Digiday Sunday
Digiday:?An eventful and important week for Digiday with our coverage of the Google/DOJ antitrust trial’s first week taking center stage. Over the past ten days we’ve published more than a dozen pieces that included daily dispatches filed from the court as well as stories ranging from a video explainer of the trial and a profile of the trial’s presiding judge to a breakdown if the code names Google used in its dealings in the digital advertising arena – which they aggressively and thoroughly dominated before triggering claims of monopolistic behavior. Beyond reporting on all things Google, our coverage of ad tech, specifically an effort by The Trade Desk to debunk rumors that is developing a new smart tv operating system, did very well. And as the presidential election looms, coverage of how the election is shaping influencer marketing in, the now, just weeks away election day, clicked nicely with readers. – James Cooper
Story highlights
Seb Joseph had the week’s most-read reporting with a late-in-the-week piece on The Trade Desk CEO Jeff Green publicly debunking rumors that the ad tech giant is in the process of framing out a smart TV operating system to compete with the likes of Roku, Amazon and TV manufactures. As he reported, while Green bluntly said the rumors are wrong, ‘It’s easy to see why the more tantalizing notion of The Trade Desk launching its own smart TV OS overshadowed these collaborations. Companies like Roku and Samsung use their own operating systems to drive ad sales, so it’s not a stretch to imagine The Trade Desk eyeing a piece of that pie’
Ronan Shields pulled together a great rundown of the DOJ vs. Google and the cases for and against either side of the antitrust trial on opening day last Monday. As he reported, ‘The DOJ claims Google’s role as a broker, auctioneer, and participant in ad auctions —?via its specific tools in Google Ad Manager (GAM), that are commonly known as “DFP,” “AdX,” and “DBM” by industry aficionados.?This scenario leads to conflicts of interest, enabling it to favor its services at the expense of rivals.’ Google then spent the week countering these and other claims with an increasingly aggressive tone.
Marty Swant and Ronan Shields also looked at Google’s ad tech impact on publishers, a central theme during the opening day of the DOJ’s antitrust trial. As they reported, ‘The DOJ’s legal team’s opening efforts centered on demonstrating publishers’ reliance on Google — i.e., the defendant’s (alleged) undue industry-wide influence — and attempting to solicit answers from witnesses representing ad tech, agency and publisher sources that could quantify its control. What they shared throughout the course of the day painted a stark picture of publishers trapped in a financial vice, where their reliance on Google’s ad tech not only diminished their independence but also led to significant financial losses as Google tightened its grip.’
Ronan Shields and Marty Swant , as the week and testimony unfolded, reported the DOJ was attempting to make the case that Google had created a ‘succeed at all costs’ culture and general operating procedures in its goal of dominating the digital ad market. As they reported, a note was presented from David Rosenblatt, then CEO of DoubleClick, just a year after Google’s $3.1 billion acquisition of the company. According to the email, Rosenblatt laid out his strategy and said: “I really believe that if we can execute on this stuff, we’ll be able to crush the other networks.” The?DOJ?presented further internal communications to support its claim that Google’s acquisition of DoubleClick, along with its popular ad server DoubleClick for Publishers (DFP), was a deliberate attempt to corner the display advertising market through a practice known as ‘tying.’
Antoinette S. reported out a well-read and timely news analysis on how the increasingly bombastic presidential race is shaping influencer marketing in terms of brand strategies and social media spending. As she reported, ‘Influencer marketing platform Collective Voice issued an influencer and brand strategies?report?this week that found 76% of consumers want election content from creators. Additionally, the survey noted that 46% of influencers are adjusting their content and partnership strategies around the election.’
Julia Russell Tabisz showed some great enterprise in the creation of an editorial-based survey dedicated to the Google antitrust trial that was pushed out via social and links in all of the stories published on the topic. The response was very strong with 126 participants and proved to be the basis of a piece by and her Ronan Shields at the end of the week with great charts rendered by Julia. Nice team effort there that was also expertly and thoroughly supported by Courtney Marabella on our social channels. The story will be published tomorrow.
Kimeko McCoy ’s edition of the Digiday podcast featured an interview with ?Lee Anne Grant, chief growth officer of Babylist, a baby registry company, during which spoke about the impact of AI on her company and the importance of creating auditing policies?to ensure data security, stability and fairness. Give a listen here
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Tim Peterson was back with a new WTF explainer episode looking at the DOJ’s antitrust case against Google. As he wrote in the video’s intro, ‘At 155 pages long, the complaint is a lot to digest. So, in a series of explainer videos, we break down the primary aspects of the Justice Department’s accusations. Check out the video here
?Here are the Digiday + Briefings for the week
—Media Buying Briefing: How Bob Kantor used his agency life to build a different Holdco model at Dawn
See you next Sunday!
Will the DOJ settlement with Google include include even more censorship provided by Google of free speech identified by AI bot sweeps of all media on the web?