CDP Institute

I can’t bring myself to lead with yet another generative AI story, so we’ll start instead with this Forrester report for Airtable, which found that organizations have lots of software applications.  The average is 367 in use at large organizations, with teams using an average of 45 daily and individuals using an average of 52 weekly.  No surprise here but a good reminder of why data integration is so important.

Data integration is one of the more promising uses for generative AI, although it doesn’t get as a much attention as search or content creation.  SnapLogic is staking its claim by opening a waitlist for SnapGPT, which will integrate and automate business processes using natural language prompts.  Removing that bottleneck could all sorts of floodgates, including some that might best remain shut.

When it comes to bad ideas, letting ChatGPT loose to read the entire Internet could rank with the worst.  OpenAI has so far avoided that one, but they are offering controlled extensions of the system’s knowledge base by adding third-party plugins for data from selected partners.  Initial sources include Expedia, FiscalNote, Instacart, KAYAK, Klarna, Milo, OpenTable, Shopify, Slack, Speak, Wolfram, and Zapier, which all sound pretty benign although Zapier could be a gateway to pretty much anything.

Deep thinkers in the advertising world recognize that a single ad is rarely the only reason someone makes a purchase. But one-touch attribution is irresistibly simple. Sam’s Club has just announced it will link in-store purchases to online search ads within its retail ad network, giving many marketers what they want even if they know better.

Sam’s Club parent Walmart is expanding its own retail media offerings through a deal with Innovid, which specializes in delivering connected TV ads. Innovid technology will power Walmart DSP, which helps people buy ads on the Walmart Connect retail media network. The deal covers ads targeted at Walmart customers but delivered outside of Walmart’s own website.

It’s not all good news in retail media land. Gap is shutting down its retail media network, according to press reports. The troubled retailer will focus its resources on more pressing issues such as logistics and fulfillment.

“I have given up the search for truth and am looking for a good fantasy” has graduated from t-shirt slogan to corporate philosophy at Microsoft, which just added text-based image generation to Bing. You can ask whether Bing is still a search engine if it makes up its own answers, or see how Rembrandt would have painted an elephant in pajamas.

Much speculation has been devoted to the impact on work of ChatGPT and its generative AI cousins. This Fishbowl study finds there’s more real-world experience than you might think: 43% of working professionals reported they have already used ChatGPT for work. But it’s still a bit of a secret: 68% hadn’t told their boss they were using it.

Taking a brief break from AI news, let’s note that in-store technology and media company Mood Media has just purchased in-store ad network tech vendor Vibenomics. It’s all about the continuing boom in retail media networks.

Adobe is running its Summit conference this week, which means lots of product announcements.  Real-Time CDP has its share, including customer segments created by generative AI and various types of integrations with Merkle, Epsilon, LiveRamp, Adobe Commerce, Marketo Engage, Amazon Ads, and TikTok.  They also announced general availability of Privacy and Security Shield, a package of privacy features including HIPAA support.

Did someone mention HIPAA?  Treasure Data just announced they’ve added full HIPAA compliance to all their products.  Obviously they’re not the first or only CDP to do this, but maybe you’re keeping score.

We’ve recently written quite a bit about ad verification in different channels, so I was going to skip news that DoubleVerify and Integral Ad Science are offering ad viewability and fraud protection on Netflix.  But the industry was super-excited when Netflix started accepting ads a few months back, so maybe you’ll care about this as well.