Insight Is A Man’s Best Friend, With Mars Pet Nutrition

Summary

AdExchanger Talks: "Insight Is A Man’s Best Friend" with J.P. Jansen of Mars Pet Nutrition

Release Date: December 3, 2024

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Introduction

In this engaging episode of AdExchanger Talks, host Alison Schiff converses with J.P. Jansen, Senior Vice President of Marketing and Chief Marketing Officer for North America at Mars Pet Nutrition. The discussion delves into the intricacies of managing a vast portfolio of pet brands, the evolving landscape of marketing technologies, and the strategic utilization of data to foster growth in the pet industry. Midway through the episode, Stephanie Paterik, GM of Editorial and Editor-in-Chief at The Trade Desk, joins to provide additional insights into the broader ad tech environment.

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Guest Background and Personal Insights

[02:13] J.P. Jansen:
J.P. shares his multicultural background, highlighting his Dutch and half-Indonesian heritage, which fuels his appreciation for Asian cuisines and cultures. He fluently speaks English, Dutch, French, and German, adding a personal touch to the conversation with anecdotes about communicating with his dog, Coco.

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Managing a Diverse Brand Portfolio

Alison Schiff initiates the discussion by exploring the challenges and opportunities of overseeing a broad spectrum of pet brands under the Mars Pet Nutrition umbrella, including Temptations, Sheba, Whiskas, Pedigree, Iams, and Greenies.

[05:38] J.P. Jansen:
J.P. emphasizes that having a complementary portfolio allows Mars Pet Nutrition to cater to various market segments, whether by price point or food philosophy. This diversity ensures broad market coverage but necessitates clear prioritization and strategic funding to support top-performing brands and opportunities.

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Evolution of Marketing Strategies

Reflecting on his career journey from Procter & Gamble to Coty Beauty Care Company and finally to Mars Pet Nutrition, J.P. Jansen discusses the transformation of marketing practices over the past decades.

[08:46] J.P. Jansen:
He reminisces about the early days of direct mail programs at P&G, emphasizing how marketing has shifted from traditional methods to digital platforms. J.P. acknowledges that while some old-school techniques like high-quality direct mail still hold value, the majority of CRM and marketing efforts have transitioned online, leveraging digital tools and social media.

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Marketing Mix Modeling (MMM) and Attribution

The conversation pivots to the significance of Marketing Mix Modeling (MMM) in today's advertising ecosystem.

[11:58] J.P. Jansen:
J.P. advocates for a hybrid approach to measurement, asserting that MMM provides a holistic view of marketing impact and ROI drivers. He underscores the necessity of combining MMM with real-time optimization tools to balance comprehensive performance analysis with agile decision-making, especially for high-stakes events like Cyber Weekend.

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Leveraging First-Party Data

A pivotal segment focuses on the strategies Mars Pet Nutrition employs to collect and utilize first-party data about pet parents.

[15:22] J.P. Jansen:
J.P. highlights the importance of quality over quantity in first-party data. Through platforms like the Greenies website, Mars Pet Nutrition gathers actionable insights—such as identifying pet life cycles and specific needs like dental care—that inform tailored marketing strategies and enhance customer relationship management (CRM).

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Addressing Sensitive Customer Data

Alison Schiff poses a delicate question regarding how Mars Pet Nutrition handles data when a pet passes away, ensuring respectful and relevant marketing.

[18:37] J.P. Jansen:
J.P. explains that Mars has robust protocols to immediately cease marketing efforts when notified of a pet's passing. The company prioritizes maintaining a compassionate relationship with customers, ensuring that communications remain appropriate and sensitive to their circumstances.

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Audience Insights and Community Engagement

Exploring deeper audience insights, J.P. shares how Mars Pet Nutrition taps into specific communities to enhance brand connection.

[23:06] J.P. Jansen:
An intriguing finding revealed that 50% of gamers in the U.S. own cats. Leveraging this insight, Mars Pet Nutrition's Temptations brand engaged with the gaming community through live streams and in-game activations like "Cat Cafe Minecraft," effectively connecting with a younger, engaged audience without direct competition for attention.

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Balancing Reach and Targeting in Growth Strategies

Alison Schiff introduces the concept of the "laws of growth," emphasizing the need to balance broad reach with targeted marketing.

[31:02] J.P. Jansen:
J.P. discusses the cyclical nature of marketing strategies—from mass reach to personalized targeting—and the importance of rediscovering the value of reach while prioritizing high-value audiences. By utilizing partnerships with platforms like Google’s DV360, Mars Pet Nutrition achieves unduplicated reach across streaming TV and online video, balancing wide exposure with strategic audience targeting.

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Embracing Retail Media Networks (RMNs)

The role of Retail Media Networks (RMNs) in the pet nutrition sector is examined, highlighting their growing significance.

[34:02] J.P. Jansen:
J.P. affirms Mars Pet Nutrition's deep investment in RMNs, particularly because pet food sales online account for 30% of total sales in America. By collaborating closely with online retailers, Mars leverages purchase-based targeting to achieve high ROI, enhancing both conversion rates and brand awareness through strategic media investments.

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Direct-to-Consumer (D2C) vs. E-Commerce Partnerships

The discussion shifts to the strategic considerations between Direct-to-Consumer (D2C) sales and partnering with established e-commerce platforms like Chewy.

[39:55] J.P. Jansen:
J.P. outlines Mars Pet Nutrition's cautious approach to D2C, preferring to differentiate their offerings—such as special Temptations packs and pill pockets—for direct sales. While D2C serves to connect with valuable consumers and gather feedback, Mars primarily relies on e-commerce platforms to maximize reach and streamline purchasing processes.

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Media Buying: In-House vs. Agency Partnerships

Alison Schiff probes into Mars Pet Nutrition's approach to media buying and the balance between in-house efforts and agency collaborations.

[41:42] J.P. Jansen:
Media buying at Mars Pet Nutrition is predominantly outsourced to specialized media agencies, ensuring access to top creative talents and cultural insights. However, certain areas like paid search on platforms like Amazon are managed in-house to allow for agile optimizations. On the creative front, large-scale campaigns are handled by top-tier agencies, while content requiring speed and volume leverages in-house resources and AI-driven automation.

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Industry Consolidations and Commerce-Focused Acquisitions

The episode addresses recent acquisitions in the ad tech space, such as Omnicom’s acquisition of Flywheel and Publicis’s purchase of Mars United Commerce.

[45:00] J.P. Jansen:
J.P. views these acquisitions as strategic moves to integrate diverse disciplines and enhance coordination across media expressions. The increasing investment in RMNs makes these consolidations logical, enabling holding companies to offer comprehensive solutions that align with evolving client needs.

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Ensuring Brand Safety and Transparency

Brand safety emerges as a critical topic, especially in the context of recent lawsuits involving major platforms.

[47:42] J.P. Jansen:
J.P. emphasizes Mars Pet Nutrition’s commitment to brand safety through a robust responsible marketing code established in 2007. The company prioritizes showing their brands in safe, contextually appropriate environments and driving diversity both in front of and behind the camera. Transparency remains a cornerstone of their marketing strategy, ensuring that all advertising efforts uphold the brand's integrity.

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Closing Remarks and Personal Touches

The conversation concludes with light-hearted exchanges about pets, reinforcing the deep bond between Mars Pet Nutrition and pet owners.

[50:12] Alison Schiff:
Alison shares a personal anecdote about her cat, Mermaid, highlighting the universal love and attention brands like Mars Pet Nutrition dedicate to pets.

[50:34] J.P. Jansen:
J.P. reflects on the evolving relationship humans have with pets, noting how pets have become integral to family life and how Mars Pet Nutrition is privileged to support this bond through their products and services.

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Notable Quotes

• J.P. Jansen [05:38]:
  "The portfolio is really designed to play in the different partitions in the market, whether it's price partitions or food philosophies."

• J.P. Jansen [11:58]:
  "Marketing mix modeling provides a holistic view on the impact of your marketing and helps set your strategy for optimal media mix."

• J.P. Jansen [15:22]:
  "It's more about quality than quantity. High-quality first-party data can be super valuable."

• J.P. Jansen [23:06]:
  "Gamers are disproportionately likely to own a cat, which makes them a fantastic audience for Temptations."

• J.P. Jansen [34:02]:
  "Pet nutrition is one of the highest penetrated online categories, with 30% of all pet food sales in America done online."

• J.P. Jansen [47:42]:
  "Context does matter. We want to make sure that our brands show up in a context where the brand is safe and not harming the brand."

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Conclusion

This episode of AdExchanger Talks offers a comprehensive exploration of modern marketing strategies within the pet nutrition industry, highlighting the essential balance between leveraging data-driven insights and maintaining authentic, wide-reaching brand presence. J.P. Jansen provides invaluable perspectives on navigating a complex brand portfolio, embracing retail media networks, and ensuring brand safety, all while fostering meaningful connections with pet parents. The inclusion of insights from Stephanie Paterik further enriches the discussion, situating Mars Pet Nutrition’s strategies within the broader ad tech landscape.

Listeners gain a nuanced understanding of how Mars Pet Nutrition continues to innovate and adapt in a rapidly evolving market, driven by a commitment to enhancing the lives of pets and their owners.

Transcript

[Alison Schiff]

Welcome to Ad Exchanger Talks, the podcast devoted to examining the issues and trends in advertising and marketing technology that matter most to you. This episode is sponsored by the trade desk Edge Academy, the online learning platform designed to help marketers stay ahead in the evolving world of digital advertising. Check out their certifications, expanded course curriculum, and more, all led by the people who are shaping the world of ad tech. Enroll today for free at edgeacademy.thetradedesk.com I'm Alison Schiff, and I hope this episode of Ad Exchanger Talks catalyzes your curiosity and that it's a doggone good listen. You'll forgive me, I can't help myself, because my guest this week is J.P. jansen, SVP of Marketing and CMO for North America at Mars Pet Nutrition. We spend part of this episode gushing about our respective beloved house pets, but we also managed to talk about mmm, first party data, retail media, audience insights, and growth marketing. Let us fill your water bowl with knowledge. But before we kick this thing off, if you're not listening to our other podcast, the Big Story, you're missing out. It's a weekly roundtable discussion of, as the name denotes, the biggest stories or story of the week. And we're an amusing crew. Let us entertain and inform you during your morning run, or on your commute, or when you're walking your pet. And while you're at it, please also save the date for next year's CTV Connect, March 12th and 13th in New York City, Ad Exchanger is joining forces again with synopsys, Admonsters and Chief marketer to host a Can't Miss summit on all the key issues and opportunities in Connected TV. Learn more and [e-mail] hey JP, welcome to the podcast.

[J.P. Jansen]

Thank you for having me.

[Alison Schiff]

So you were telling me right before we started this is your first ever podcast, so I am honored to be your first host.

[J.P. Jansen]

Yeah, I'm excited. I'm looking forward to it.

[Alison Schiff]

So that's one thing I didn't know about you, that this is your first podcast. But what's something that maybe not a lot of other people already know about?

[J.P. Jansen]

Yes. So a lot of people who know me know that I'm Dutch. Other people think I'm French. But what people don't know is that my mother, actually, my grandmother on my mother's side is half Indonesian. So I have an Indonesian side. And that's why I enjoy very much the food from Asia and spending time in that region.

[Alison Schiff]

I also love that food. I have no family connections but that doesn't stop me from stuffing my face across cultures. I saw from your LinkedIn page that you speak, it looks like you speak at least four languages. English, Dutch, French and German.

[J.P. Jansen]

Yes, yes.

[Alison Schiff]

So I have a silly question. Like if you were talking to a puppy and you wanted to say like, good boy in Dutch, how would you say that?

[J.P. Jansen]

Gut gedan. I know it's a very hard language.

[Alison Schiff]

I would have trouble with that. And what about German?

[J.P. Jansen]

What would I say to a puppy in German? Gutgern. Gutgemacht. That's probably.

[Alison Schiff]

Yeah, gutgemacht. So my accent is absolutely the worst. I did take French in high school. Would it be like, bon garcon. Good boy.

[J.P. Jansen]

Bien fear.

[Alison Schiff]

Okay, well, speaking of a good boys or girls? I'm not sure. You have a dog named Coco, right?

[J.P. Jansen]

Yes, yes. She's an American lab. She's six years old, full of energy, big dog and. But lovely. Absolutely. Always the, the beauty about dogs, I think in general, but especially American labs, they, they're just, they're just perpetually optimistic. I don't, I've never, I think, ever seen her grumpy or not happy.

[Alison Schiff]

I cannot say that about my black cat, Mermaid, who is staring at me right now. I do love her, but I have seen her grumpy. Anyway, for people who aren't familiar, there are a lot of very recognizable pet brands like under the Mars pet nutrition umbrella, Temptations, Sheba, Whiskas, Pedigree, Imes, Greenies, lots of others, and Neutral. Oh, go on.

[J.P. Jansen]

Y and Neutral, the last.

[Alison Schiff]

And so you'll have to forgive me, I'm gonna make a lot of goofy, like wordplay on pet related things because I can't help myself. So Mermaid personally thank Per personally thanks you for Greenies and Temptations because she loves that stuff. She is a huge catnip flavored Greenies fan. But anyway, what, what is the biggest challenge but also the biggest opportunity of managing such a big portfolio of brands? Because I think there are more than I mentioned.

[J.P. Jansen]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's actually a blessing from my seat because the portfolio that we have is really designed to play in the different partitions in the market, whether it's price partitions or whether it's what we call food philosophies. So the portfolio is really complementary and it reaches different shoppers, different target groups. Also, some brands are more developed in certain channels than other channels, so it gives a really broad coverage. What that does do, of course, as you manage a broader portfolio, is that you need to be very clear about your priorities. Make sure that the top priorities are fully funded and supported. And sometimes that means saying no or making choices on other opportunities that you could pursue. But by and large, this portfolio, and obviously not designed by me, I'm standing on the shoulders of giants, so to say, over the years, has been really designed to meet the different needs of pet parents in the US and we're.

[Alison Schiff]

Going to talk a lot about your strategy and how you approach marketing. But I want to look backwards a little bit in time because before you joined Mars in 2021, then as a global head of digital commerce for pet nutrition, you were at Coty beauty care company for around four and a half years, mostly focusing on E commerce. And then before that you were at P and G for a really long time. 16 years. Started in 1997, which was really just at the very, very beginning of E commerce starting to take off. I found this great fact on the George Washington University School of Business website when I was doing a little research for our conversation. It's like a history of commerce timeline kind of thing. And apparently 1997 was the year that Amazon and eBay each hit 1 million completed transactions. And today Amazon ships something like 1.5 or 1.6 billion packages every day, which is mind boggling bonkers. Yeah. And so do you know that that meme of like a teenager versus a rotary phone, where like a young person who's never seen a rotary phone before is presented with a rotary phone and then they're challenged to make a phone call and they have no idea how to use it like that. You have to rotate the dial.

[J.P. Jansen]

So yeah, I agree.

[Alison Schiff]

That's like my goofy way of asking what's something that used to be common practice at the beginning of your career? Say when you were an assistant brand manager at P and G in the late 90s and commerce was just starting to take off. That would feel like antiquated or old school to a brand manager or a media buyer today. Like someone in their mid-20s or, you know, is it all just like pretty. Pretty much like solid foundational stuff and you have to update it as time goes on and technology changes.

[J.P. Jansen]

Yeah, well, to start with the latter, I absolutely believe a lot of fundamentals have not changed, despite the world's around us changing a lot. But if I go back one example, when I started my career, I was working on in baby care on Pampers, actually at P and G. And my probably my first year, almost two years, I was solely focused on our direct mail program. Everything was about dark mail, making sure we obviously were able to identify new moms or new parents, get them in our database, and then designing our direct mail program with a lot of focus on how people scan a page and so forth. And that's completely foreign to marketers. That start today. Right? There is some direct mail still in other companies, but most companies, all those dark mail programs and CRM have all moved online and have become digital. So yeah, that was a. You know, I even remember having a whole seminar for a week on how to design the most impactful direct mail letter and leaflet and sample, and that has almost completely disappeared.

[Alison Schiff]

You know, I was having a conversation recently with a friend and we were talking about how direct mail almost feels luxurious now because there's not much stuff in our physical inboxes anymore. So when I get a really nice catalog, as I do periodically from Airbnb, about travel, and it's very nicely printed, it feels very fancy, it feels luxe, almost like something you want to put on your coffee table. And it looks nice and it feels nice, but it's, it's limited and like that's part of the value.

[J.P. Jansen]

Yeah, absolutely. Now I do, I do believe there is also room for really high quality sampling. So making sure that, and that's the beauty about today's age. You can really target really well your sampling and making sure that the right sample comes to the right consumer at the right time in, in the life cycle that they're at for the category. So there's still a role to play in direct. But yeah, a lot of that has been obviously moved online and from email programs, CRM now obviously even more social and through sms. So yeah, the world is changing, but.

[Alison Schiff]

Some old school things are cool again. Like everything is old is new again style. Like media mix modeling, for example. There's been just so much more talk about mmm. So how do you guys think about measurement? How do you approach attribution? Are you a proponent of mmm?

[J.P. Jansen]

Yes, actually, I think your measurements, we should have different tools for different purposes. So marketing mix modeling, I've always been a big fan of it. I got exposed to it when I worked at Berksong gamble over 20 years ago. So I've always had MMM or a version of MMM in my, in my toolkit. And what marketing mix modeling really allows you to do is to have a really holistic view on the impact of your marketing. It allows you to, if your data is granular enough to go quite deep into what is the driver of roi. And it's in my mind a great tool to set your strategy to say, okay, what is the optimal media mix? What do we need to refine? How do we allocate budget to different media vehicles, to different brands and also to different executions. Because creative, creative quality makes a big difference in roi. But then again, you also need tools that allow you to optimize almost in the moment. It won't give you maybe the full comprehensive view of your performance, but allows you to react very quickly. So as you mentioned, e Commerce, about 30% of our business is now online with the likes of Amazon and chewy and walmart.com so on those platforms it's critical to optimize sometimes almost on a minute by minute basis when it's cyber weekend. So for those activities you need a whole different way of measurement that maybe is not fully comprehensive but allows you to quickly optimize. So I believe you need to have a range of tools to measure your performance and then be also very clear what the purpose is of each tool and how they can be very complementary.

[Alison Schiff]

You mentioned chewy and I'm actually looking right now in my living room, there's a chewy box that I've just left on the floor because my cat likes it better than the toys I bought her, of course. So. But for mmm, and I appreciate that a hybrid approach is the one that makes most sense because you just have to use the right tool for the job. But for mmm, you need lots of historical data, you need lots of sales data, ad spend data, roi, first party customer data, and you have to do it across channels. But I want to focus on first party data. I mean, E commerce kind of alleviates the challenge of data collection, but first party data collection. But it's always been a particular challenge for CPGs to be in a position to collect their own first party data because the direct relationship isn't always there. There's some disintermediation with a retailer. So what's your strategy for collecting first party data about your audience, like pet parents and what signals are like, really important beyond like this person owns a cat and this person owns a dog, which does tell you a lot.

[J.P. Jansen]

Yeah, yeah, it's. I would say to summarize it, for me it's more about quality than quantity. So having really high quality first party data can be super valuable. We see it in our business when we for example, are able through our Greenies website where we also sell direct. By the way, we find consumers that are really into Greenies. They love the brand, they love to buy, even direct from us, they love to subscribe. And it's a relatively small group, but it's large enough to use that group of consumers, that first party data to then go and work with the likes of Amazon or the likes of Google or Mac Meta to start using that first party data as a lookalike audience or to build a lookalike audience based on that first party data. And we've seen far greater effectiveness of our media when we use high quality first party data as an input in designing a broader audience or designing a broader campaign. And when it comes to data, the data becomes really valuable if it also allows you to truly and in a meaningful way tailor your marketing based on that data. So for example, in pet, when we collect data on new pet owners, new pet parents, and we're able to identify breed mix, obviously age of pets, whether that pet is neutered or spayed, which is very important for our veterinary business, for example, that data is really actionable and valuable because it allows us then to very much tailor our marketing to where that pet parent and their pet is in what we call the pet life cycle. For example, you can start to identify that phase that the puppy becomes an adult, which we know is a moment that pet parents are open to try new products or maybe switch to a different brand. So being able to have, so having that data and that first party data is a very important marker to optimize our CRM and our marketing.

[Alison Schiff]

I have to ask a question that is a little bit of a sad question, but it just popped to mind. What do you do and how do you treat it and how do you make sure that you update your file when like a pet passes away? Like, it would be really a sad feeling to keep getting emails from Mermaid, for example, and Mermaid's gonna live forever, so that's fine. Like she's going to be with us for all of eternity. But that would seem to me to be a big challenge because you want to personalize and you want people to know that you understand them. But it has to extend even further than like the pet's life.

[J.P. Jansen]

Yeah, yeah, we do. We have all kinds of protocols and we make it very easy for people to also unsubscribe. But we, yeah, we do stop the relationship, obviously when we get notified that the pet has passed away. And our approach, you know, if you don't have a pet, we don't necessarily market to you direct. I think it then becomes less relevant. We know that. And then when you reenter the category and we're able to do and you start a relationship again with one of our brands or one of our properties, then the cycle starts again. But we generally stop marketing when the pet leaves the home or unfortunately passes away.

[Alison Schiff]

Yeah, I don't want to talk about it. So the potential customer base is absolutely massive though because just recently in October I was reading about this study that Mars released on pet parents and their behaviors and their predilections. And apparently there are 1 billion pets globally and 37% of dog and cat owners consider their pets to be the most important thing in their lives. I mean, so you have an opportunity to tap into the most important thing in someone's life. So how, how do you use data and insights like that to get to tap into that relationship, to foster it further? A little pet related wordplay there and bring it into your marketing?

[J.P. Jansen]

Yeah, well actually a lot of it actually tied to our overall purpose which is creating a better world for pets because we fundamentally believe pets create a better world for us humans. And there's indeed a lot of evidence out there that having a pet is really good for us humans. Mental, mental health, physical health. It, you know, if you have a pet friendly workplace, your, your, your workplace actually becomes more productive because people connect better. So there's a, there's a lot of benefits of pet ownership. But what we also have seen through studies is there are still a lot of questions and pain points when it comes to having a pet. So what we're trying to do based on this study and based on a lot of research we're doing is identify those pain points and see how can we help pet parents to have a better experience through our products and through our services. For example, I don't know if you've seen, we just recently, it happened over the weekend. There was a big balloon that was stuck between two buildings in Chicago. I didn't see this big dog. Yeah, yeah. And that dog, that balloon was actually, there's actually an actual dog called Waylon who was overweight and who started a weight loss journey with the help of iams, one of our brands providing tools, advice and of course healthy weight nutrition to help Weilong get back to a healthy weight. But the reason why we chose a stunt like this to, to get the conversation going is because almost 60% of dogs in America are overweight. So and veterinarians have seen an 108% increase in dogs being overweight just over the past 10 years. So that's an example how we use data and insights to then say, okay, now this is an important area which we want to raise awareness for and we want to Help pet parents to identify, first and foremost, is your dog overweight? Because most pet parents don't even know. And then help them do something about it. So to improve the quality of life of their pet and, and get their pet back to a healthy weight.

[Alison Schiff]

I just love examples because it brings what you're talking about to life. Is there another one you could share? Some other pain point or some unique audience insight that you've been able to glean about your customers and pet owners?

[J.P. Jansen]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. One of my favorites, and it's actually in cats. So you mentioned Temptations, which is our number one cat treat brand here in the US and temptation is all about. It's very irresistible to cats. Cats love temptations, but it's also a way for cat parents to bond with our cats and to have a connection with our cat. And we started to look at potential audiences that we can tap into or communities more. And we found out that gamers, which is a huge community, are disproportionately likely to own a cat. So if in the US one in three households has a cat gamers, 50% of gamers have a cat as a pet, which is a fantastic insight and actually makes a lot of sense because if you think about it, if you're gaming, you still want to have a pet, you want companionship, but you don't want to necessarily interrupt your game to walk the dog. So in hindsight, it all made sense. And that drove us with our Temptations brand to genuinely connect with the gamer community, enter into live streams, because gamers love to watch other gamers game. Right. So we had Temptations as part of those live streams in a very natural way. There was Temptation product. It allows the gamer that was gaming to have her cat, in this case close to her. And we started to also go into Minecraft and have a cat cafe, Minecraft. So it sparked a whole series of activations. And the beauty about it is you're connecting with gamers. You know, they're disproportionate cat parents. They're also a younger generation. So it creates, creates a, creates future potential as well for the brand. And you're doing it in a way without any quote, unquote, competition for attention because, you know, we work with cats. But if you go online, there's a lot of cat content out there. You're always, you're not just competing with other cat brands. So that's a great example on how we build an audience insight and how we bring that to life.

[Alison Schiff]

There is a lot of cat content out there. I consume a lot of it. And Mermaid particularly likes consuming the creamy dairy flavor Temptations. That's her. She's really into that. And she likes the Lickables. Yes. And the Catnip Greenies. Big fan, Big ups.

[J.P. Jansen]

Yeah, Yeah. I think next year we're bringing back Tasty Human as a. As a special flavor for Halloween.

[Alison Schiff]

God, do not. Do not tempt her, because I don't know where that's going to end up. But. All right, we're going to take a quick break, and when we're back, we're going to talk about the laws of growth a little more about commerce in store sales versus online sales. Lots of good stuff, so stick with us. I'm Alison Schiff, managing editor of Ad Exchanger. And today I have Stephanie Paterik with me, GM of Editorial and Editor in chief at the trade desk, where she leads the content strategy and execution. And she also has more than 20 years of experience, experience in media and journalism. Stephanie, welcome.

[Stephanie Paterik]

Alison. I admire your work. So happy to be here.

[Alison Schiff]

Thank you very much. So what shifts or forces are driving the evolution of the ad tech industry? This is such a big question.

[Stephanie Paterik]

It is a big one. And I think we're in a remarkable moment in time because we're really witnessing the maturation of the ad tech industry. And by that I mean, you know, just in my career as a. As an advertising journalist, I've seen programmatic go from this niche part of the ecosystem that transacted primarily in remnant inventory to a vital player that's supporting premium content. And I think that three forces are sparking this. It comes down to consumers, regulators, and innovators. And first, I think it's important to understand that more people are spending time on the open Internet than in walled gardens. So they're spending more time streaming shows, listening to podcasts, reading news. And second, the Department of Justice has really held Google's feet to the fire this year, and that has exposed the danger of black boxes. So everyone in the supply chain is being scrutinized, and there's a pressure to add value, not just extract it. And all of this really represents a massive opportunity for innovation and for adtech to keep evolving with quality content, supply path, efficiency, and really transparency for all parties at the fore.

[Alison Schiff]

What is one piece of advice that you'd give to someone looking to take their career to the next level?

[Stephanie Paterik]

I love this question so much. Get outside of your own expertise to understand the big picture. I think one of the biggest mistakes that people make in their careers is to silo themselves within one area of expertise. And I want to be clear, specialization is valuable, but the more that you can get curious about what your stakeholders know and the deeper you understand how the entire media ecosystem works, I think the more brilliant you'll be at what you do. So don't be afraid to play the role of a reporter and ask the subject matter experts in your organization what they know. I think you'll be surprised at how generous people are with their knowledge.

[Alison Schiff]

Advice for your career, advice for life. And how can the trade desk Edge Academy help a marketer with their career?

[Stephanie Paterik]

We talk about transparency a lot in our industry, and one place where it's vital is education. At Edge, we have a strong belief that the more everybody understands programmatic, the healthier the whole ecosystem becomes. And we really believe that this knowledge is an advantage for anybody who's looking to grow their career or their business. And this goes for the cmo, the planner, and the trader. Edge has served the advertising community for 11 years, and it's evolving to stay ahead of the curve. So we've got new classes on timely topics like omnichannel advertising, connected tv, as well as foundational certifications like trading essentials and marketing foundations. So it's just a fun challenge to meet learners where they're at and help them navigate this space that changes, as you well know, literally every day.

[Alison Schiff]

Stephanie, thank you for the insights and for the advice.

[Stephanie Paterik]

It's been so fun to be here. Thanks for having me.

[Alison Schiff]

Okay, we're back and I want to talk about a pet theory that you have, which is that the laws of growth are making a comeback, but in a digital context, meaning that the best way forward is to combine the best of both worlds, to maximize your reach and your penetration, which is the number one law of growth, but to also prioritize high value audiences and use data to target your marketing and to customize content and do all that good stuff. It does sound great, but how do you actually do that? How do you put it into effect?

[J.P. Jansen]

I think a lot of companies, at least from my experience, have gone through these cycles, starting off with being all about mass reach and mass media, then discovering the power of digital marketing, and then really getting almost mesmerized by this idea that you can personalize and customize everything to almost every individual consumer at scale, and then only being somewhat disappointed after that phase because in doing that and being so focused on ROI and targeting, losing out on maybe total reach, casting a wide enough net so you get enough new consumers to enter your brand, I would say We've gone a little bit through that cycle ourselves and as you pointed out, we have rediscovered the fact that reach is still extremely important. But the way you can get to your reach, within that buildup of reach, you prioritize what we call high value audiences. First, I mentioned puppy and kitten pet parents, or if you talk about wet dog food, we're now able to target dog parents who think their dog is a picky eater, which is a highly relevant motivation to buy wet dog food. And while that's targeting and that's using data, it's still at scale, it's still making sure we have sufficient reach. Obviously, the challenge in the digital world is how do you measure reach? We have all these walled gardens. Everything is very fragmented. So that's been a big focus area for us. And we worked with Google, with DV360, our DSP, to really get to unduplicated reach across streaming TV, across online video. And that's still the bulk of our spend. We spend a lot on video formats and that's been a real breakthrough because now we are able to get to unduplicated reach numbers. We can cap or limit frequency, which allows us to then invest again into broader reach. Long winded story answer. Maybe. But I believe with the technology we have and the partnerships we have, we can strike the right balance between getting to reach and within that target those audiences that have the highest value for our business.

[Alison Schiff]

I mean, you mentioned walled gardens and fragmentation, but you didn't mention retail media networks which are little walled gardens and there are more and more of them cropping up all the time. And it would seem to me that you must be at least experimenting with RMNS as a CPG brand or many CPG brands under the one umbrella. So how do you think about retail media and are you invested deeply into it? Yes. No. Why?

[J.P. Jansen]

Yeah, the short answer is yes, we're deeply invested in retail media. It's also because pet nutrition is one of the highest penetrated online categories. It's up to, I think the latest re now 30% of all PET food sales in America are done online. So naturally we are working very closely with our online retailers, retail partners to reach those shoppers and to convert them. But not only is it investing on platform media, what we're also seeing, and we're getting a good return leveraging more upper funnel tactics through retail media networks. And the beauty often is because we can base our targeting on purchase, this purchase based targeting and that has a very good ROI for us. So a very large portion of our budget. Our media budget is actually invested directly with retail media networks for both conversion on platform as well as for broader reach and awareness tactics. And there's an additional benefit to it, which is in general, we are investing in our retailers. And of all the ways of investing in a retailer, investing into media is not only appreciated by the retailer because it's an important revenue stream and a highly profitable one, but it's also getting us an additional benefit beyond a trade investment. It also gets us a return in terms of driving further awareness and conversion.

[Alison Schiff]

I have heard some CPG brands talk about concern though that they're possibly cannibalizing search when they spend on retail media, that it's hard to tell actually whether it's incremental or causal. I mean, is that something that you think about? Is there anything that retailers could do to put advertisers at their ease on that score?

[J.P. Jansen]

Are we talking search on platform? Paid search? Yeah, paid search, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's this is where trial and error and testing really comes into play. What we're seeing I've seen also in my previous role as I worked in Beauty on E commerce directly, people that search for your brand on a retailer platform, most likely they will convert anyway. Even if there is a competitive ad or something else that tries to get in the way, they're pretty determined to buy your brand. It is far more incremental as you use paid search to go after more generic searches or adjacencies when people search for a certain product and you offer an adjacent product to have that as your as your sponsored ad. So the concern though is if you purely look at roas, which is a terrible metric, branded search always has the highest return on ad spend, but it's usually not the most incremental spend you can do. And this is where marketing mix modeling again can play a role to help you identify what is truly incremental and what is just subsidizing a sale. That would have happened anyway.

[Alison Schiff]

I agree though that when someone is searching for a specific well, I'm thinking cat food brands because that's what I do a lot of searching for. And I do often buy online because I'm lazy. If I search for greenies, I do want greenies. There's a reason why I'm buying them. It's because they're dental treats so I wouldn't really be cannibalizable like I we I I'm searching for that and it doesn't matter if other stuff stuff crop up crops up. So I guess as the Competitive brand. It would make sense maybe on the surface to try and win a sale from paid search. But it sounds like it's really a bad tactic.

[J.P. Jansen]

Yes, unless. Because there's always an exception to any rule unless you have a particular product that is truly superior, that is really a better experience or maybe even or significantly better value. If that's the case, you can get to potentially conquesting as it's called can make sense. It's also often what smaller brands use as a tactic to just build general brand awareness. So there's the surge volume of the well known national brands and then by quote unquote conquesting, you actually get exposure to a lot, a lot of people that may not have been aware of your brand in the first place. So there are exceptions to the rule. But in general branded search, great return on ad spend but usually not very incremental.

[Alison Schiff]

And how do you think about D2C commerce versus partnering with E commerce platforms like Chewy for example. I mean you mentioned the Greenies website, but of course you also sell on Chewy a ton.

[J.P. Jansen]

Yeah, yeah. It's for to be successful and direct to consumer you have to really have a more differentiated proposition versus what's already out there on Amazon or other places. We've been a little bit more reluctant to go deep into direct to consumer sales. So selling direct because of that reason you have to have a really differentiated proposition. We have had for example on Temptations we sell special packs with a combination of different flavors Greenies. We have pill pockets which if you have a dog or a cat and you need to pill that the animal then pill pockets are a game changer. So that's for example a proposition a lot of people want to subscribe to in order to make sure that that never runs out if you want. So there are exceptions but in general we see direct to consumer more as a way to connect with our most valuable consumers, learn about those consumers, get feedback on new products before we launch them in retail and then also maybe not sell direct but look at can we generate quality trial through sampling using our dog to consumer quote unquote engine.

[Alison Schiff]

Changing gears a little. I'm curious how you guys decide what to do in house and what gets delegated or outsourced to an agency partner and how much of the media buying stuff you handle internally yourself?

[J.P. Jansen]

Yeah.

[Alison Schiff]

Not yourself personally?

[J.P. Jansen]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, I understand what you mean. So the media buying still is more is done through our media agencies. There's some media, Amazon for example we do in house in order to optimize update, search in particular to be really agile and optimize that in the moment. But media by and large is still outsourced in general. I think if you look at on the creative side, when you're looking for big creative ideas, when you look for new campaigns, then generally that's done through tier one, as we call them agencies because you want to be able to tap into the top creative talents, you want to have a partner that's firmly rooted in culture and what's happening in the world around us. So for quote unquote creativity with a capital C, we definitely use our agency partners. But then on the other extreme you have content that it's more about adaptation, it's more about quantity and speed to get that content out there. It's content that's guided by brand guidelines. It's often derived from hero assets and their in housing or even more automation actually using AI gen, AI is the name of the game because then it's more about quantity, about speed and about low cost. So that's the other extreme and then there is almost a middle ground when it comes to content and that is leveraging obviously creator content or influencer content, which we use in house resources to identify that content and then be able to quickly amplify that content if we think is relevant and it's working for our brands. And that's actually an area, I mean that we're stepping up further because we have a lot of evidence that that kind of content performs even better, especially in social media then content then we can create ourselves or that we have agencies create for us.

[Alison Schiff]

As you were speaking, I was thinking of this silly but hilarious cartoon I have up on my fridge. I can't even remember where I cut it out from but instead of ChatGPT it says Cat GPT and it's a little cat sitting in front of a laptop and over and over again on the screen it just says Treats, Treats, Treats. Just sticking with agencies. What's your take on the fact that multiple of the major holding companies have made these big splashy commerce focused acquisitions Like Omnicom bought Flywheel last year. It was a huge price tag, $835 million. There was Publicis which already had Citrus ad and they just bought Mars United Commerce a few months ago. So are these good moves from your perspective?

[J.P. Jansen]

Well, obviously I'm not in a position to answer exactly why they made those acquisitions, but if you think about the fact that a lot of investment media investment and spend has moved into regional media networks, it makes a lot of sense More and more, what clients, or at least we're looking for, is how can we work with a holding company or with a partner that is able to bring all the different disciplines to the table and at the same time, coordinate if you want, overall, the expression of the brand, make sure that we're all marching from the same sheet of music if you want. And so I think through that lens, it actually makes a lot of sense. There's just a lot of investment that is going into retail media networks, and therefore it is becoming a far greater part of our mix that we need to manage and coordinate.

[Alison Schiff]

I should probably know the answer to this question, but what's the relationship, or was the relationship between Mars and Mars United Commerce?

[J.P. Jansen]

There is no, there's no connection between the two companies. No, no, no. The. At the moment, Mars Agency is. Is our shopper agency. So we're using it for shopper marketing and also for some of our retail media support. But there's. It's the. It's purely coincidental that both companies have the same name.

[Alison Schiff]

Really? I for some reason thought maybe they named their agency Mars to woo you or something along those lines. That is very interesting.

[J.P. Jansen]

No connection.

[Alison Schiff]

So, penultimate question to close us out. Totally different topic. I wanted to ask you about your perspective on brand safety. And I know you probably can't comment on X's lawsuit against the wfa. Mars is a defendant, along with a whole bunch of big marketers. The suit alleges that there was this conspiracy to withhold ad dollars from X and the WFA ended up disbanding Garm. It's a big shame, et cetera. But my question is this. So can, like, just broadly, like, can a brand or a publisher really strong arm other brands, like, force them into spending with them? Because it, it felt a little bit laughable, but it does seem to have.

[J.P. Jansen]

Worked for X. I not involved at all in that issue. When it comes to the lawsuit or anything like that, I'm not aware of any connections with other advertiser or coordination of effort. What I do believe is that a lot of advertisers are looking for a safe environment for their brands. There's a lot of choice out there at the moment. There's a blessing and a curse. Also leads to more challenges in measuring reach. What's important for us, though, is that we look for ways to make sure that our brands are showing because context does matter. So we want to make sure that our brands show up in a context where the brand is safe. It's not harming the brand. We also very much look for other ways of driving diversity in the way we do our marketing. So we are proud we have our own responsible marketing code, which is already in place since 2007. And transparency, brand safety, diversity, both in front of the camera as well as behind the camera, all those elements are super important to us. And yeah, that's what we live every day.

[Alison Schiff]

Well, I'm glad to hear that. And I'm going to close out with a very important question. What are you getting Coco for Christmas?

[J.P. Jansen]

Ah, great question. She usually gets a new toy and by the time it's New Year's, that toy is already destroyed. But yeah, in general, it's fascinating how close our relationship with our pets have become. We always say from the barn to the bedroom, right? Pets used to be in the barn. Now they sleep in our bedroom or sometimes even in our beds. And that has spurred a whole wave of behavior that when I grew up, at least it didn't exist. Nobody was thinking about buying a toy or buying something for Christmas for your pet, but now it's almost frowned upon if you don't. So it's a fascinating world and I feel very privileged to be part of this world and helping to create a better world for pets because ultimately, pets.

[Alison Schiff]

Create a better world for us 1000%. I'm going to get Mermaid a replacement for her favorite toy, which is this really cheap, but she loves it. Turkey leg shaped chew toy made out of cloth, doesn't even have catnip in it. She's obsessed with this thing, so that's what she's getting.

[J.P. Jansen]

I don't want to stereotype it. That almost sounds like a dog toy versus a cat toy.

[Alison Schiff]

Well, it's very tiny and I did get it. It was next to other cat toys. But maybe she has dog like tendencies sometimes. So I don't know, maybe she's got a little puppy in her. But she's sitting right next to me now, so I just spoiled the surprise. Sorry, Mermaid. This episode is sponsored by the Trade Desk Edge Academy. Whether you're a seasoned programmatic pro or are just starting out in digital advertising, the Trade Desk Edge Academy's expert LED courses and certifications are here to help you stay relevant, ready and ahead of the curve. Enroll today for free at edgeacademy.thetradedesk.com.