03 May 2022 | The Media Leader Staff

100% Media Roundup: 3 May- 6 May

This is a daily digest of news stories from around the media world, updated by The Media Leader team, to ensure you’re 100% up-to-date.

Friday 6 May

Stagwell reports 24% organic net revenue growth

Stagwell Inc reported $527m in net revenue, a 24% year-on-year organic growth, in its Q1 financial results.

The challenger company noted that 56% of said growth was driven by digital services.

Founder and CEO Mark Penn said: “Stagwell is growing strongly. […] We grew first quarter net revenue 24% versus the prior year, more than double the pace of legacy holding companies, and grew Adjusted EBITDA at an even faster rate of 34% year-over-year.”

The company reaffirmed their 2022 outlook, expecting 18%-22% net revenue growth this year.

Ozone Project partners with MediaCom for mobile ads

UK digital advertising platform The Ozone Project is partnering with MediaCom to launch Ozone Stories, a new “high impact” mobile-only display format.

The format borrows from the existing stories format found across social media platforms. It will plug into Ozone’s existing ad slots and provide brands with the opportunity to promote multi-frame messaging alongside publisher content.

Vivendi’s Canal+ ‘considering bid’ for minority stake in Starz

French premium TV channel Canal+ is working on a potential bid for a minority stake in US premium channel Starz, according to the Financial Times.

Starz’s slate of content includes popular series such as American Gods and Outlander.

Canal+ is owned by Vivendi, who is seeking to bulk up their streaming offerings, according to the report.

S4 Capital reports big revenue increase after ‘embarrassing’ delay

After a delay that executive chairman Sir Martin Sorrell described as “unacceptable and embarrassing”, S4 Capital’s full-year 2021 results showed the company doubled its revenue to £686.6m.

Sorrell: “In our third full financial year we almost doubled in size, approximately half through organic growth and half through combinations and generated over $900m of revenue in 33 countries.”

He stated that 2022 has started “more than in line” with their latest three-year plan to double gross profit/net revenue organically.

Shares of S4 Capital were up over 4% in trading following the release.

Psaki to step down, White House names Karine Jean-Pierre as new press sec

President Biden has named Karine Jean-Pierre as his new press secretary following Jen Psaki’s upcoming departure.

It was reported earlier this month that Psaki would be leaving her role at the White House to join MSNBC.

Jean-Pierre will become the first black person and first openly gay person to assume the role.

She has been principal deputy press secretary under Psaki, who congratulated and praised Jean-Pierre on Twitter.

She is passionate. She is smart and she has a moral core that makes her not just a great colleague, but an amazing Mom and human. Plus, she has a great sense of humor.

— Jen Psaki (@PressSec) May 5, 2022

Study: high contrast, low text ads perform well on Snap Ads for key industries

High contrast imagery and minimized text on Snapchat Ads were associated with higher ad performance, according to a study by VidMob and Snap.

High contrast ads with bold colors saw 15% and 40% higher swipe up rates for financial services and entertainment ads, respectively. Similarly, CPG ads with high color contrast yielded twice as much screen time as other ads.

Meanwhile minimized text (i.e., less than 5% of the screen was dedicated to text) led to a 175% higher view rate for financial services ads, 85% higher view rate for CPG ads, and 23% higher swipe up rate for entertainment ads.

“The findings show that creative can account for 2x and 3x increases in performance, a major factor in campaign success,” says Stephanie Garofoli, VP of partnerships at VidMob.

WPP partners with Epic Games for “metaverse curriculum”

WPP has parterned with Epic Games, the interactive entertainment company behind game engine Unreal Engine and popular video game Fortnite, to help WPP agencies “deliver a new era of digital experiences for brands in the metaverse”.

The partnership will include a new “metaverse curriculum” training programme for WPP creatives and technologists, where they will learn how to create custom brand experiences in Fortnite and use Unreal Engine for real-time 3D creation and virtual production.

WPP will also work with Epic Games-owned “kid tech” company to deepen its understanding of online safety and privacy to help its campaigns engage younger audiences in a responsible manner.

Thursday 5 May

Lord Puttnam to chair Election Advertising Review Panel

Advertising industry alum and Chariots of Fire producer Lord Puttnam has been announced as chair of the Election Advertising Review Panel, a new project by non-profit Reform Political Advertising to review misleading ads it has tracked throughout the election period.

🧵We are delighted that Lord Puttnam @dputtnam agreed to chair a board and review process for the misleading ads we’ve been tracking in this election period.

The project goes some way to dismantling the argument that it is too complex to regulate lies in electoral ads. pic.twitter.com/jri2hwvSV6

— Reform Political Advertising (@clearpolitic5) May 4, 2022

The project is attempting to “[dismantle] the argument that it is too complex to regulate lies in electoral ads.”

Reach reports almost flat revenue growth for first quarter

Reach, the Daily Mirror and Daily Express publisher, reported in a trading update an almost flat year-over-year revenue decrease for the first quarter of 2022.

Today the company reported revenue decline of 0.9% for the first three months of the year. It anticipates much the same for 2022 despite recent newsprint inflation necessitating a change in cost expectations.

The publisher grew digital revenues by 9.3% year-over-year, however print revenue declined 4.2%, led by declines in circulation revenue (5.7%) and advertising revenues (10.1%).

TikTok unveils revenue share ad product

TikTok announced a new TikTok Pulse program, the company’s first ad product that involves a revenue share with creators.

The new contextual advertising solution lets advertisers place their brand next to the top 4% of content in the For You feed, with 12 categories of content to choose from.

Creators and publishers with at least 100k followers will be eligible for the initial stage of the program, which has a 50-50 revenue split with creators.

ESPN+ to exclusively broadcast London NFL game

ESPN+, ESPN’s paid subscription streaming service, will exclusively carry this year’s NFL international game in London between the Jacksonville Jaguars and the Denver Broncos.

The game will be played at Wembley Stadium on October 30, with coverage beginning at 9:30am ET.

The exclusive is the first of an annual occurrence for the platform – ESPN+ will be carrying one international NFL game per year through the 2033 season under the new rights agreement with the NFL announced last year.

UK government disallows PR agencies from working in Russia

As part of the UK government’s ongoing actions against the Russian Federation in response to their invasion of Ukraine, Foreign Secretary Liz Truss announced yesterday that it has cut off Russia’s access to the UK’s management, consulting, accounting, and public relations services.

These UK services account for 10% of Russian imports in these sectors.

Wednesday 4 May

ISBA updates Influencer Marketing Code of Conduct

ISBA, the UK advertiser trade body, has updated its Influencer Marketing Code of Conduct to better focus on helping brands deliver diversity, equity, inclusion, and representation in their influencer activity.

The original Code of Conduct was released last September, and aimed to reduce misleading photo editing.

The body announced 23 major brands and 13 talent agencies and influencers have given their backing to the updated code.

ISBA plans to release template influencer marketing contracts in the coming weeks.

Publicis Groupe acquires ecommerce platform Profitero

Publicis Groupe has acquired Profitero, a SaaS global ecommerce intelligence platform that provides insights and product visibility to brands in over 50 countries.

Profitero currently employs 300 workers and is led by CEO Bryan Wiener and President Sarah Hofstetter.

Wiener will report to Publicis Groupe Chairman and CEO Arthur Sadoun.

Snap partners with Cameo for short-form video ads

Snap and Cameo, the company that allows stars to send personalised video messages to fans, have partnered to create custom short-form video advertisements for Snapchat.

The announcement, which was made at this year’s NewFronts, will mean Snapchat’s advertisers will have access to over 45,000 celebrities that are currently active on Cameo.

Tuesday 3 May

Paramount+ to launch in UK and Ireland 22 June

Paramount+ will launch in the UK and Ireland 22 June.

The streaming service will launch with a robust slate of content from across Paramount’s production studios such as Showtime, Paramount Pictures, Comedy Central, MTV, and Nickelodeon.

Paramount+ will launch on Sky platforms as part of a new multi-year distribution agreement. Existing Sky Cinema subscribers will be able to access the platform at no added cost.

The streaming platform will also launch in South Korea in June, with further launches planned in Italy, Germany, France, Switzerland, and Austria planned for the second half of 2022.

Spotify launches first-party measurement tool Brand Lift

Spotify is launching Brand Lift, its new first-party measurement tool to give businesses large and small a better understanding of how users are responding to their audio, visual, and display advertising in Spotfy’s free music streaming option.

The measurement tool works by distributing an in-app survey to test and control groups that do and do not see a brand’s ads, respectively.

Brand Lift is now available in 14 markets across the globe including the UK.

Dentsu’s Greenspoon to deliver keynote at WOO’s Toronto Congress

Jeff Greenspoon, president, global solutions at dentsu international will deliver the keynote address at the World Out of Home Organization’s Global Congress Toronto.

The theme of Greenspoon’s address will be “Accelerating Growth in the Digital Economy”.

The Global Congress will run in Toronto from 25-27 May.

Netflix cancels Meghan Markle programme

As part of a move to reduce costs, Netflix is cancelling Pearl, an animated series created by Archewell Productions, the company founded by Prince Harry and Meghan Markle.

Markle was serving as executive producer on the show, which would have been about an adolescent girl who is inspired by historically influential women.

The show had previously been announced last year as part of an expansion of Netflix original content.