the alarming declines
don’t signify the end of magazines. However, they could be a
harbinger of doom.
In an effort to keep magazines top-of-mind and
accessible to all, consumer titles have experimented with
digital formats over the past 10 years. In nearly every case,
converting the glossy pages of traditional publications to an
interactive, convenient and competitive version has been an
expensive and complicated challenge. The endeavor is also
nearly impossible to replicate consistently over the course of
a traditional publishing schedule. It is generally understood
that magazines’ strongest asset is their ability to capture
attention and connection in a manner not replicated by any
other medium. Unfortunately, the industry has not been able
to replicate that attention on a digital platform, nor have they
determined how to fully monetize engagement levels in the
face of ever-cheapening CPMs (cost per thousand) on largescale digital platforms.
There’s no doubt that the magazine business model
doesn’t work in a modern, online world where competition
for 24/7 eyeballs increases daily. Up to this point, struggling
magazine brands have attempted their forays into the digital
platform on an individual basis in order to extend the life of
their content services with dubious results. Digital subscriptions for major titles have held at about 30 percent of all
magazine subscriptions and no data thus far indicates major
increases on the horizon. Now, the latest publishing attempt
to evolve the magazine landscape in a digital world is here,
and it’s called Texture.
The new Texture digital magazine app was launched
several years ago as “Next Issue,” a joint project funded by
magazine greats Conde Nast, Time Inc., Hearst Magazines,
Meredith and News Corp. More recently joined by Rogers
State of Media l 27
Communications in Canada, and boasting $50 million in a
fourth quarter 2015 venture capitalist infusion, the leaders
of the magazine world hope to join forces in an attempt to
maintain relevancy and stop the circulation bloodbath.
The Texture app is essentially built on the Netflix,
“all-you-can-eat in one monthly subscription” concept and
offers 145 titles for a $14.95 monthly fee. A basic monthly
subscription of $9.99 removes “premium” titles like Sports
Illustrated, Us Weekly and People, but still offers 95 percent
of the platform’s available titles. New features support article
and topic curation across titles, allowing users to create
personalized content lists or simply read their favorite titles
from beginning to end. After operating costs, the publisher
partners share revenue based on a usage model. Articles
read are attributed to each publisher and subscription revenue is split accordingly. If no one reads a title, the publisher
receives no revenue share. Competition is slim in this “allyou-can-read” category; the only other major app offering
this service is Magzter, which has a larger library but fewer
premium titles and more of an international focus
than Texture.
Readership and audience
Publishers aren’t yet sure whether this app will inadvertently drive down the quality of their titles’ readerships.
If Texture achieves scale, touts abundant readership data
collected within the app and attracts new readers to existing quality content, they will have succeeded and this deal
with the devil will be worth it. No amount of quality audience
erosion will hold them back, and it’s unlikely that quality
audiences would disappear anyway, since magazine fans will
consume their favorites no matter the format. What’s more,
fears over this business structure have been raised before
with Netflix itself, and thus far, there have been no complaints from the networks as they cash the retransmission
rights checks they enjoy as a direct result of Netflix’s scale.
But make no mistake, scale is essential. If Conde Nast, Time,
Hearst, Meredith and News Corp can’t figure out how to
attract more subscribers, the failed effort will be a sign of the
decline of magazine publishing as a whole, not just another
failed attempt at conversion to a digital platform.
But as with many previous forays into experimental
digital competition, the publishing industry has dabbled with
the Next Issue or “Texture” app but never fully committed.
Their commitment fears have been primarily focused on a
fear of cannibalizing their print publication audience while
“cheapening” the audiences they attract through a less
expensive version of their premium content. But truth be
told, potentially cheapening their brands has never bothered
them before. Remember the ‘90s and early 2000s when
cheap circulation tricks included $1 annual subscriptions at
the check-out counter of Best Buy? Many would argue that
falling circulation calls for radical measures and an occasional reader of a digital app is better than a rare reader of
a print copy; especially when the former gave up their email
address and the rare reader sailed by the title in an airport
while maintaining complete anonymity.
However, if it’s such a great idea, why has the app
only sold a couple hundred thousand subscriptions over the
last few years? Well, if no one has heard of the app, no one
Google
Facebook
Magazine
Newspaper Industry
Yearly Ad Revenue in Billions
(2008 - 2014)
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
2000
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
Source: Folio: magazine
28 l Winter 2016
“There’s no question that small phone
screens are a huge problem when it comes
to readability, but magazines had a whole
device designed for them: tablets.”
will subscribe. The recent
cash infusion was highly
publicized, but $50 million
won’t go far if it’s devoted in
part to the technology platform upgrades. Scale needs
to be achieved quickly, and
it’s hoped that new TV ads
will boost Texture’s profile
the way Netflix boosted
theirs to become a household name.
User experience
There’s no question
that small phone screens
are a huge problem when
it comes to readability, but
magazines had a whole
device designed for them:
tablets. With that in mind, it
seems like magazines had
the advantage in the digital
technology sector. But it’s
also true that entertainment
time is increasingly spent
on mobile phones. That
said, it could be argued
that magazines were never
an “on-the-go” medium. It
was always their ability to
capture and hold the attention of their devoted readers that made
them so valuable. Why can’t iPads or
laptop screens at home be devoted to
magazines? Why must the beauty and
engagement of magazines be removed
simply so readers can access them in
two-minute bites throughout the day?
Destroy the engagement, and everything the magazine industry stands for
is destroyed.
With this in mind, refining
the digital experience on Texture is
vital. Even after the re-structuring and
feature updates Texture completed
over the last year, usability could be
improved. The curation capabilities are
sometimes clunky and the magazines
lack the depth of links, video and on-
line flexibility that traditional websites
offer. However, for the traditional magazine lover, the features that have been
added do not detract from the reader
experience and feature improvements
that will likely bring in new readers.
Monetization
If successful, will Texture create an even greater monopoly within
the top magazine publishing groups?
Yes it will, but potentially only in the
short term. The future success of the
industry relies on scale and publishers need to band together to ensure
a solid platform. Unlike the television
networks’ experiment with Hulu, texture will maintain the individual identities of magazine titles. After all, each
magazine brand has been
carefully built to identify
with specific audiences.
Hard core followers of
specific titles will continue
to read them cover to cover
and new readers have the
opportunity to find brands
they love by searching for
specific content. Though
Texture is owned by the
major publishing houses,
their recent infusion of capital came from an outside
source, which will help them
maintain a growth trajectory even if their vision is
insular. Consumer demand
for niche publications produced outside the confines
of the monopoly will be
addressed by a profit-minded third party.
In terms of affecting advertisers, Texture
simply contributes additional eyeballs to the print
platform. The increased
measurement capabilities
of the digitally-scanned
versions might be a boon
to the reach of magazine advertising.
Though one drawback could be spread
advertising. Since Texture focuses its
reading app on a single page view,
multiple-page spreads do not have
the same effect that they do in print
versions. However, the biggest gain
for advertisers could be the reach
opportunities. Instead of confining ads
to a single magazine, future opportunities could include sponsorship of
whole segments of readers by genre.
Running in-app ads reaching Texture
readers on their homepage or within a
grouping of male-targeted, parenting
or women’s service publications offers
advertisers opportunities beyond the
scanned page.
State of Media l 29
SPORTS CORNER
STATE OF MEDIA CONTRIBUTORS
WINTER 2016
Jersey Ads:
Tracy Bielenberg
Director/Business Development
Sara Brown
Supervisor, Digital
Specialty: Researching all media formats
Favorite thing about winter: Chapped
Specialty: Social media
Favorite thing about winter: Skiing
lips (said snow one ever)
followed by hot chocolate
Jonathan Christens
Director of Communications
Darrell Drake
VP, Research
Specialty: Researching all media formats
Favorite thing about winter: Freshly
Specialty: Research
Favorite thing about winter: Without
Coming to a U.S. league soon?
By JOSH HILGENDORF
When it comes to sports, there’s no shortage
of discussion surrounding the name on the
back of every jersey. Fans fall in love with
the hotshot quarterback or rookie point
guard that dazzles with no-look passes.
However, there may soon be another
name featured on jerseys for the public
to talk about.
For the first time in the United
States, an advertiser’s logo will appear
on a uniform in one of the four major
leagues. Participants in the 2016 NBA
All-Star Game will wear jerseys featuring
the Kia logo. The logo will be small and
discretely placed in the upper left corner
of the uniform. The two-year All-Star test is
expected to be just the beginning, as league
officials are pressing for uniform advertising to
become commonplace in the coming years.
Kia’s deal to appear on the All-Star uniforms was
completed during negotiations with Turner Broadcasting.
Kia, an official sponsor of the NBA, often places advertisements during NBA games on TNT, which is owned by Turner.
Turner gained the ability to sell ads on NBA jerseys as an
adjunct to its NBA broadcasting rights contract through the
2025 to ‘26 season.
So what does this all mean? Well, jersey advertising
is not a revolutionary concept. It is widespread across major
sports in almost every other country, appearing on soccer
and basketball uniforms in Europe, rugby shirts in Australia
and baseball jerseys in Japan. Even in the U.S., corporate
logos are seen plastered all over NASCAR cars and driver
jumpsuits, as well as on golfers’ hats, shirts, pants and bags.
But up until the NBA announced the Kia agreement, the four
largest U.S. leagues, the NBA, NFL, MLB and NHL, have
avoided jersey advertising altogether.
At first glance, it seems illogical that advertisements
are not already on every team’s jersey. After all, sports are a
business, and selling advertising space on jerseys is another,
potentially lucrative revenue stream. Marc Ganis, a sports
marketing consultant, estimates that each league could generate hundreds of millions of dollars if small ads are sold on
jerseys. But the reasons this has yet to occur are numerous. The biggest hurdle to overcome might be the backlash from
fans that could occur with the introduction of this new advertising. After all, without fans, the sports genre would not
be the massive moneymaker that it is today. Fans often have
an obsessive relationship with their favorite teams. They respect the history of the franchises they follow, and may look
at the introduction of jersey ads as an attack on their
storied reputation.
In addition, U.S. fans are already inundated
with advertising while watching live sports.
Football and baseball have frequent stoppages in play, as each game lasts an average of three hours, allowing for numerous commercial breaks. With soccer’s
average match lasting less than two
hours of continuous gameplay (i.e., no
dedicated media timeouts or frequent
stoppages in play), there just aren’t as
many opportunities for standalone ads
to be shown to consumers. This is the
reason sideline and jersey ads work so
well in European soccer leagues. But in the
United States, fans of the four major sports
may see jersey advertising as just another
attempt by leagues and sponsors to cram more
ads into an already cluttered space.
Though how far would fans actually go to
voice their displeasure with jersey advertising? It seems unlikely they would stop buying tickets or tuning in because of
a small addition to the uniforms of their favorite players. After
all, many NASCAR and golf fans embrace corporate sponsorships, even wwlooking at them as an integral part of their
favorite competitor’s identity. Another big issue is that there are a lot of mouths to
feed in professional sports. Aside from each organization,
every team owner would most likely want a piece of the
prize money jersey advertising could reap. Not to mention
the player unions in every league that would assuredly want
those that are actually wearing the logos on their chests to
get their fair share as well.
Beyond how the money would be divided is the
question of how ads would be sold. Would each league
strike a deal with one or two sponsors, or would each team
reach out to sponsors individually? Problems may arise when
advertisers aren’t as willing to spend money to put their logo
on small market teams. Would there be a bidding war in the
MLB for real estate on the New York Yankees uniform,
while the Miami Marlins are left to take whatever sponsor is
left over?
The NBA’s deal with Kia serves as the perfect experiment that should shed a lot of light on these questions, as
it’s an isolated game, focused more on the players than the
teams they represent. If the reception is negative, jersey advertising can disappear after the 2017 edition of the All-Star
game. However, if it is positive or even unnoticed, then there
may be a new and lucrative edition to team uniforms in the
coming years.
32
30 l Winter 2016
fallen snow, warm fires and ski trips!
it I would not have the ability to fully
appreciate summer
Omer Fazal
Digital Supervisor
Josh Hilgendorf
Media Supervisor
Specialty: Digital
Favorite thing about winter: Snowfall!
Specialty: Strategy
Favorite thing about winter: There’s
plenty of basketball to watch
Elizabeth Kalmbach
VP, Group Media Director
Sara Van Kuiken
Associate Media Director
Specialty: Strategy
Favorite thing about winter: Counting
Specialty: Sports
Favorite thing about winter:
Luz Lopez-Montera
Media Planner
Kelsey Maciejewski
Associate Digital Strategist
Specialty: Traditional planning
Favorite thing about winter: Gathering
Specialty: Digital media
Favorite thing about winter: The
down the days until summer
Hibernating with comfort food and Netflix
with loved ones, especially around the
holidays
possibility of a snow day!
Jade Osowski
Communications Coordinator
Zach Spangler
Creative Specialist
Specialty: Social media
Favorite thing about winter: Ice
Specialty: Graphic design
Favorite thing about winter: The
skating
seasonal beverages!
Please send all press and content
inquiries to [email protected]
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