Agency

Over the past decade, Pew Research Center has documented the wide variety of ways in which Americans use social media to seek out information and interact with others. A majority of Americans now say they get news via social media, and half of the public has turned to these sites to learn about the 2016 presidential election. Americans are using social media in the context of work (whether to take a mental break on the job or to seek out employment), while also engaging in an ongoing effort to navigate the complex privacy issues that these sites bring to the forefront.  By Shannon Greenwood, Andrew Perrin and Maeve Duggan

Price wars have broken out in consumer industries around the world. It’s no secret that retailers such as ALDI, Amazon and Walmart have used price to position themselves against traditional competitors in their markets, pinching margins all around. Financial asset managers have been out-price-cutting one another in exchange-traded funds in a bid to gain market share. Major US telecommunications carriers now compete fiercely on price as they try to win new customers. And airlines are gearing up for a price war on trans-Atlantic routes as some low-cost carriers plan service between the US and Europe.  By Sandeep Heda, Stephen Mewborn and Stephen Caine

Pharmaceutical manufacturers, payers and healthcare providers (HCPs)—as well as a host of tech-focused newcomers—are exploring digital programs that complement standard therapies and hold promise to keep patients healthier and produce better outcomes.

According to UBS Evidence Lab, 54% of 18- to 34-year-olds visit YouTube at least once per day, making it the third-most popular social media platform for daily usage among this age group.

Veteran direct marketers believed that non-DR TV couldn’t be measured. But that was before advances in digital measurement and data analytics. Thanks to these technologies, behavior can now modeled and predicted in online and offline channels.

Research shows that hurtful workplace behavior can depress performance, increase employee turnover, and even mar customer relationships.  By Christine Porath

Before turning the corner from 2016 to 2017, Telemundo accompanied the launch of El Chema, its latest 10 p.m. nightly attraction, with A 360 Escape, a virtual reality vignette about the series. By Simon Applebaum

The words “multicultural” and “diversity,” to many progressives – and until November 8, almost all marketers – have had a positive connotation. These terms have been very often used as shorthand for, if you will, “all voices matter.”  By David R. Morse

Despite the proliferation of health and wellness information online and in real life, according to the National Center for Education Statistics, only 12% of the U.S. adult population is “health literate.”

As the recent rise in spending on influencer marketing suggests, the methods and sources consumers use to vet products online is undergoing a significant shift.

The FCC on Tuesday (1/3) gave Univision Communications and Mexican media goliath Grupo Televisa a huge New Year’s gift by agreeing that the public interest would be served by permitting foreign ownership of Univision beyond the federally mandated limit of 25%.  By Adam R Jacobson / RBR + TVBR

Healthcare marketing is not automobile marketing but there is something we can learn from the Ram campaign. How can we create campaigns that go beyond the ephemerally provocative, to those that create legacy? How can we use our unique platform to do good?

At the end of the 20th century, usage of the World Wide Web moved out of academia and grew at a breathtaking rate. By 2015, over one-third of the world’s population had logged on to the Internet at some point in the previous year; the Connected Revolution had arrived.  Now pundits say that we are on the verge of a fourth revolution: the Age of Smart Machines.  By Alessandro Zolla, Machine Learning Program Lead

We all know people love stories but not all stories are equally compelling, particularly when it comes to brand building. Great marketers recognize that the focus of the story should be the brand. The story is a means to an end, not an end in itself.  by Nigel Hollis

In Latin American countries, the most magical Christmas night for children isn’t on December 25th, but rather on January 6th, the night in which the Three Kings flood the house with gifts.

For the time being at least, influencer marketing is a popular and effective way to reach consumers. Influencer platform Bloglovin’ sought to find out how female consumers feel about the tactic, and what would cause them to respond in a negative way to influencer posts.

Demographic targeting (using consumers’ age and gender to make media decisions) continues to be used widely, but advertisers are raising questions about its effectiveness.

Facebook’s latest revelation of miscounted metrics is reported to have agencies in a spin. One top ad agency executive is reported to have said that it is freaking out people because “It’s hard to explain to clients”. But really you have to wonder if clients should be worrying about the minutiae of metrics about individual posts. Perhaps we all need to take a step back and look at the bigger picture.

eMarketer updated its benchmark estimates for industry-specific digital advertising outlays, noting that broad trends lifted spending across all sectors in 2016.

Many entertainment marketers are still employing a mass-market, broad-strokes approach that TV commercials offer. But this kind of mindset does not translate to influencer marketing.