New Agency Review At P&G; NYT Revenue Grew After It Killed Open Exchange Sales In Europe

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A New Review

Procter & Gamble is running a round of internal bids in an effort to cut marketing costs and bring more services in house. Rather than launch a formal review, P&G has asked its incumbent agencies, Carat and Hearts & Science, to duke it out against its in-house trading desk for seven brand categories across its North American business. Execs with knowledge of the pitch tell Adweek that Carat won away some of Hearts & Science’s business with the CPG giant. As always, having P&G as your flagship account is a double-edged sword. “We are now providing brands a little more flexibility to decide if they do their own planning, digital buying or put their hands on the keyboard for search and programmatic,” says a company spokesperson. “This puts our brands closer to decisions to drive growth.” More.

Brand Cache

When The New York Times shut off its open exchange sales in Europe in the lead-up to GDPR, its digital ad revenue didn’t slip. In fact, digital ad sales increased significantly after the publisher introduced geographical and contextual targeting for GDPR last May. The Times briefly re-upped its inventory on the open exchange last year but then withdrew again, SVP of global advertising Jean-Christophe Demarta tells Digiday. “The fact that we are no longer offering behavioral targeting options in Europe does not seem to be in the way of what advertisers want to do with us,” he says. “The desirability of a brand may be stronger than the targeting capabilities.” More.

Snap Out Of It

The departure of Snap finance chief Tim Stone eight months after his hire is the latest in a long string of executive departures, including strategy leader Imran Khan, VP of sales Jeff Lucas and previous CFO Drew Vollero. More on that at AdExchanger. His early exit will be seen as an ill omen by investors who are already skittish about Snap, which is facing user decline, stubborn unprofitability and a Justice Department probe into competitive disclosures about Instagram during its pre-IPO process, The Wall Street Journal reports. “Snap has an opportunity to pull out of a tailspin that it’s in, but the CEO has to act quickly,” says Brent Thill, an analyst at Jefferies who follows Snap. More.

But Wait, There’s More!

You’re Hired!

This post was syndicated from Ad Exchanger.