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Foreign.
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Welcome to Ad Exchanger Talks, the podcast devoted to examining the issues and trends in advertising and marketing technology that matter most to you.
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This episode is brought to you by the Weather Company. You likely know them best for the Weather channel app and weather.com or as the world's most accurate forecaster. But for marketers, they're a powerhouse of scale, reaching over 330 million people every month. They're proving that when you lead with trust and precision, you don't just reach an audience, you move them.
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A
Hi, everybody. Welcome to another episode of Ad Exchanger Talks. I'm Associate Editor Victoria McNally and I'm going to be your guest host for the week. I'm also joined by a great guest this week, if I do say so myself. It's Carrie Drinkwater, who is the chief Investment officer for Carat us. She was actually the first ever chief investment officer for Carrot when she joined up a couple years ago and she was one of the first agency leaders that I ever interviewed when I first joined Ad Exchanger. So it's fun to come full circle like that. Will chat through how the last few years have been for the agency and why she thinks media buying is better thought of in terms of content and culture rather than specific channels or silos. Speaking of which, Carrie is also going to be joining us at Convergent TV World this spring, and you should, too. The event is coming up on March 5th and 6th at the Time center in New York City. And we'll be breaking down all those silos, converging the worlds, bringing together people from linear tv, ctv, gaming, streaming, retail media, the list goes on. Plus, podcast listeners will get 10% off of the price of their ticket when they use the code POD10. So if you came to CTV Connect last year, which was our previous event, or if you just want to check it out for the first time this year, come on down. We'd be glad to have you. Hi Carrie, thanks so much for joining me on the podcast this week on a very, very super cold day.
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B
Very cold, very cold.
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A
Yeah. You're in Boston, right? So, I mean, compared to New York, you probably are used to this.
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B
I am. I mean, I don't know, as we get older, we sort of start to regret geographically where we've chosen. But yes, we are still about. We had 18 inches. I think we're still about, I don't know, 14 out of 15 in. So yes, it was a lot.
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A
I think we tapped out at 10 where I live in Brooklyn. So yeah, definitely.
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B
City is tough. City is tough. City Snow is never fun and then gets ugly quick. For sure it's fun for about your first 12.
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A
Cool. So weather conversations aside to kick things off, what is something about you that not a whole lot of people who are listening right now are going to know already?
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B
So I did see this question and it was interesting because obviously I've. I'm a pretty open book. I'm very transparent and honest, so that it was tough. But what I will say what people don't know, because my daughter just figured it out because she and I share a Spotify list, is I almost always listen to classical music when I take off or when I'm traveling or when I'm trying to just get to. I hate flying. So usually on takeoff or turbulence, I just click on some classical music. So it's my happy place to. Or my Zen spot is classical music. That's a little fun fact.
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D
Interesting.
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A
Is there any particular composers or styles that you're into?
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B
No. And that's why my daughter was like, what do you listen? I just, I do Spotify or I do random Pandora shuffling of just classical. I mean, it tends to be a lot of Mozart. I feel like that seems to be a comfort spot for me. But I have been listening to classical music since I was young, I guess, and I am not musically inclined at all. I am not artistic at all. I am more of a math person. So that's a little fun fact that my daughter knows and now everybody knows.
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A
I imagine it makes like trying to get from one place to another in an airport a lot more exciting, too. I'm picturing like, I've never actually seen Amadeus, but that scene in 30 Rock where they're riffing on Amadeus and they're just running down hallways and they're playing the music.
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B
I saw when a friend in college did a thesis about if you had music as the background of your life, how your life would be so much more exciting. Exciting and interesting and romantic. And I. I do think that everything that we do, if there was a soundtrack going on behind us, it would make it that much more exciting. So I love that.
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A
Amazing. Well, on a personal level, I'm really glad for this opportunity to catch up with you, just to catch the listeners up. You and I first spoke for a Q and A that I wrote up way back in 2024. I just started at Ad Exchanger a couple months before. And you just started a carrot. So we were both pretty new to our roles. Obviously you're much more of an expert beyond this particular role that you're in now, but at least compared to me. But I remember we discussed a lot of your goals coming into the role of bringing a more holistic, client centric approach to Carrot's business. And now that it's early 2026 a year and some change, how would you say it's been going so far? How much of your early goals do you feel like you've.
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B
I know it's hard to believe. I feel like I just joined Cara and yet it also feels like I've been here for 10 years. So I think that's a good thing. I think, look, I have been beyond happy beyond measure that I came over to Kara and to Dentsu and been on this journey with them. I think again, in the last 15 months, our whole industry continues to transform and that's just sort of the nature of it. And I think being involved with clients, hearing challenges and trying to not only tackle but win in this ever changing media landscape has been amazing. I've been lucky that we have some great clients, amazing CMOs who are willing to take chances and really put a stance out there. Super smart data centric clients. And given our data stack and what we have here at Dentsu, it's been great and it continues to change. So I think it's been amazing. I'm so happy that I'm here. Being part of Cara has been truly like, good for my soul, good for my brain, good for my life. And I think it's just getting more challenging, but more fun. I think challenges are fun, so everything I dreamed of, but more, I guess in a fun, crazy way.
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A
So I, I do want to go back to the term holistic because I, I feel like, I hear it used a lot to describe, you know, larger media strategies. It can get kind of buzzwordy, but not, not on the level of like the word leverage, for example. Like when I hear holistic, it doesn't make me want to like roll my eyes. It's still, it's still a cool word. Um, so from your perspective, what, what does that term mean to you when you're using it to describe your own strategies or your own perspective?
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B
You know, it's interesting because it is definitely overused and I think sometimes used inaccurately. I mean, a holistic strategy for me really means focusing on the consumer, focusing on where they're paying attention, where their passion is, what matters to them. That gives you the. If you're holistic, you can reach them. Where, when, how. I think people are starting to morph holistic into. Let's get rid of Silos and have people be specialists in every media type. And that, to me, I don't even think that's truly possible. Um, I think a hands on keyboard, great, you can be hands on keyboard. But if you don't understand the purpose, the goal, the overarching technical challenges within each discipline or what the client needs, if you're just simply putting your hands on keyboard because you're in a silo and you can do any medium, I don't think that's beneficial for any client or honestly any employee. So I think holistic means finding the consumers where we can have the greatest impact, not I can buy everything everywhere all at once.
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A
So, speaking of which, I feel like especially over the last couple years there's been this big trend with agencies consolidating a lot of their silos, especially on the TV side of things. Like you have CTV and you have tv, you have online video and you have social video. And they all used to be these separate departments. And a lot of agencies now are starting to combine them and converge them a bit more. What, what is it looking like a carrot? Like what, were you already kind of more converged or how do you approach, you know, even just how you're divvying up the work?
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B
Yeah, I think at cara, you know, we're very client centric. So I don't, I don't even think there's such a thing as a TV buyer. I think you're buying content and I think you have to understand where that content is on what screen, on what platform and how it's being consumed. So our investment teams are specialized in the type of content. So whether it's social, whether it's video, whether it's search, whether it's audio, we do have specialists within those, but they are led by a holistic investment leader who can really understand where the consumer is and how to optimize across those different silos, I guess. But look, I think what is the statistic? In two or three years, less than 50% of households will have cable subscriptions. So, you know, long term you just have to really think about content where it's being consumed. I actually, I have a funny story. There's this game, it's called Herd Mentality. Have you heard it? It's super fun. You can get on Amazon. It's really fun.
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A
It's like, it's like a crowd of people.
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B
So it's a crowd of people. It's kind of like Family Feud, but individual style. So you get a card and the question you want to get the herd mentality. Right. So you want to know what everybody's going to say. So question. Like, it could be, what's purple? And you're. You have to think, okay, what is everyone around this table going to say? Are they going to say Barney? Are they going to say eggplant? Like, are they going to say Viking? Like, you know, so you have to try to think of the. What the herd will say. And the question was, and we were playing over the holidays, and it was young people, older people, grandparents, kids, adults. And it was, what's your favorite network? And if I tell you, everyone was stumped. What do you mean network? Like a streamer. It was wild. Even the grandparents couldn't answer. And so I said espn, because there were three men at the table, boys and men. And that was the herd mentality. But no one could answer. The grant parents said, we don't know. I mean, they didn't even say NBC or abc. They just lost this idea of what a network was. So, to me, it was just. I always like to take little antidotes from my life and relay them into work because, again, this is what we're trying to do, really relate. But it was wild.
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A
Yeah. Wow. That's surprising that even, like, the older people didn't have, like, any kind of nostalgia or, like, here's the thing, I watch the most of it because I feel like you. You hear that a lot. When people talk about linear television, like, there are still a lot of older populations watching it just kind of as a holdover of, you know, previous habits.
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B
I think they watch the news or they watch a show or a sport. I don't think they watch a network. Yeah. So anyway, I don't know. I digress, but I just thought that was a fun story about sort of how the world has evolved and how people are starting to consume and think about what they're consuming. Yeah.
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A
In terms of the world evolving, you also said something there. I'm really curious to dig into that. There's. There's basically no such thing as a TV buyer anymore. Like, that's. That's such an interesting way to frame that. And I'm curious, like, from your perspective, maybe, as you know, you've thought about your career. Like, when did that change?
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B
I think we really saw the shift. I mean, maybe 10 years ago, you know, when you started to look. We did this project that we called Anatomy of A rating years ago, when, you know, Grey's Anatomy was dominating. I just saw one in hiatus, which is interesting after so many years. But when you started to understand the proliferation of where a rating was, it wasn't on live TV anymore. I mean, back then it was like delayed or TiVo or taped or DVR or VOD, you know, so it really started to think about the evolution of consumption. And so I feel like you had to start to think, okay, where am I going to find this consumer, on what platform, with what content and what creative message am I going to say? So I think it's been like maybe 10 years, but probably hard pivot the past four or five. I mean, again, I don't know how long you've been following the upfronts, but, you know, we had this moment of time where you had. You were buying linear, but it could run anywhere. And so you really had to think about delivery and content. And then that sort of went away and then the money all shifted to digital. But could you buy the content? And so it's been this evolution. But I think hard pivot maybe five years ago, in terms of true alliteration of the meeting.
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A
Gotcha, gotcha. So in terms of, you know, you brought up upfronts, obviously it's still kind of early, except not really. Like, it's sort of always on for a lot of places now. How are you approaching this year with clients like, or I guess more broadly, like what. What are clients typically coming to you with in terms of questions about their. Their TV and video buying or their content buying? I guess I should say.
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B
Yeah, I mean, we're actually going to them. You know, we've really been sparking some interesting conversations. You know, I know, you know, we taught you. You mentioned ctv. And so what's been fascinating to me is, as we think about, you know, how is CTV being used? Is it upper funnels at lower funnel? It can be truly performance, it can be truly content, it can be brand. We started probing and poking around and I will tell a story and I won't reveal, I won't reveal the names, but my husband and daughter were watching, I'll tell you, they were watching Disney. They were watching Good Luck Charlie. I don't know if you know that show. And they received an ad for a DSP while they were watching it. Now, I wasn't even in the room. It was clearly targeted to me, so it was wild to me. Right, because they're watching a child show. I'm not there. My husband's savvy enough in the business that he knew what it was. And so we started asking around, well, about targeting. And look, we have great data. I mean, The Dentsu audiences. Again, one of the reasons I came over to Dentsu and Takara was because the audiences, they've built and they know people consuming and where they are and what they're doing. But what's interesting to me is when you start to talk to partners, whether it's a DSP or some of the networks, you say, okay, how do you know who you're reaching on ctv? Same with Linear, but let's just go, ctv. They're like, well, you have this subscription. I'm like, well, my husband. So my husband's Hispanic. He has all our subscriptions. So everything's under his name. So how do you know you're reaching me? And they say, well, when you have your profile, I'm like, no, we don't have separate profiles. It's just his pro. Like, it's just says. It just says ed does. I don't have one. And I don't do it intentionally because of what I do for a living. But. And then, so it's like, well, if we, you know, there's no direct. I mean, look, there's lots of models, there's lots of assumptions, there's probably some gender bias, but you don't direct. You're using all this data, but you're still just getting a household. You don't know who it is. I mean, again, if you have a device, it's so different. But if it's just ctv, if it's just you watching and you're sharing, I don't really know it's you. Right? Like, I'm assuming it's you. And I have a lot of data. But it's the same with linear. Again, this is no different than linear, except people are saying, but you know exactly who it is. You don't. And then add on. This is the twist on linear. You know exactly where you run. You know what's spot, you know what show, you know what time, you know what break CTV, you know, 10% aired in the top 10 shows. You don't even know where you're running. It's so wild to me that this whole industry is so focused on targeting and data and tech, but you don't know where you're running and you don't know who you're targeting. So it's been this, like, crazy journey. So I'm, like, going on a tangent when. So we're talking to clients about, okay, if we're using CTV for brand building, okay, let's buy differently. You know, a lot of the networks now you can buy specifically, you could buy top 10 shows, let's do it for brand, but if we really need to use it for bottom of the funnel, let's open it up, let's figure out what's the best thing. You know, let's use data for geo or for, you know, audience or whatever it may be. So I think we're telling them because we're in it and we're so curious and we're really starting to figure out how we're going to navigate. And look back to your upfront question. I think sports will drive did last year. I think that right now that sports and big events are the only must buys and if you need them, you should participate in the upfront. And we need to be really creative with then what we're doing with these partners for content and how do we use data to be smart, not to just use data to use data and not know who we're reaching. So sorry, that was really long.
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A
No, that was great. I love the real world examples. We're all about that at ixchanger. It's a big thing. Allison says all the time, make it real for us.
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B
Right.
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A
But so you bring up sports, obviously that's always what these conversations kind of come back to. Everybody wants live sports, everybody wants live events. There's only so much of that type of inventory to go around. And I'm really curious what those conversations look like with clients, clients when they really want it. Like, do you ever have to tell somebody like you don't have the money or it's not worth it for what you're trying to do or like providing alternative ideas?
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B
Look, there's a ton of sports around the sport, right? There's so much that you can do in social, online. Like there's a ton you can do if you want to be part of the sports audiences. And there's enough, enough data now that you can find those audiences in other places. I think the price tag as it appears isn't always insurmountable. We find ways if the sport is resonating, if the sport is driving sales, if your sport is converting, it's worth it. Like, right. Wouldn't you rather pay your cost per user, cost per experience or cost per click or whatever it is will end up going down if you can create money off of it. So I don't think we ever get to the, oh, it's out of your price range. We get to what's your goals, what do we need to do and how are we going to do it? And we've had some really Fun, creative ideas that we hope. I can't tell you now, but hope come to life in some of these platforms. I mean, I think what was really interesting for us was when there was the Disney YouTube TV strike. And I hope these facts are right. You might have to check them, but I'm pretty sure YouTube TV I think is 15 million users. I could be wrong. And when they dropped Disney, they lost College Football on YouTube TV lost 1.5 million viewers. I mean, that's crazy. Like, that is such a significant amount of people that are using YouTube TV for sports. So when you start to think about that, that opens a whole new platform, right? So people really are using third party YouTube TV or Hulu or whatever they are to watch their sport. So that's a door, right? Like, can you be on their home screen? Can you understand what they're doing? Can you reach them on the follow up? So again, long answer, but there's a lot of ways to tap into sports without having the 32nd spot at the break.
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A
Do you find that it's, you know, live sports is one thing and then sports itself is another thing. Do you find that like, sports is converting more consistently than like, like when clients are interested in that? Is it the focus on sports that they want or the focus on live?
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B
I think it's a focus on attention. So I think they want to find content and culture. You know, I think we talked about this a little bit last time. You know, culture. You know, we have done so many studies at Cara on culture and culture. EQ and brands have performed in culture, outperform brands that just perform in media. So I think they want to be where there's attention, where the moment is happening. It's about culture, right? It's what people are talking about, it's what's happening. And so I think they want to be where there's attention because attention drives impact.
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A
All right, so I have so many more questions to ask about what your conversations with clients are looking like right now. We are going to take a super quick break and then we'll come back and I will ask them.
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B
Great.
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C
Hey there. I'm Allison Schiff, managing editor of Ad Exchanger, and I have with me here Adrian Beck, head of marketing insights and analytics at the weather company where she focuses on the development and application of consumer and customer insights for marketing and advertising, as well as understanding weather's impact on consumer behaviors. So, Adrian, your team at the weather company, which includes the Weather Channel digital platforms, recently completed some first of its kind research called Wired for Weather. What can you tell us about it?
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D
We've long known that weather is the biggest external factor influencing daily life. How we feel, what we do, what we buy. We wanted to dig into that and uncover how marketers can use weather data more effectively. So we partnered with the neuroscience firm NeuroInsight to prove how does weather impact our subconscious, which is where 90% of decisions are made? And then what does that mean for marketers? We found that weather literally rewires our brains, changing how we process emotion and memory, which are two of the biggest drivers of purchase decisions. Basically, you have to feel it and remember it if you're going to buy it. But maybe most interesting for marketers is because of that rewiring power. When brands use weather as a contextual signal, they can improve ROI by 10 to even 20%.
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C
Well, how does weather change our emotion and our memory?
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D
We've uncovered that weather creates distinct but universal mindsets based on brain activity. And that feels like set of weather conditions. So in other words, when it feels cold, regardless of who you are or where you are, our subconscious response is really similar. And because we can predict the weather, we can help predict those mindsets. So an example would be when it feels like the start of a new season. So think about that first spring like day coming out of this winter weather we're experiencing now. The memory and engagement parts of our brain are really active. That makes us open to trying new brands and trying new products. We're ready to engage with the world. We're optimistic and social and creative. We're more likely to start a new health routine and to make impulse purchases. But on the other hand, when it's rainy or snowy, our brains activate in a way that means we're more emotional and safe, sensitive and pragmatic. Still high energy, but in a problem solving mode. So we seek out things that comfort us and remind us of happy memories. That creates a really important role for marketers.
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C
Well, tell me what it actually means for marketers.
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D
Ultimately, brands can use weather data to anticipate these mindsets and deliver more effective campaigns. Our weather targeting solution enables brands to dynamically connect with and influence these weather driven consumer mindsets throughout the digital ecosystem. At any given time, any or all of the four weather driven mindsets that we've identified through this study could be happening across the country. But weather targeting takes into account that relative nature of weather. At a zip code level, a 40 degree day in Chicago means something very different than it does in Miami. These signals can be always on and that reduces media waste and can boost performance for all marketing channels, whether that's CTV display, search, audio or others. And that means that brands can easily get their message in front of the right mindset at the right time. If you're curious, check out weathercompany.com thank you, Adrienne.
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C
I wish I was in Miami.
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D
Me too.
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C
Through Great insights.
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D
Thank you so much.
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A
All right, we're back. You mentioned earlier that when you're talking to clients, you're sort of unpacking what their goals are with regard to brand awareness. You know, increasingly CTV especially is being viewed as a performance channel. Do you find that there are a lot more clients who are interested in that capability for CTV and in like a. Specifically a performance driving kind of channel?
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B
I don't think it's. I think it depends on the client, right? Like, it's not that clients just want performance. It depends on what the campaign is, what the brand is, what the product is. I mean, look, there's a lot of, there's a lot of different ways to think about performance by category, right? Like for pizza, we have Papa John's and love Papa John's. They're a great client and sometimes they need to build the brand or change the brand or talk about the message and sometimes they just need to sell pizza or they just, you know, it's a holiday or Halloween or something. We gotta, you know, it's such a big pizza day. So it depends on. It's not that we want to be a high funnel, low funnel. It's like, what are, what are our goals? What are our KPIs for this campaign, for this launch, for this product? And I think you have to think about that. When you think about automotive, you know, are they trying to like, do they know when someone leases up, do they know when someone, you know, is about to be their cycles of buying cars? Or do they want to build the brand with the next generation or do they want to target a competitive automotive? You know, I, so I think it's not what our clients asking, it's what does each client need for what they're trying to do short and long term? Right. We have to think about this year, but we also have to think about the next three years with everything that we're doing. So I don't think, I think it'd be foolish just to think of it as a strat, a whole, you know, one strategy for the agency. You really have to be client specific.
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A
So to put things into hypothetical, let's say you've got a big enterprise client, brand new they're just coming on board, like, what are the questions that you ask to get a sense of what their goals are? Like, how do you onboard them?
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B
Well, I mean, when we win a client, obviously we've done a ton of work to get, you know, the pitch process is grueling and gruesome and long. And so by the time we're onboarding, we, I have a really good sense of who the audience is and how we can activate and how we can drive business and scale, scale. So I think, you know, without letting too many secrets out, I think before they come in the door, obviously what we've pitched them and what we believe is best for their business has won them that. And again, the pitch process is grueling and gruesome, but by then we know what you should be doing. And again, we truly believe in culture. We believe it's what brands pay attention to and we believe the brands have had great success about it. So with it. So ideally, when we're onboarding, we're understanding what culture means for them and how we can integrate that into their media plan. But it's not a one size fits all. I mean, it just isn't. Nothing in life is right. We're all so unique and different and it changes. It's changing so rapidly. I mean, I think you're seeing now with AI and some of these AI engines opening up search now. And so what does that look like if I'm going to OpenAI or if I'm going to Copilot? Right. When I'm in Copilot and I'm looking for something, what does that look like? Do I want it to be a picture? Do I want it to give me a link? Like, if I'm the client, how do I want to integrate with Copilot? What do I really want that to look like? I mean, we never thought about that a year ago, right? We never thought, let's change the way. Or again, when you're on TikTok, what? Definitely all these younger generations. I'm not younger. I'm still using TikTok as a search engine. What do I want that to look like? So does that search or is that social? Right. Like, how do I think about that? So again, it really depends on the brand. The brand, the content, the idea and the culture at the moment.
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A
I'm so fascinated that you brought up TikTok because I've been thinking about it a lot lately because of the ownership changes and they've had some issues with their privacy policy updating in a way that made all these consumers really nervous and people are starting to leave as a result. And I don't know if you'll have an answer to this, but I'm curious, given the focus that carrot has on data, you have a lot of access to Mercury's data. Do you anticipate it getting harder to collect data from consumers if they're getting more suspicious about what that data is used for?
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B
I mean, look, I think privacy is always, has been and will continue to be a priority. I think how people use data, I mean look, didn't we talk about like cookie deprivation like years ago? I mean didn't we talk about this time last year the government was going to shut down TikTok? I mean I think we've been to the rodeo and we can never loosen up or stop thinking about how to protect consumers rights 100%. So to answer your question, I don't think it's going to stop, stop, halt, truly alter. But I do think we have to understand, you know, I think again if you think about five years ago it was like the walled gardens and how are we going to get around it and how are we going to target, what are we going to do? I mean we continue to navigate and evolve and figure it out back to the idea of attention, you know, let's get people's attention where they are. I also think consumers sometimes appreciate the algorithms, not the breach of privacy at all, but understanding like if you're working in copilot, you're trying to have it learn who you are and what you like. Is that breaching your, you know, is that a breach of privacy or is that now you understand me, you know what I want so you can go find it. You know similar when you're in Amazon and it says, you know, what did you buy last? And you might like this. So I don't know, like as a consumer I think do you care when it's recommended to you or do you kind of like it? Like are you liking what commercials you're getting in your social feed? Are you annoyed? It's like interesting to me. I like it because it's relevant. But do you like. Just curious, are you like personally to your point?
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A
I think it depends on where I am and how intense the ads are. I'm not really on a lot of social media that has ads anymore I think because I got kind of tired of not seeing my friends photos.
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B
Yeah.
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A
So there's definitely a give and take there for sure. Especially when it comes to stuff that focuses on user generated content.
- [32:34]
B
Yeah, and look, it is also, we talk about it all the time. I'm sure you've been around friends in personal settings and you talk about something and then they're like, we just got the ad and we're talking about it. And that like freaks people out, yet somehow then they engage with it. I also, and again, tangent. I think personalization, like so is that baiting privacy? If it's like people call it personalization, but it's like, okay, well you're using my PII to figure out what's personalized to me. So that's fascinating to me. I also think there's a complete misuse of data in terms of. I don't think there's enough sophistication in terms of the funnel. Meaning. I know, and I don't want to say what it is, but I've recently bought three things from ads that I've seen that took me a while and I continue to get the ads for the same thing after I purchased it. So that waste, I think waste is an opportunity when it comes to content. I think waste is truly waste when it comes to direct bottom of the funnel if I've already purchased it. So people always say there's no waste when it's one to one, but I think there's a lot of waste.
- [33:40]
A
To your point, I have heard stories of people deliberately clicking on things and like trying to mess with their ads algorithm specifically to like, I don't know, have fun with it. Like, yeah, I'm gonna order a bunch of tuxedos. Sure. Like, right, right.
- [33:56]
B
It's wild. The algorithms are wild. But again, is it an algorithm or is it personalization? You know, people tend to change the language depending on how they want to look at it. Half empty, half full, I guess. Privacy or personalization, right?
- [34:13]
A
Well, going back to AI for a little bit since that is also a type of algorithm in some respects. You know, you've been talking about using Copilot. I'm also curious. There's been a big trend lately of a lot of agencies sort of developing their own agentic AI and data platforms and sort of using them both, you know, as employees or then also giving that over to clients for self serve capabilities. So I'm curious like what Carrot and what Dentsu are doing with regard to AI in that field, if, if anything.
- [34:44]
B
Well, Copilot's a client obviously. So we are all super users internally and we love it. And I again, I could talk about Copilot all day because it truly has transformed my work experience. Like I can Say can you find me an email that has this subject? And it does. And so we are all trying to be super users, so plug for copilot for sure. And then in terms of, you know, we are using AI and again, don't want to share too much, but we have proprietary AI that we're using to optimize our media. We have a modern media product which is amazing and we are able to truly. And again, this has been, you know, you talk about programmatic being AI. I mean, in theory, if, you know, the algorithms tend to be old school AI I guess is the best way to say it. But we are completely figuring, navigating how to use AI not only to help us be able to optimize, be better, but to also take away the mundane tasks, right? The things that used to like analytics it would take a week, now it takes 10 seconds. So we're really integrating AI into our analytics to help us be more forward thinking, to help us predict and not react. And it's really exciting and wild and I just think it will start to transform the way we are able to transact our media because we have that capability that we never had before.
- [36:14]
A
I'm curious also for your thoughts. It's not really like a TV or video thing obviously, but the big thing right now everybody's talking about is the ChatGPT ads and sort of the idea of including ads in more AI chatbot products for consumers. Is that something you've been talking to clients at all or that you have any kind of interest in exploring from an agency perspective?
- [36:37]
B
I can't say too much, but yes, we are doing some beta testing in that space. So yes.
- [36:46]
A
You know, trying to be mindful of not being able to say much when you're thinking about those types of ad buys, like is that coming out of a particular budget? Like, do you have a, you know, is it coming out of digital search or some kind of experimental budget or like, how are you thinking about the actual practical strategy of buying for that?
- [37:04]
B
So this is where I do think clients have evolved so much, at least the ones that we work with. And we're so lucky is that when we have an opportunity that presents itself in agentic search or whatever we're going to call it, and we go to a client say we have this opportunity, they say let's do it and then we figure it out. So I think that's trust, that's believing that, you know, and we wouldn't do it for every single client, for every single category, and we wouldn't bring Everything to them all the time. But when it makes sense and we think it's an opportunity, we figure it out together. So maybe it comes from the search budget, maybe it comes from a social budget, maybe it comes from, we'll have to take some options. Or maybe it's, they go internally and they find it. So it's not a direct pull from here to get to here. It's. This is something that just came to us. We want you to be first to market, to do it. And they're like, let's go.
- [38:00]
A
So to bring it back to tv as we start to kind of wrap things up. Part of the reason I wanted you to join me on talks this week is you're going to be at Convergent TV World in March, which is an event we've got coming up. You're going to be on one of our panels that's sort of got like.
- [38:13]
B
An aspirational me anything style always makes me nervous.
- [38:17]
A
I mean, it's kind of what we've been talking about this whole time. So hopefully this is like a nice trial run for you.
- [38:22]
B
Yes.
- [38:23]
A
But I did have some like very 101, you know, like advicey style questions to ask as we're renting things. So for you, what is the number one thing that you think other professionals in ad tech or in advertising should know about what it's like to be a media buyer?
- [38:39]
B
Oh, it's challenging. It's so hard. It's again, to be a media buyer, to invest in media is fascinating and challenging. And I would say continue to push to make sure that we continue to be curious. But please be patient. You know, long gone are the days where you only had 10 to 15 partners. Now you want to meet with everybody all the time. It's not possible. I used to have a rule that you have to call everybody back or respond. It's just not possible. You know, I think I get 100 emails a day asking for meetings for partners I've never heard of. So I think know that we are overwhelmed, that we are curious and we want to be good partners.
- [39:25]
A
So what advice on the other side of things would you give to other media investment professionals about how to navigate all of this?
- [39:33]
B
Be curious, be curious, be patient. I think we've lost. You know, I use the analogy, I say we are often swimming with a brick. Everything is so dynamic. And look, the agency model is tough. You know, clients are. It's tough like the margins and the money. And so you're staffing, you're trying to cut staff, but you want everyone to be curious and great. And that's the beauty of Cara. They're so small and scrappy that everyone's in it to win it. So. So I would just say continue to be curious and be kind.
- [40:02]
A
Well, that feels like great advice for life, not just for me. True. Very true.
- [40:07]
B
All right.
- [40:08]
A
Amazing. Well, once again, thanks so much for taking the time to be on the podcast this week, and I'm looking forward to seeing you and everybody else who's listening at Convergent TV World coming up.
- [40:18]
B
Thank you so much. I really enjoyed the time together.
- [40:24]
A
Foreign.
- [40:31]
C
This episode was sponsored by the Weather Company. From the number one most downloaded weather app to sophisticated enterprise data, they're helping people and businesses build a more resilient privacy. First Future, head over to WeatherCompany.com to learn how their insights can weatherproof your marketing strategy.
- [40:53]
A
Sa.