Burger in Front, Party Out Back: McDonald’s NZ Debuts the Cheeseburger with a Mullet via McCann NZ, FleishmanHillard Aotearoa +...
McDonald’s New Zealand rolled out a limited‑time "Cheeseburger with a Mullet" – nicknamed the McMullet – after a social‑media buzz around adding an extra slice of cheese at the back of a cheeseburger. The campaign, created with McCann NZ, FleishmanHillard Aotearoa and OMD NZ, featured influencer posts, on‑site barbers and a pop‑up at the Penrose restaurant where customers with a mullet haircut received a free burger. Fans quickly embraced the DIY hack, generating hundreds of mullet‑styled burgers and a prize of a year’s supply of cheeseburgers. The stunt blended humor, local culture and real‑time testing to drive engagement.
WiredCo Joins OpenAI’s ChatGPT Ads Pilot in Australia
WiredCo, an award‑winning brandformance agency, has joined OpenAI’s ChatGPT Ads pilot in Australia, bringing Boost Mobile and THE ICONIC on board as the first local brands. The agency is creating conversational ad units that sit natively within ChatGPT, targeting the...
Agency Agenda: VaynerMedia's Marcus Krzastek on AI, Media, and Creative Convergence
VaynerMedia International President Marcus Krzastek says the agency is dismantling the traditional divide between creative and media, building a single, integrated system that can operate across markets. He highlights how AI‑driven tools and platform‑native capabilities on TikTok and Meta let...
Context Matters: How to Target Smarter When Tracking Gets Worse
With third‑party cookies disappearing, 60% of brands feel unprepared, leaving small advertisers especially vulnerable. Lacking first‑party data and limited budgets, they struggle to track and retarget prospects. Contextual targeting—matching ads to page content—offers a cookie‑free solution, delivering up to tenfold...
The Contract Layer for Agentic Advertising
The IAB Tech Lab’s OpenDirect standard provides a machine‑readable API for guaranteed, direct‑sold ad campaigns, mirroring the role OpenRTB plays in programmatic. As AI agents begin to negotiate, book, and manage these campaigns, a deterministic, shared state model eliminates the...
ChatGPT Ads Now Offer CPC Bidding Between $3 And $5: Report via @Sejournal, @MattGSouthern
OpenAI’s ChatGPT Ads Manager has added a cost‑per‑click (CPC) bidding option, with bids ranging from $3 to $5 per click. The change follows a rapid price decline since the pilot’s February launch, where CPM rates fell from $60 to as...
GrowthRise Mastermind Recap Apr 21, 2026
The GrowthRise Mastermind recap highlighted key decisions around display advertising platforms, noting that AdRoll is most effective when a company’s Google spend is below $50,000, while Google Display outperforms once that threshold is crossed. It reinforced that a 1.5‑2% click‑through...
Apple Maps Is Getting Ads, and It Just Lost the One Thing that Made It Worth Using
Apple confirmed that ads will be integrated into the Maps app’s search results and a new Suggested Places feature beginning summer 2026 in the US and Canada. The ads will promote nearby businesses, turning Apple Maps into a paid advertising...
Stop Measuring. Start Moving: Closing the Execution Gap in Peak Sales Moments
Marketers often treat BFCM data as a post‑campaign report, missing real‑time optimization opportunities. QR code scans, which capture high‑intent consumer signals, are especially underutilized—one‑quarter of marketers failed to act on 2024 scan data before Cyber Monday. Brands that responded to...
Google Adds AI-Qualified Call Leads to Improve Measurement
Google Ads is rolling out an AI‑qualified call leads feature that evaluates the substance of inbound calls rather than just their length. The machine‑learning system generates call summaries and tags, feeding higher‑quality signals into smart bidding and reporting. Recording is...
We Let AI Plan Our SEO Week. Here’s What It Recommended.
Foundation Inc. used multiple AI tools to create a data‑driven SEO Week Survival Guide for attendees of the April 27‑30 conference in Manhattan. The guide ranks coffee spots, restaurant picks, and analyzes how AI cites conference sponsors, revealing that Culture Espresso received...
BrightonSEO San Diego 2026
BrightonSEO returns to San Diego for its fourth U.S. edition, running September 15‑16, 2026 at the San Diego Convention Center. Organizers anticipate more than 1,500 attendees from the United States and abroad. The two‑day agenda blends expert‑led workshops, keynote talks...
What a Q4 CPG Campaign Taught Us About Influencers’ Real ROI
A leading consumer‑appliance CPG brand partnered with an agency to run a two‑month Q4 influencer campaign that split creators into awareness‑focused storytellers and performance‑driven affiliates. The full‑funnel approach delivered 148% of forecast impressions, over 200 K clicks, and lifted both hero‑SKU...
The Agentic Shift in Martech: Three Examples
Legacy enterprises are deploying AI agents like Claude and Codex to replace weeks‑long martech workflows with hour‑scale interactions. By converting plain‑language prompts into infrastructure‑as‑code, self‑service tracking instrumentation, and automated analytics recommendations, these agents democratize tasks traditionally reserved for engineers. The...
Creators Are Not the Future of Affiliate Marketing, and That’s a Good Thing
The article argues that influencer marketing and affiliate marketing are fundamentally distinct and should not be forced into a single model. Affiliate programs are performance‑first, driven by measurable actions like sales and revenue, while influencer campaigns are fee‑based and measured...
How Native CTV Is Solving the Channel’s Attention Problem
The NewFronts highlighted a shift in connected‑TV advertising toward performance, with native CTV emerging as a key format. By embedding ads into the smart‑TV home screen, brands reach viewers during the 10.5‑minute browsing window before content selection, turning attention into...
IPL 2026 Ad Race Sees Digital-First Categories Dominate CTV
The IPL 2026 advertising landscape shows a stark split between Connected TV (CTV) and Linear TV. Digital‑first categories such as e‑commerce media, entertainment and social platforms captured 35% of CTV ad volume, while traditional mouth fresheners led Linear TV with...
Stepherson Inc., Superlo Foods Expands Loyalty, Digital Engagement With RSA America
Stepherson Inc. has rolled out RSA America’s loyalty and digital engagement platform across all 11 Superlo Foods stores in Memphis and Mississippi. The multi‑year agreement adds a unified rewards program, digital coupons and a branded mobile app designed to lift...
‘The Creative Is Coming Out of the Internet’: What This Year’s Webby Winners Say About Advertising
The 2026 Webby Awards highlighted a shift in advertising where creative originates on the internet rather than being imposed on it. Winners showcased AI‑enhanced campaigns, from a Dr Pepper jingle generated online to the “death of Duo” stunt, and blended digital...
New Programmatic 'Transparency' Initiative Excludes Advertisers
The IAB Tech Lab announced a new Programmatic Governance Council aimed at boosting transparency in the roughly $200 billion U.S. programmatic advertising market. The council brings together agencies, publishers and platforms such as Dentsu, Omnicom, Disney, Amazon Ads and The Trade...
Google Ads Makes Call Recording Default For AI Lead Calls via @Sejournal, @MattGSouthern
Google Ads now enables call recording by default for AI‑qualified lead calls in the United States and Canada. The AI reviews recordings to identify high‑intent signals—such as scheduling a consultation or expressing purchase intent—and counts only those calls as conversions,...
GEOGrow.ai Unveils Next-Level AI Visibility Platform at LEADSCON Las Vegas
GEOGrow.ai unveiled its AI Visibility Platform at LEADSCON in Las Vegas, offering brands, marketers and growth experts a suite of tools to secure and grow presence in AI‑driven search. The platform introduces Brand DNA Monitoring, AI Memory Audits, Agentic Content...
IAB Tech Lab Launches Programmatic Governance Council
IAB Tech Lab announced the creation of a Programmatic Governance Council, bringing together leading agencies, publishers, and ad‑tech platforms such as Dentsu, Disney, Amazon Ads, and The Trade Desk. The council targets the roughly $200 billion U.S. programmatic advertising market, which...
'Always On' Isn't Broken -- The Way We Use It Is
The article argues that today’s “always on” advertising has devolved into a blanket, budget‑draining approach that treats every audience as constantly receptive. It calls for a shift from a channel‑centric mindset to a behavior‑centric one, activating each medium only when...
StackAdapt Brings Campaign Intelligence Into Claude with MCP Server Launch
StackAdapt announced the general availability of its Model Context Protocol (MCP) Server, which injects the platform’s campaign intelligence directly into AI tools such as Claude. The server lets advertisers query performance, creative status, and audience results in natural language without...
Google Rolls Out New AI Safety Features in Ads Advisor
Google is upgrading Ads Advisor, its AI assistant in Google Ads, with three new agentic safety features. The enhancements include proactive policy assistance, continuous security monitoring, and instant certification capabilities powered by Gemini. By scanning accounts and websites automatically, the...
3 New Ways Ads Advisor Is Making Google Ads Safer and Faster
Google Ads is rolling out three AI‑driven safety upgrades in its Ads Advisor tool. The platform will now proactively flag complex policy violations and guide advertisers through fixes, monitor accounts 24/7 with personalized security recommendations, and automate certification processes using...
OpenAI Turns on Cost-per-Click Ads Inside ChatGPT
OpenAI has activated cost‑per‑click (CPC) advertising inside ChatGPT, allowing marketers to bid $3‑$5 per click. The move follows a rapid decline in CPM rates, which fell from $60 to $25 per thousand impressions within ten weeks. By shifting to a...
Why Your Marketing Keeps Falling Off a Cliff (and What to Do About It)
Accounting firms struggle to keep marketing consistent amid client work, tax season and staff turnover. Generic AI writing tools often produce robotic, jargon‑filled copy that feels disconnected from a firm’s voice. Plot AI, launched for bookkeepers and accountants, uses a...
Brands Want To Know How Well Their Affiliate Content Is Performing In The AI Age
Adobe and other brands are struggling to attribute performance in AI‑driven search results. Partnerize’s VantagePoint, a generative‑AI attribution platform launched in 2025, promises to identify which affiliate content drives traffic and conversions. The new Influence Compensation Lighthouse Program ties the...
Brands Want To Know How Well Their Affiliate Content Is Performing In The AI Age
Adobe is turning to Partnerize’s VantagePoint generative‑AI attribution platform to solve the attribution blind spot created by AI‑driven search. The solution, now enhanced with the Influence Compensation Lighthouse Program, assigns influence scores (HaloIndex) beyond last‑click and automates publisher payouts. Brands...
Daily Search Forum Recap: April 21, 2026
The Search Engine Roundtable highlighted several Google updates, including the insertion of shopping ads into the free‑listing grid and a bug in Search Console that blanks job‑listing metrics. Google’s John Mueller reiterated that SEO remains a moving target where imperfect...
WWO: Guidelines for Using AI to Build Your Media Plans
Westwood One’s Audio Active Group released guidelines for local advertisers on leveraging artificial intelligence in media planning. Cumulus Media president of operations Bob Walker emphasizes that AI can be useful but must be used with precise prompts, reputable sources, and...
Why IBM Says Every Brand Now Needs a GEO Playbook
IBM warns that AI‑driven agents will dominate search, estimating 75% of visibility shifting to machine answers within two years. To stay discoverable, brands must adopt a Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) playbook, a 12‑component system covering content, technical foundations, citation strategy,...
Meta’s AI Push Has Made Its Way Into Ad Creative. Not All Marketers Are Happy About It
Meta has been automatically applying AI‑generated tweaks to advertisers' creative assets, often without the brands’ knowledge. Snag Tights discovered altered ads that misrepresented its products, prompting the company to request a shutdown of Meta’s AI testing on its account. Other...
Introducing Index Cloud: Bring Your Own Intelligence Inside the Exchange
Index Exchange unveiled Index Cloud, a neutral compute layer inside its global data centers that lets partners run custom models, data and applications directly within the real‑time auction. Using containerized workloads, partners can process impression‑level signals in under five milliseconds,...
impact.com Expands Creator Management Capabilities with YouTube’s Creator Partnerships API
impact.com announced an expanded collaboration with YouTube as an early adopter of the Creator Partnerships API, letting brands discover creators, manage sponsorships, and pull performance insights. The integration offers end‑to‑end campaign management and access to verified audience and engagement data....
Podcast Data Firm Bumper Unveils Audience Verification Metric to Boost Advertiser Confidence
Bumper, a podcast data and growth firm, launched the Bumper Score, a new audience verification metric that rates podcasts on a 0‑200 scale with 100 as the industry average. The score aggregates first‑party hosting data, verified listener information from major...
Fashion Retailer Quince Tops Podcast Ad Spending, Sports and Comedy Dominate Genre Placements in March
Fashion retailer Quince led March 2026 podcast advertising with an estimated $6.57 million spend, primarily on comedy programs. BetterHelp, Amazon, Meta, and T‑Mobile rounded out the top five, each allocating roughly $5‑6 million, with a strong preference for sports podcasts. Magellan AI’s...
Meta Launches First Instagram Campaign in Thailand to Drive Reels Adoption
Meta has launched its first dedicated Instagram brand campaign in Thailand, a 10‑week digital effort built by BBH Singapore. The initiative features two hero films, six 20‑second Reels and 15 creator‑led pieces starring local influencers to spur Reels creation among...
Scam Texts Are Creating a Friction Tax for Retailers
Scam text messages (smishing) have surged, costing consumers $470 million in 2025 and eroding the near‑98 % open‑rate that made SMS a retail goldmine. Retailers now face a “friction tax” as shoppers delete or ignore legitimate texts, hurting engagement and revenue. Telecom...
The Tech Lab’s New Programmatic Governance Council Is So Over All The Ad Tech Drama
The IAB Tech Lab announced a new Programmatic Governance Council (PGC) comprising major buyers, sellers, and platforms to address inefficiencies in the $200 billion programmatic ad market. Co‑chaired by OMD’s Ben Hovaness and three sell‑side executives, the council aims to curb...
Why Marketers Are Switching Mobile Measurement Partners (And What To Look for Instead)
Marketers are abandoning legacy mobile measurement partners as consumer journeys now span TikTok, QR codes, email, web and apps. Nearly 50% of B2C marketers plan to replace their MMPs within the next 18 months. Branch positions itself as a next‑gen...
New Guide: The Identity Gap Holding Back Travel Marketing Performance
Travel marketers have poured money into orchestration tools, yet 70%‑95% of website visitors remain anonymous, limiting personalization and direct bookings. Wunderkind’s new guide argues that identity resolution is the missing layer that can turn invisible traffic into measurable revenue. By...
Google Veteran Joins Bulgarian AdScout to Tackle “Trust Tax”
Google veteran Lachezar Atanasov has joined Bulgarian adtech scale‑up AdScout as Head of AI Product. He aims to eliminate the industry’s “Trust Tax” by building autonomous orchestration infrastructure that amplifies authentic human advocacy. Leveraging his experience launching Google DeepMind’s GenAI...
What’s The Biggest Technical SEO Blind Spot From Over-Relying On Tools? – Ask An SEO via @Sejournal, @HelenPollitt1
The article warns that the biggest technical SEO blind spot is the false sense of completeness created when SEOs rely solely on tool dashboards instead of raw data. Tools deliver snapshot reports, prioritized issue lists, and simulated metrics, but they...
The Advertising, Media, and PR Award Winners From the 30th Annual Webby Awards
The 30th annual Webby Awards announced winners in advertising, media and PR, highlighting the best digital campaigns across more than 100 categories. Jury‑selected honors went to brands such as Centivo, NikeSkims, LinkedIn, and Wieden+Kennedy, while a new AI category recognized...
B2B Influencer Marketing in 2026: The Rise of LinkedIn Influencers in B2B Tech
B2B influencer marketing has migrated from occasional expert webinars to a creator‑led model anchored on LinkedIn, where founders, CMOs and product leaders publish consistently. These "LinkedInfluencers" build trust through repeated, expertise‑rich posts that shape buyer opinions long before a sales...
Going Global? Contextual AI Needs To Be Your Strategy
US and UK brands expanding globally often rely on accidental attention, but contextual AI is essential. Eskimi’s research shows AI‑driven contextual targeting lifts attention per mille by 74% and reaches a 95% brand‑safety score, far above standard display and keyword...
How to Measure Demand Gen Creative Impact with Asset Uplift Tests
Google introduced asset uplift experiments for Demand Gen campaigns, letting advertisers run A/B tests that isolate the incremental impact of specific creative assets. The framework requires a minimum of 50 conversions, continuous budget, and a 50/50 split to achieve statistical...