Will the metaverse rescue marketers from the loss of third-party cookies and device tracking? Perhaps you scoff the metaverse doesn’t actually exist. That didn’t prevent 74% of marketers telling Qualtrics they were already advertising in it and 59% of that group saying it’s their most successful channel. Pioneering? Optimistic? Delusional? Take your pick.
The data business is infinitely fascinating, amirite? So you’ll be excited to learn that two firms which track consumer purchases are merging. NielsenIQ specializes in measuring fast-moving consumer goods, while GfK collects data about consumer durables purchases. Both are majority-owned by private investment firms, which will retain shares in the combined operation.
Contextual advertising is a more realistic option to replace cookie-based targeting. Sadly, this Nielsen study finds that contextual data alone is among the least valuable signals for delivering return on investment, although it does help in combination with other factors. Their conclusion is based on multi-touch attribution studies, which find that individual-level purchase data and look-alike models work best.
Disney has agreed to license more than 200 characters, costumes, and environments (but not voices or talent likenesses) to OpenAI for Sora, its gen AI video platform. This is highly unusual for Disney, which generally sues AI models for copyright infringement; in fact, it sued Google for that a day before announcing the OpenAI deal. Disney will also invest $1 billion in OpenAI, nicely illustrating how very eager they are to join the AI party.