Today in Digital Marketing - When War and Stock Imagery Meet

Episode Date: March 2, 2022

The new podcast format that borrows from the programmatic ad world... The stock image bank of the Ukraine war... Why you should care about an agency conglomerate's revenue numbers... How digital killed the "We Won't Be Undersold" promise...Go Premium! No ads, more stories, audio chapters, and extended weekend episodes — https://todayindigital.com/premiumADVERTISING as low as $20: https://todayindigital.com/ads JOIN OUR SLACK! https://todayindigital.com/slackFOLLOW US: https://todayindigital.com/socialmedia (TikTok, LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, and Reddit) ENJOYING THE SHOW?- Please tweet about us! https://b.link/pod-tweet- Rate and review us: https://todayindigital.com/rateus- Leave a voicemail: https://b.link/pod-voicemail FOLLOW TOD:- TikTok: https://b.link/pod-tiktok- Twitter: https://b.link/pod-twitter- LinkedIn: https://b.link/pod-linkedin- Twitch: https://twitch.tv/todmaffin  Today in Digital Marketing is hosted by Tod Maffin (https://b.link/pod-todsite) and produced by engageQ digital (https://b.link/pod-engageq). Subscribe at https://TodayInDigital.com or wherever you get your podcasts. (Theme music by Mark Blevis. All other music licensed by Source Audio.)Does your brand need a podcast? Let us help: https://engageQ.com/podcastsOur Sponsors:* Check out Kinsta: https://kinsta.comPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Do you have business insurance? If not, how would you pay to recover from a cyber attack, fire damage, theft, or a lawsuit? No business or profession is risk-free. Without insurance, your assets are at risk from major financial losses, data breaches, and natural disasters. Get customized coverage today,

starting at $19 per month at zensurance.com. Be protected, be Zen. Today, the new podcast format at zensurance.com. Be protected. Be Zen. And on the Premium Podcast, with no ads, more stories, and extended weekend episodes, tap the link in the show notes for more. Don't switch all your gift cards to digital. You could be throwing revenue away. It's Tuesday, March 1st. I'm Todd Maffin. Here is what you missed today in digital marketing. An interesting new technology may soon power an entirely new form of podcasts. Insider Inc. announced a partnership with Spooler and say they've created a new kind of audio platform that lets podcasters feature real-time updates. Borrowing from programmatic ad technology, Spooler's system does the same for editorial content, letting producers offer on-demand news in a podcast format that can be reassembled, re-sequenced, and updated in real-time by the podcast system itself.

Here's how it works. The publishing tool creates customized podcast episodes from individually produced audio segments. Those get stitched together into a single podcast. For example, producers will be able to create playlist programs in the Spooler app that are automatically merged to make the podcast sound seamless, even when it's being updated repeatedly. Like most podcast platforms, the player allows listeners to skip segments, scroll through upcoming stories, and select the ones they want to hear. Insider's CEO noted that this

technology could improve podcast adoption on smart speakers and in cars where people search for up-to-date information via voice commands. You might be familiar with the stock image house Deposit Photos. What you might not know is that the company is based in Ukraine, and it's now using its resources to counter Russian propaganda. The company has set up a dedicated image collection to show the reality of Russia's invasion. The new library is titled The Truth About Russia's War in Ukraine and features images of anti-war demonstrations around the world, including in Russia, as well as bombings, empty grocery shelves,

and more images of the devastation. Deposit Photos updates the collection in real time, and it's free for you to download and use the images. Anyone can download the stock photographs for their blogs, publications, social media, or design purposes. The digital agency conglomerate WPP has reported an outstanding 2021 with like-for-like revenue increasing 13%. Turns out that was a record year for the company. The holding company posted its fastest organic growth in more than 20 years and hit its 2023 revenue target two years early. New Business was a major contributor with its expanded work with Google and partnership with Coca-Cola. The company generated $8.7 billion

in new business last year. Given that it represents a large group of agencies, WPP's numbers are often seen as a good indicator of the state of the agency industry in general. What happens to us all? Through no fault of our own, we end up with a gap in our resume. Maybe we were caring for a relative, or took the time off to adopt a child, or spent three months troubleshooting a Facebook ad account. Sometimes you'll want to explain to potential employers why there's a gap. Well, to help with that, LinkedIn today announced that it will add a career break option to its experience section, allowing professionals to explain those gaps on their resumes.

According to the platform, more than half of professionals have taken some sort of career break, but 60% of people believe that there is still a stigma attached to career breaks. What do hiring managers think about gaps in resumes? Half acknowledge it's becoming more than common. More than 45% believe candidates with career breaks are untapped talent. And the majority of employers say they are more likely to contact a candidate who provides context about their break. LinkedIn says users will be able to choose from 13 different options

to describe their career break, including caregiving, career transition, bereavement, layoffs, health and wellness breaks, and more. It's the season for new styles, and you love to shop for jackets and boots. So when you do, always make sure you get cash back from Rakuten. And it's not just clothing and shoes. You can get cash back from over 750 stores on electronics, holiday travel, home decor, and more. It's super easy.

And before you buy anything, always go to Rakuten first. Join free at Rakuten.ca. Start shopping and get your cash back sent to you by check or PayPal. Get the Rakuten app or join at Rakuten.ca. R-A-K-U-T-E-N dot C-A. Do you have business insurance? If not, how would you pay to recover from a cyber attack, fire damage, theft, or a lawsuit? No business or profession is risk-free.

Without insurance, your assets are at risk from major financial losses, data breaches, and natural disasters. Get customized coverage today starting at $19 per month at zensurance.com. Be protected. Be Zen. Instagram is dropping one ad placement as part of its attempt to create a consistent viewing experience for videos on its platform. IGTV ads, sometimes called in-stream video ads, will no longer be supported. Creators that had been monetizing through those ads will receive a temporary payment based on earnings. This is actually part of a wider decision to drop the standalone IGTV application entirely. Thus, all of your brand's videos will now need to be posted

through the Instagram app, which frankly, I think nearly everyone was doing now anyway. Also announced, all videos watched on the Instagram app will soon have access to the same features, such as full screen view and mute. A couple of updates from Google to share with you. First, the company announced yesterday that on January 5th, it removed all app campaign placement data from several reports within the Google Ads API and the AdWords API. Google says they made the change because, quote, the data provided didn't fully represent the complete view of the placements

that help developers monitor brand safety for their advertisers, unquote. If you use these reports, the search giant recommends that you reference the app campaign's brand safety placement report instead. And second, if you are experiencing errors when using the URL inspection tool within Google Search Console, here's why. The company confirmed today it is experiencing issues with the URL inspection tool and that you might see an increase in errors when inspecting URLs. Google says it is working on it. Well, every city had one. A late night ad in which the owner wears some goofy costume and yells, I won't be undersold! It was a great USP for its

time, but can this promise be held up in the new world of online buying? For the John Lewis clothing retailer, no. It can't. The company has used the tagline, never knowingly undersold, since 1925.

It's become part of the brand. And now, the company is retiring it, saying the promise is no longer enough to assure trust because it applies to fewer and fewer sales as shopping moves online. Their promise never did apply to online sales. So what's replacing it? Some PR speak about proactively leading on great value and that shoppers will therefore benefit from great prices every day

without having to shop around, blah, blah, blah. I, for one, will miss the costumes the most. Ever had one of those days where it feels like everything you touch blows up? That was my day. Started recording the podcast, nearly voiced it all, then decided to try a new post-processing plugin out and the whole thing crashed, corrupted our master production

file. So yeah. How was your day? See you tomorrow.