Talking YouTube and the State of the Ad World Live From Cannes
Conversations with execs from Pfizer, Human Ventures and more
(When I described Cannes to AI, the above image is what it came up with)
I had the pleasure of conducting a dozen (12!) video interviews at Cannes last week, as part of my ongoing partnership with the folks at VuePlanner - and was able to compile a fantastic cross industry view on the state of digital advertising, along with some of the biggest trends and obstacles to anticipate as we head into the back half of 2024.
And of course, I was able to obtain lots of intel and perspectives on YouTube - which has emerged as a suddenly dominant player in television - even as it faces significant challenges of its own.
We’ve been posting several of these clips over the past few days (check out the Next in Media YouTube channel), and will continue to roll out this series over the next month or so. But in the meantime, here are a bunch of top level highlights and observations:
As AI comes on strong, brands are going to have to seriously revamp how their organizations are setup - the whole company, not just the marketing division. That’s according to industry veteran Janet Balis, who’s logged stints at Ernst and Young and AOL:
“If you are actually going to use data and AI intelligently, you have to connect everything….Silos don’t always make sense based on human behavior…You want the dollars to move fluidly - with where the human attention is moving, and the things that will actually drive growth”
On retail media, and whether we’re overdoing in on performance - “It is the piece that [CMOs] can most readily explain to their CFO.”
On how shopping is changing radically - “When you look at younger generations they are not making purchase decisions based on past preference and long historical loyalty…They are making purchases in an much more vulnerable way…”
Next I spoke to the always insightful Human Ventures founder Joe Marchese (and onetime Fox head of sales), who challenged me on my recent take that the algorithm might be threatening narrative storytelling (and why TikTok may be like “chicken fingers.” Among the highlights:
Why he thinks younger people aren’t necessarily choosing the algorithm over lean-back TV experiences. “That generational divide seems to be based on flawed observational science….kids today “are binge watching Suits.”
Joe sees a deep irony in the fact that tech giants crashing the upfronts, and selling very traditional (brand-friendly) packages. “A lot of people have been talking about the upfronts and how this year things would never be the same…the NFL and Shonda Rimes. You know what I was selling years ago at Fox? The NFL and Shonda Rimes.”
“YouTube on CTV is more similar to other CTV viewing that YouTube on a phone or a computer.”
“Cable was a good deal with a bad user interface.”
“Retail media confuses me.”
Lastly, we talked to Wendy Aldrich , VP, Global Integrated Media Strategy at Pfizer, and her colleague Josh Palau, vp of Performance Marketing about why the pharma brand is looking to bring social video and TV budgets and metrics together on equal footing, and why YouTube may never fit in a single bucket.
Aldrich: “This year we are taking a much more integrated approach to how we plan video, and we’re thinking about the entire ecosystem of video inventory [from linear to CTV to digital to social]. From a consumer standpoint they don’t differentiate.”
Palau on the YouTube ad landscape: “It’s definitely complicated.It is where we are right now.”
Lastly, check out my podcast conversation with Alban Villani, Epsilon’s CEO of EU and Asia, on how Retail Media is growing up differently in the European market, and the marked differences in privacy attitudes and regulation overseas compared to the US.
Thanks so much to my friends at Epsilon, who have been terrific partners during this recent podcast series.