The Biggest Media and Advertising Questions for 2017: We’re only a month into 2017, and already we’re seeing big changes in the marketing industry. Here are some of the big questions marketing industries (like Safeguard!) are considering.
Excerpt:
1) Can Snapchat please Wall Street?
As Snap Inc. preps for its much-anticipated IPO, it’s already setting itself up for a bold and potentially dangerous benchmark: becoming the next Facebook. As The Wall Street Journal reports, Snap executives plan to talk up the 150 million daily active users for the Snapchat app when they hit the road to pitch investors on what they hope will be a $20 billion to $25 billion IPO valuation. It’s a dazzling user number, except when compared with Facebook’s 1.18 billion daily active users. Of course, that kind of engagement didn’t happen overnight for Facebook. But there was a clear moment when Facebook went from college kid social network to the social network everyone from junior to mom to grandma is using. Will Snapchat have such a demographic crossover moment that will help accelerate its growth?
2) What will the AppNexus IPO tell us about the state of ad tech?
The WPP-backed ad tech firm, which operates as something of a jack-of-all-trades for web publishers and advertisers, is expected to go public during the second quarter of 2017 at a possible valuation of up to $2 billion. Will its financials reveal—like other ad tech IPOs—a company that is struggling to become profitable or that relies as much on humans as it does on powerful software? Or will it give hope to those in the ad world that see AppNexus as a potential independent counter to Google and Facebook’s power? If so, what will that mean for the rest of the ad tech landscape?
3) Will the Verizon/AOL/ Yahoo mashup happen, or even matter?
Even if there are no more revelations of hacking at Yahoo, there are still questions about whether Verizon Communications will go through with its plans to acquire Yahoo. Verizon could also ask for either a reduced price or more legal protections to cope with the liability from the data breaches. If this messy deal does close, there is still uncertainty about Verizon’s ability to stitch Yahoo’s ad tech and vast pools of data together with Verizon’s and AOL’s own data and technology platforms. Will Verizon really be able to build a digital ad targeting powerhouse that becomes a must-buy for advertisers (let alone even begins to make Google and Facebook the least bit nervous)?
Read More The Biggest Media and Advertising Questions for 2017 | WSJ | http://on.wsj.com/2kqzcYY