Audience-First Video Advertising, Accelerated Cord-Cutting & More | Weekly Marketing News

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This week in marketing news, sources have covered everything from audience-first video advertising to the increasing shift of consumers from traditional to Connected TV. Here are some of the headlines you might have missed. 

In digital marketing news, 2021 is looking like an exciting year for video advertising. As consumers become more and more interested in relevant ad experiences, many marketers are looking to apply an audience-first approach to their video advertising campaigns. MarTechSeries explores this shift in perspective in a new article. In past years, marketers have considered video advertising to be a limited format when it came to personalization. But recently, video consumption has become a more interactive experience for consumers, and MarTechSeries believes there are three keys to effective video ads –– custom video creative, considerate format delivery, and audience segmentation. Marketers who carefully consider these three factors will find that video advertising is the key to success in 2021. 

And in Connected TV news, cord-cutting has continued to accelerate into the new year. A new report from The Trade Desk has found that 27% of U.S. households say they will be cancelling their pay-TV package by the end of 2021. According to their second Future of TV survey, this is nearly double the rate of last year, which reached 15% and was still far above the single digit rates of previous years. This is in part due to the pandemic, which has driven down the time Americans watch linear TV as they increasingly turn to streaming services in order to watch their favorite shows. At the time of the report, 68% of view time has been dedicated to streaming, with traditional time only making up 28%. And marketers are aware of this shift –– CTV advertising is the top choice for marketers looking to re-allocate their budgets, and more than half of those surveyed have said that they plan on making sure they have skills in both traditional and Connected TV. 

Check out the rest of the marketing headlines that caught our eye this week below.

DIGITAL

Picture This: An Audience-First Approach to Video Advertising – 2021 will be an exciting year for video advertising. Advancements in technology and emerging formats will help advertisers tailor their video advertising to be more relevant than ever.

Why SMEs Do Better Digital Marketing Than The Biggest Brands – Beyond just solving ad fraud on their own, small business marketers do better digital marketing than the biggest brand advertisers. To find out why, read on. 

Digital marketing helps small retailers gain ground during pandemic  – When the Covid-19 pandemic hit the US, it gave a giant gift to brands that mainly sell directly through the web. With their brick-and-mortar competition shuttered and the virus raging, Americans flocked online and loaded up on home goods, comfy clothes and much more.

In 2021, what’s old will be new again in marketing – Fuel Capital’s founder discusses how he sees marketing evolving in 2021, and how we’ll see old school marketing resurfacing as marketers move away from the oversaturated channels like Facebook, Google and Twitter. 

Optimizing digital experiences will move beyond the marketing department in 2021 – Brands cannot risk poor online interactions with customers and have those interactions be what turns revenue away. That is why, if 2020 was the year of rushing to digital, 2021 will be the year of perfecting it.

CONNECTED TV & STREAMING

Why B2B Marketers are Plugging into Connected TV – B2B marketers recently represented just a small portion of CTV ad dollars. But the ability to target homebound business decision makers via this rapidly growing platform is now proving more alluring. 

Cord-Cutting To Accelerate In 2021, With 27% Of Cable Households Disconnecting – Cord-cutting will accelerate in 2021, sending cable-TV subscriptions into virtual free fall, with a whopping 27% of U.S. households saying they’ll cancel their pay-TV package by year’s end.

Roku buys rights to Quibi shows for growing ad-supported channel  – Roku agreed to buy the rights to content from Quibi, giving the maker of popular streaming-media devices a library of original shows from the short-lived mobile video service that launched and shuttered in 2020. 

“Instagram is Too Noisy” – DTC Shifts May Help Fuel Connected TV Prioritization – Instagram has become an increasingly crowded space for DTC advertisers, forcing many to seek out new channels on which to serve their ad campaigns. 

MOBILE

What Social Media Trends Will Impact Your 2021 Marketing Strategy?  – The “social” part of social media took on a whole new weight in 2020, as the COVID-19 pandemic brought people inside.  That meant a switch to more social media activity online, and a shift in behaviors — some expected and some unexpected.

Newzoo sees mobile marketing upheaval in 2021 – Research firm Newzoo discusses impact of Apple’s IDFA changes and four more trends in the mobile market this year. 

Facebook Shares New Insights into Gaming Trends and Marketing Opportunities – With people seeking alternate forms of entertainment during the pandemic, gaming saw massive growth in 2020, and Facebook says that mobile gaming, in particular, had the biggest rise.

Hypercasual mobile game trends to watch in 2021 – Hypercasual is one of the most talked-about genres in mobile gaming. It took off at an unprecedented rate with Flappy Bird going viral in 2014, and it has remained a leading category in terms of downloads ever since.

WE’LL KEEP YOU UP-TO-DATE

That’s it for the roundup this week, next week we’ll be back with another list of what’s making news in marketing.

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