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Behind the Numbers: an EMARKETER Podcast
The Most Interesting Thing At Advertising Week New York 2025 Is ... ? | Behind the Numbers
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- [00:00]
A
In a fast moving market, you have to know what's working. With Nielsen Ad intel, you'll know the where's, whens and hows of advertising across industries and channels. Maximize your ROI and achieve better results. Stop guessing enough of that. Start winning instead. Nielsen Ad Intel. Hey gang. It's Friday, September 19th. Jeremy, Marissa, Danny and listeners, welcome in to behind the Numbers, an email to video podcast made possible by Nielsen. I'm Marcus and joining me for today's conversation, we have the Briefings crew, all living in New York, the senior director, Jeremy Gorman.
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B
Hey, great to be with you. I'm so excited to be with my fellow marketing and advertising briefing folks. By the way, it's a good group.
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A
Senior editor, Daniel Konstantinovich.
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C
Hello. Happy to be here.
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A
And the analyst, Marissa Jones.
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D
Hi. Happy to be here.
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A
Thank you. Thank you. Taste fact facts about the Alphabet Two for you. One, the word Alphabet comes from the first two letters of the Greek Alphabet, alpha and beta. It was first used in its Latin form, alphabetum, during the 2nd and 3rd century, C, E. But this one, I think is the most interesting part of the Alphabet, which is the ampersand. So it's that like squiggly and thing sign that we use sometimes used to be taught as the 27th letter of the English Alphabet. It's a ligature, a character consisting of two or more letters joined together. And it's a ligature of a Latin word, et, which means and. And the Merriam Webster dictionary notes that if you squint, you can make out the et kind of curled together into an ampersand. It was called and per se and meaning and by itself is the word and so and by its and is the word and it was read at the end of the Alphabet. So and per se and over time became ampersand.
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C
You know, one day historians will look back at this moment in time and be saying the same kind of stuff. Yeah, this exact podcast. This will be a crucial. You know.
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B
You learn a lot at the very start of this podcast. There are a lot of people who just like the first three minutes, this first three minutes they stay on and then they're like, okay, I'm good. I've learned enough today.
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A
Our drop off rate is pretty significant after the third minute.
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C
One day people are going to look back at this podcast recording and say the kind of stuff you were saying, Marcus. But it'll be about like the dizzy face emoji, you know, with like the squiggly eyes.
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A
And I won't understand what they're talking about then either. Today's real topic, the most interesting thing at Advertising Week, is we'll discuss. So advertising week New York 2025 is from October 6th to the 9th. 16,000 people will be in person attending from over 4,000 companies, listening to 1300 speakers during over 500 events. And I asked the gang to tell me what they think will be the most interesting thing session Advertising Week this year. They of course went through all 500. They probably just picked from the first page. Let's be real. This will of course be scored and a champion crowned for picking the most interesting thing. Jeremy is up first. Which session will be the most interesting? Jeremy?
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B
So this is really difficult. And I went through like everything, by the way, but like, I did it based off of keywords. Okay. There's a lot of topics that we get asked quite a lot about. Social media is one of them. And there's a really good one on the tech stage. It looks really exciting. Can I get a second opinion on social media? And it's basically just about, you know, people are turning to social more and more to make major decisions. I think there's been so much talk about search being eaten alive by generative AI, and I think that people aren't necessarily focusing enough on basically social as a decision engine, you know, from purchasing from, you know, recommendations on what show to watch next. You know, we just had the Emmys recently, so I think that that's a really interesting topic. And Reddit will be on that with Genentech and CMI Media Group, and they're going to be talking about how, you know, industries that are maybe even less sexy, arguably like healthcare and mortgage and home buying, can really benefit from having a concrete social strategy. So I'm really excited for that. I think there are other platform from a discovery standpoint beyond Reddit that a lot more marketers are turning to. So I just think it's a really interesting topic.
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A
So this one, I think is interesting because. Well, I don't know if I agree with the premise of the session because you're right in that people are going to social more for a lot of reasons. But you mentioned the decision engine piece of this. I wonder whether it's a trustworthy decision engine because, like, I guess I'm wondering what people think of the information that they see when they get to Reddit after a doctor's visit, because the session description reads, more and more people turn to social media for even the most critical decisions. In a world where people go directly to Reddit after a doctor's visit, how can brands Learn from industries like healthcare, mortgage, home buying and more who have turned that into brand power. And as you can see from this chart here, most doubt social media, health information. Most people, and if they are going to trust a platform in this regard, it's most likely to be TikTok, according to KFF. So I know a lot of people are going to Reddit, they're going to Reddit a lot more, but I don't know if that's a good thing as it pertains to how much people trust, particularly health information at least.
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B
I mean, I think for me it's less about Reddit and more about the general premise. How important is it to be thinking about your brand across all different social platforms and figuring out what your strategy is from a discovery standpoint? I think also depending on how, as you know, we've got a wealth of data in our database and we have a lot of different points that show that in particular, trusted influencers that you get to have a relationship with, you will take a lot of information from them. You know, be it on TikTok or Reddit, where there are some power users that are essentially the influencers of that platform. So I think it's really situational. I think that's definitely true, that you've got to vet your information online. But whether or not all of the information is true, the fact is, you know, your users, your customers and the prospects you're trying to reach are on social. So if you're not part of that conversation, you know, like, what chance do you have it really being discovered in Reddit's defense?
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A
And you're talking about social media more broadly. But Reddit really does seem to be the social player of the moment in a lot of regards. And a big part of that is because they're getting surfaced a lot more as part of the AI searches. Reddit's kind of having a second window of sorts. You can see from this chart here Reddit surfacing in Google searches and being the most cited website by AI models, according to June7Rush data has led to the surge in US Reddit users. According to our forecast team, they've gone from about 110 million two years ago to 170 this year. So Reddit is a place where people are going to find information whether they trust it a certain amount or not. It is a place. And so I think that the point is still well taken.
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C
As for the Reddit question and the example of, you know, going to Reddit after a doctor's visit or something like that, I think that is definitely a powerful use case for Reddit individually as a platform, but I think it's also something that it doesn't have complete hold on. I think that a lot of people are starting to go to like chat GPT for very similar purposes, you know, like typing in their symptoms or something the doctor said there. And I think that does pose a threat to the like, search. You know, get opinions from everyone use case that Reddit provides. But that's more of a specific, you know, Reddit only point.
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A
Right. Because they're put. I mean, Semrush was saying that Reddit is the most cited place when people are doing that. But Danny, to your point, they're reading the answer and they're moving on with their life. They're not going to Reddit and continuing that conversation, even if Reddit is overwhelmingly the number one source for these AI models when they're pulling stuff.
- [09:19]
D
I guess. I was also going to ask Jeremy your opinion on do you think AI is going to kind of cannibalize this growth that we're seeing from things like Reddit, even if it is citing Reddit? Like, to your point, Marcus, a lot of people won't necessarily be going to Reddit once they get the answer.
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B
Yeah. So what's interesting is Reddit has a really fantastic tool called Reddit Answers that they launched last December that has been growing quite a bit this year. And I think that you basically see everybody is trying to create their own version of ChatGPT to keep you a little bit more engaged. But you're right, I think part of the challenge is like, generally people go to Reddit because they have a specific problem and they solve that problem or they address, you know, whatever need. And then they don't say, and let me see how I can stay on this platform. Right. It's a little bit about how that platform kind of developed. So it's really valuable and people are very motivated. But at the same time, you have to figure out, like, how do you keep people on platform and engaged? And I think that that is a particular challenge that they have more than like, let's say a YouTub, which has more of a mixed model. Sometimes people go to YouTube for a specific answer and sometimes they just say, like, I want to go down the rabbit hole and, you know, spend the next six hours of my life here.
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A
All right, it's a good start. Can I get a second opinion on social media? Will be a Thursday session at 12:20. Marissa, which one do you have for us now?
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D
I did only look at the first page. But that's because I saw what I was most interested in on the first page.
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C
So.
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D
So that's the only reason. So the session that I'm finding most interesting is Streaming Strategic Advantage. How precision meets Scale. Danny and Jeremy will know that I'm very interested in CTV and streaming. So this kind of jumped out to me immediately and I think it's very interesting kind of just looking at CTV as audiences shift away from the linear landscape. But while I'm assuming just based on the title, this panel will talk a lot about precision targeting within streaming. My big question and why I'm interested in it is are they going to go beyond that to address that? There are many problems for advertisers in the CTV landscape. I'm wondering if they'll address lingering issues with the format which namely I would say ad reach is still very low compared with traditional models. Providers are really proliferating. There's a lot of fragmentation in it. So advertisers are kind of confused on where to invest. Subscribers are largely not on ad tier so that presents a problem. And, and a lot of platforms, especially sports centric ones, see very high churn rates. We also are seeing tariffs potentially posing a threat to the CTV landscape and there are issues with measurement and inconsistent measurement standards still. So I'm very interested to see whether any of these concerns are going to be addressed and where the panelists see the future of CTV because of these concerns.
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A
Yeah, there's so much here and I think this is, this one I think is very interesting because you think ctv, it's a very hot topic but there are still so many to what you're pointing out, Marissa, there are still so many issues and things to be to be worked through. So I think there were. The only one I would push back on a little bit is the tariffs piece. Tariff seems to affect everything. I said this to Paul Werner I think a year or two ago. I think if every streaming service, particularly ones like Netflix have a lot of staying power, could double their prices. I don't think churn would really move at all. I did find a bit of data so I think basically showed that large chunk of folks would tolerate significant price increases. 44% of people said they would tolerate an over 30% price increase before canceling or downgrading to a plan with ads. The rest said 10 to 20% would be fine according to a June test data. So I don't think that the tariffs will have as much of an effect in this space. But I think all the other Points are extremely well taken.
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C
Yeah. And to your point, Marcus, I think, you know, that consumer might not cancel Netflix if they were to increase their price by 30%. But they might downgrade to ad supported plans or cancel other streaming subscriptions. Like Netflix would be their main one. But the others kind of get cut out, I suppose.
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D
No, yeah, just going off that point, I wonder if they're going to address how smaller players are faring if cost increases and tariffs do end up kind of trickling down. Like you said, Danny, like Net, things like Netflix have a lot of staying power. People are very unlikely to cancel it because it's Netflix. That's just not the first service that you think to cancel. You probably think to cancel a smaller subscription that you might have. So I'm wondering if they're going to address what smaller players in the streaming landscape. Maybe, maybe fears that they might have.
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C
Right now, which is.
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B
By the way, I was just going to say that I think that that's why Paramount, you know, is reportedly interested in a Warner Brothers Discovery deal. You know, with the thinking that basically in the future you don't want to be the one service. I think, you know, Marcus, we've talked about this on other shows like going back probably like two years where I think of it as a game of musical chairs and, you know, somebody is going to be left without a chair, you know, and who is going to be the one that gets squeezed out of this market. And if you can, if you're a traditional player and you can get bigger, then you're going to have a better catalog and then you're less likely to be squeezed out.
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C
Just I think the fragmentation aspect is a really interesting part of the CTV story. There are a whole lot of providers. It's not very easy to compare and contrast performance and ROI across these different platforms. So I think that's a big frustration for advertisers. I'm curious if that's something that will be addressed. I think maybe you're already starting to see the market kind of move toward addressing that with things like all of these streaming services starting to offer programmatic inventory through Amazon. You know, just going to one big provider and striking a partnership so that, you know, advertisers can have an easy in to all of these different streaming services. But I do think that it's a big problem and it's something that has repeated in other digital ad sectors. And now CTV is going through it too. Our May forecast says that CTV will take up a third of total TV viewership time by 2027. And it's set to capture an even bigger share of ad spend just over the next several years. So I think there is some time for the sector to address these issues before CTV becomes the dominant and like main form of video consumption other than linear. So I guess we'll see what happens. But I'm very curious to see what the state of those issues is right now.
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A
Yeah, lots of elements to this. So an interesting one indeed. This session on Streaming Strategic Advantage will be Monday at 9:40. Jeremy. Oh no, you went already? No more. Danny, you're up. All right.
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C
My pick was a panel that's going to happen, I believe on the second day or third day. I think it's on the Wednesday of ad week. It's called the Agency model of the future and it's exactly what it sounds like. It's about the current sort of precarious state of agencies. I think that the traditional ad agency business models are under threat for a lot of reasons. I mean, AI is probably one of the biggest or if not the biggest. Although we've also been writing about issues like a lack of young hires at ad agencies. So I'm very curious to hear what these people who work at these agencies or leadership at some notable creative or like data focused agencies about what they are doing to change, to adapt for the future. Because I think that you really have to do some soul searching. No matter what kind of client base you're serving or what type of service you're providing as an agency right now, if you're a creative agency, AI is definitely a big threat for, you know. Well, you know, I think that there will always be a market for like a human creative touch. But there are a lot of large clients like say Coca Cola, who has been very publicly experimenting with AI and historically has had deep agency relationships. That's a brand that might decide, hey, you know, we don't need to have these costly agency relationships because we can just use AI to create ads just like they did last holiday season. I think other big brands might follow suit. Those are also like the ones the companies that agencies are competing for in terms of business and there's only so many of them. Those are also companies that have the ability to take advertising in house in a more effective way now, thanks to AI. I could go on and on about all the different issues or things that are interesting to me, but I'll let it sit there in case you guys have anything to say.
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B
So I really like this one. I might like it more than mine.
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C
If I'm Being honest, it sounds like we have a winner.
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B
No, well, no, we're trying to be fair. I'm just trying to be fair when I say objectively, like we've talked about this same thing where we have storyboarding meetings where we go through and we talk about like different threads that we're seeing on an ongoing basis. This is one we're seeing a lot where, you know, there are platforms that are offering these features where bit by bit, you know, like you might question like why do I need my agency or do I need them as much, do I need to like re scope them, you know, in terms of what they do for us and then the agencies have to figure out like where they add value and is that value going to shift and does that impact the pricing model? So I think that there's so many different things that I don't know if they all get covered at this panel, but I think that that's something that I encourage everybody to seek out as much content on as possible because this is going to be a, a major change in the agency world over the next few years.
- [19:32]
D
I'm also interested and I don't necessarily have an answer for this, but if they're going to address this thread that we've been following seems like daily about economic uncertainty and how that's impacting advertisers and where advertisers are investing, how much they're investing. Studies showing that marketers worldwide are anticipating budget cuts, especially in the current quarter. So I'm wondering if they're going to address that at all.
- [19:58]
C
Yeah, if you're an agency, like those are all enormous, maybe even existential threats to the business and pivoting to small and mid sized businesses, which is something we've seen some of like the big four agencies do, is also not a guaranteed, you know, new source of revenues because it's something the big tech platforms are also doing, is trying to open up to small and mid sized businesses. So you know, why would I, if I'm, you know, some mom and pop business that's trying to advertise online, why would I go through Omnicom instead of just going straight to Meta and using the services that they provide?
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B
Well, you know, there's another argument which is like the whole mom and pop thing that never would have gone to Omnicom before, before did these major hold cos start to pick up business that they would never have touched before because they have to in order to write. Like a lot of these, let's not for are public companies and it doesn't look great to say, like we're just not going to grow. We're going to take a meaningful step backwards. So I think that they are in a tricky position.
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C
Yeah, exactly. Like it's a space they have to move into to, you know, open up more revenues. But even that space is contested by other big forces.
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A
The agency model of the future. Wednesday session at 2:30. All right, gang. So we had. Can I get a second opinion on Social media was the first one. Streaming's strategic advantage. How precision meets scale. And then the agency model of the future. And the most interesting session. And the winner is. Marissa. It wasn't close. Jeremy tried to team up with Danny at the end there.
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C
This is. Yeah, I'm gonna need the ref to take a second look. Slow motion replay, please.
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B
I get no vote. I mean, Marcus is the decider in chief.
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C
Fair.
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A
Exactly.
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C
Congratulations. Take it all the way to the bank.
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D
Thank you.
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A
Well done. Marissa is indeed going to be, I think, a very interesting conversation. But over 500 sessions to choose from, so lots to be going on. Enjoy if you are going or from a distance if you are not. That's all we have time for. Thank you so much to my guests. Thank you to Jeremy.
- [22:14]
C
You're. You're muted, Jeremy.
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B
I know, I know. And I couldn't find the unmute so I just went like this.
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A
So Jeremy left already. He was furious with the decision.
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C
Thank you.
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B
It was great to be with you as always, Marcus.
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A
Yes, indeed. Thank you to Marissa.
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D
Thank you for having me.
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A
And to Danny, thank you.
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C
Yeah, always a pleasure. Even when I lose.
- [22:35]
A
Thanks to the whole editing crew and to everyone for listening in to behind the Numbers, the marketer video podcast made possible by Nielsen. Subscribe Follow Rate review all of that stuff. We'll be back on Monday.
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B
Happiest of weekends.