Winning this week’s Ne Plus Obvious Award (which I just invented), a Princeton University study that found internet-connected TVs track customer data. They found trackers on 69% of Roku channels and 89% of Amazon Fire channels – and that lots of the data could be linked to specific individuals. Maybe that’s not literally obvious, since the notifications are well hidden, but if you’re surprised then you haven’t been paying attention.
Mastercard is buying SessionM, which combines a CDP with a loyalty system. It extends Mastercard’s growing suite of data-driven marketing services for retailers and other brands. The deal joins Treasure Data/Arm, Lattice Engines/Dun & Bradstreet, Mintigo/Anaplan, Radius Intelligence/Kabbage, and Allsight/Informatica as examples of a CDP purchased by a company outside the usual set of martech suppliers.
And you know those sophisticated marketing technologies you’ve been struggling to deploy, including cross-device campaigns, chatbot access to shopping behavior and customer service interactions, and social media ads based on visits to other sites? Accenture Interactive found consumers consider them four of the five creepiest things you can do. The only thing that’s creepier is receiving an ad for something you only talked about near a voice assistant.
The IAB is forecasting that digital video will capture some 60% of total TV/video ad spend this year, a growth of 100% on its share five years ago. The new 2025 Digital Video Ad Spend & Strategy Report also notes that CTV saw a 16% increase YoY in ad spend growth. CTV and social video will be the top “must-buys” for advertisers in 2025.