Digiday

For the first few months of 2025, Target has been caught in a media frenzy due to its moves involving?diversity, equity and inclusion policies?and subsequent boycotting, on top of?missing its revenue expectations last November. Media buyers and commerce executives say they don’t expect to put a dent in the retailer’s audience data, making it unlikely to impact its ad business — at least for now. Ask any media buyer or commerce exec to list the top retail media networks in what’s become a saturated field and they’re likely to name Target’s Roundel in the top five. Still, the retailer is playing catch-up with the biggest retail media players. At this point, there are more than 250 retail media networks across which advertisers have to divvy up their dollars, making Target’s fight for ad spend that much more contentious.

Media agencies, long reliant on The Trade Desk’s platform, have begun voicing frustrations that had previously been contained to whispers. The growing sense isn’t the trusted partner it claims to be, but rather a frenemy — one that plays nice while consolidating more control over the ad dollars agencies once commanded. A prime example: The Trade Desk publicly reports a 20% take rate, but agencies and other platform users suggest the real number is closer to 30%.?

For emerging brands, launching in big-box retail is often the ultimate distribution goal. But launching in thousands of Walmart or Target doors at once also comes with expensive operational challenges.?In fact, some brands are?saying no?when these retailers come knocking, choosing to focus on growing more sustainably, and at their own pace, given the current economic and fundraising environment. Not only do these big launches come with additional manufacturing and marketing costs, but they can also impact a small brand’s entire supply chain. In this piece by Gabriela Barkho, we speak to Ross Goodhart of Jupiter, and Anna Reid of Nimbi Supply.

Digiday’s survey found that the top three social platforms among marketers this year are Instagram, Facebook, YouTube and TikTok (yes, I know that’s four — stay with me). Instagram is the No. 1 social platform for marketers as of Q1 2025, with 93% of marketer pros saying their companies currently use the platform, followed by its Meta sibling Facebook, at 84%. YouTube and TikTok tied for third place, with 65% of marketers saying their companies currently use each platform. It’s a slightly different picture from what social media marketing looked like six months ago, but the key word here is slightly. Story by Julia Russell Tabisz

2025 is shaping up to be a brutal year for publishers hoping programmatic ad auctions would keep the cash flowing. Things are so bleak that not one would speak on the record about their dwindling fortunes. Better to suffer in silence than to become the industry’s next cautionary tale. “There’s still quite a lot of softness in money coming from the open auction,” said the revenue lead of a publisher in North America. “Still” being the operative term. The slump that took hold last fall hasn’t just lingered — it’s deepened. What started as a downturn largely confined to ads sold through Google’s ad exchange has spread like contagion, dragging down auction prices across the board — no matter which ad tech vendor is running the sale.? Story by Seb Joseph

The media industry is experiencing a significant transformation driven by ad tech. That sentence is as relevant in the mid-2020s as it was in the mid-2010s and the prior decade, although it begs the question: Is there anything different this time around? The short answer is, “Well, some things…” But for a more thorough examination of the matter, let’s revisit what sources have been telling Digiday in recent weeks. Story by Ronan Shields ?? This is the first edition of Digiday's new Ad Tech Briefing. Sign up here to get it right to your inbox each week: https://lnkd.in/e_AHRZjf

Two and a half years ago, Oren Schauble realized he didn’t understand content creation. At the time, Schauble was the svp of marketing for a toy company, Gel Blaster, and recognized that the traditional advertising toolkit wouldn’t cut it when organic social was “the future.” He decided to dedicate an hour a night — the time he’d typically spend watching Netflix — to making content on TikTok and, eventually, Instagram. “As soon as I got it, it changed everything about what I was capable of at my job,” said Schauble. “I was able to rapidly deploy campaigns, know how to make them good, and know what to ask for. It also opened up a lot of doors career-wise.” Schauble has since racked up nearly half a million followers on Instagram (411.9K) and almost a quarter million on TikTok (203.4K). Nine months ago — 18 months after he started learning the platform —?he left corporate America to become a full-time content creator, branding himself “the internet’s creative director.” Schauble is one of a number of advertising professionals who’ve recognized the potential of becoming creators to better understand the current marketing landscape. ?? Read the full story here: https://lnkd.in/ecrpQsUt In this piece by Kristina Monllos, we also speak to Jocelyn McCanles, Sam Ogborn, Andrea Ogunbadejo of Eva Nosidam, John Cornette of EP+Co, Amber Burns of Allen & Gerritsen, Aisha Hakim, and Nathan Jun Poekert of GENERAL IDEA.

Publishers: How has your paid social media budget changed in the past year? How do you determine the content to promote via paid social? How are you allocating your paid social budget across different platforms? Tell us in this survey. Sponsored by Piano.?

As AI remakes virtually every industry and everyone’s way of working, laid-off professionals in Big Tech are discovering that their skills are in hot demand in some of the most unexpected places — and HR people searching for tech talent are reaping the benefits. The tech industry continues reeling from layoffs. Last month, Meta followed through on its earlier promise by?cutting about 5% of its staff, or 3,000 employees, while Google said it would offer?voluntary buyouts to workers?in its platforms and devices unit, which employs about 25,000 people. Many of those displaced workers are landing on their feet in other fields, often for better positions and more money. In this piece by Tony Case, we speak to Danny Veiga, Sarah Bouzarouata of JLL, Elin Thomasian of TalentNeuron, and Drew Firment of Pluralsight.

Nvidia GTC (GPU Technology Conference) 2025 is taking place this week in San Jose, Calif., and the giant chip manufacturer has unveiled a range of AI capabilities across a range of industries, with marketing companies like Accenture and S4 Capital Group’s Monks both showcasing their partnerships. On Tuesday’s keynote, NVIDIA CEO and founder Jensen Huang detailed numerous updates, claiming AI and machine learning has “reinvented the entire computing stack,” which requires different processors, operating systems, applications and data orchestration. “The way you access data will be fundamentally different from the past,” he said, citing Perplexity’s model of fusing traditional search methods with conversational AI as the new norm. “Instead of doing retrieval that way, I just ask Perplexity what I want… This is the way enterprise IT will work in the future as well.” Story by Marty Swant