Advertising & PR

IAB Europe Appoints Sonia Carreno as next Chief Executive Officer

IAB Europe named Sonia Carreno, longtime IAB Canada president, as incoming chief executive, succeeding Townsend Feehan after her twelve-year tenure leading the European digital advertising trade association.

IAB sets new standards for agentic buying and measurement

IAB Tech Lab published AAMP 3.0, adding an OpenProposal protocol letting AI agents negotiate media buys, plus a draft contractual framework standardizing terms for advertising measurement and verification services.

Comscore data shows how AI discovery is splintering beyond ChatGPT

Comscore data shows ChatGPT's share of AI chatbot prompts fell from 70% to 50% in early 2026 as Gemini and Claude gained share, forcing publishers toward multi-platform optimization strategies.

Editor's noteA single-assistant optimisation strategy was always a bet on one vendor holding its lead, and that bet has now visibly lost. The practical consequence is that discovery work splits across several surfaces with different citation behaviour. Watch whether measurement tools catch up before budgets are asked to.

The Scoop: 3 national news outlets sue after being denied access to the White House

CNN, Politico and MS NOW filed suit after the White House revoked their journalists' press credentials without explanation, alleging retaliation for critical coverage and violation of due process protections.

Editor's notePress-credential fights usually stay procedural, which is why this one matters: three outlets going to court together turns an access dispute into a due-process record. For communicators the practical read is that White House access can no longer be assumed in a plan. Build briefings that survive losing the room.

What a Ticket to the MIXX Awards Europe Ceremony Actually Buys

IAB Europe previews its Mixx Awards Europe ceremony in Amsterdam, detailing what a ticket includes: campaign showcases, networking access, live category winners across 24 disciplines, and cross-market creative comparisons.

The case for and against retail media networks as brand-building channels

A trade analysis weighs whether retail media networks can build brands beyond conversion advertising, citing first-party purchase data and closed-loop measurement against high testing costs and shopper-team budgets focused on performance.

Ogilvy Australia Wins St John, Depicts Lottery Winner Enjoying Dream Home in 'Good Good' Campaign

Ogilvy Australia has won the St John account, launching a 'Good Good' campaign that depicts a lottery winner enjoying his dream home.

Editor's noteThe win adds a high-profile charity account to Ogilvy Australia's roster and tests whether aspirational, feel-good creative can shift St John's public image beyond emergency-service branding. Marketers should watch whether the lottery framing draws scrutiny given the charity's status, and whether ticket-sale or donation metrics follow the campaign's launch.

Princess Tells Poolside Story, Narrated By Deborah Mailman, to Show Off ABC iview

Agency Princess launched a multichannel campaign for ABC iview, narrated by actor Deborah Mailman, filmed at a public pool to position the streamer as a hub for Australian stories.

Rory McKechnie Joins TBWA\NZ as ECD

Rory McKechnie has joined TBWA\New Zealand as executive creative director, the agency announced.

Why WPP isn’t the biggest casualty in the PepsiCo-Coca-Cola-Publicis shuffle

Publicis won PepsiCo's global media account while exiting the Coca-Cola pitch, which WPP then secured; analysts say the shakeup exposes deeper turnaround risks at WPP.

Media Briefing: Overheard at the Digiday Publishing Summit, Sept. ‘26 ‘Google Zero’ edition

Publishers at Digiday's summit said declining Google search traffic will not recover, criticised opaque AI licensing deals, and described shifting revenue toward subscriptions and events.

Editor's notePublishers saying search traffic will not recover is no longer a prediction, it is a planning assumption, and that shift is the story. The same room criticised AI licensing terms it cannot see, which tells you the replacement revenue is not arriving from the companies that took the traffic.

HubSpot rebuilds its platform around AI agents

HubSpot unveiled a platform overhaul at Unbound26, centring Breeze Assistant to orchestrate specialised AI agents across CRM, marketing and sales tools, replacing manual tool selection with outcome-based automation.

Editor's noteEvery martech vendor announced agents this year; HubSpot has rearranged the product around one. Replacing tool selection with stated outcomes is a real change to how a marketing team works day to day, and it commits the company to a bet its competitors have so far only described.

Content & Connections - Meet the IAB Europe Team at DMEXCO 2026

IAB Europe will host sessions and a networking reception at DMEXCO 2026 in Cologne, covering retail media, digital advertising investment trends and a new report on AI adoption.

How Reuters’ dynamic paywall is boosting subscriptions and ads

Reuters' machine-learning dynamic paywall adjusts access based on predicted subscriber and ad value, growing subscriptions and advertising revenue at once while reducing unwanted bot traffic.

Google debuts ‘ad detection tool,’ letting marketers better assess ad experiences in Chrome

Google added ad-measurement metrics to Chrome's User Experience Report, tracking ad count, density, and network and CPU usage; independent ad platforms receive the same access as Google's own advertising units.

Channel 4 Sales to become exclusive partner for Paramount in UK

From 2027, Channel 4 Sales becomes exclusive UK advertising partner for Paramount's Channel 5 portfolio and pay-TV channels, taking over a 300 million pound contract previously held by Sky.

Editor's noteContract moves rarely lead a section, but this one redraws where a large share of British television money is sold. A broadcaster now sells a rival's inventory alongside its own, taking the business off Sky, and every media buyer's negotiating position for 2027 changes with it.

ChatGPT Ads are a tactical bet, not a platform strategy

OpenAI's ChatGPT Ads face plateaued user growth and heavy overlap with Google's audience; the company forecasts 100 billion dollars from ads by 2030 versus 180 billion from B2B products.

Who owns your AI agents after they launch?

Marketing teams deploy AI agents widely but lack clear post-launch ownership; research finds most organizations report unclear accountability for maintaining, monitoring and retiring agents, risking governance gaps.

OpenAI’s next ChatGPT ad format: click to chat, not to site

OpenAI is testing a ChatGPT ad format letting users click into a branded AI chat with a business agent instead of visiting an external website; Wayfair joined the pilot.

What we’ve learned from the creator snafus at this year’s US Open

Credentialed creators disrupted play at the 2026 US Open, including flash photography during Naomi Osaka's match, prompting USTA scrutiny; marketers say better credentialing and briefing are needed.

Editor's noteCreator credentialing has been a quiet operational detail for years. It stopped being quiet when a flash went off during a point at a grand slam. The lesson brands should take is not that creators are a liability, but that nobody briefed them, and briefing is cheap.

The answer to your martech problem depends on the problem

A CMO Council study of 988 martech stacks found revenue leaders do not consistently use more sophisticated tools, urging marketers to audit existing features before buying new platforms.

Google avoided (yet another) breakup… now comes the test of the ad tech remedies

Judge Leonie Brinkema rejected the Justice Department's push to break up Google's ad tech business, instead ordering behavioural restrictions on its exchange and ad server, with a 30-day remedy filing.

The Scoop: Influencers draw the ire of tennis’ most prestigious competition

The US Open’s expanded use of social media influencers sparked backlash after content creation activities disrupted matches, prompting debate over balancing audience growth, brand exposure, and traditional tennis etiquette.

Editor's noteWe selected this as the lead story because it captures a growing tension at the heart of modern marketing: the pursuit of attention versus the quality of the audience experience. The US Open controversy highlights how brands, rights holders, and creators are redefining engagement, while raising important questions about authenticity, access, and the limits of influencer-driven promotion.

Everyone In Ad Tech Will Soon Have An AI Operational Layer. Are You Building Yours Or Renting Someone Else’s?

Ad-tech firms are moving beyond standalone AI tools toward integrated “AI operational layers” embedded within workflows, using connected business data to automate decisions, improve execution, and accumulate organizational knowledge.

Editor's noteMagnite and Raptive are already committing real capital and headcount to owned AI decisioning rather than licensing it, which turns this from a thought exercise into a live build-versus-buy window closing in real time. The harder cost the piece surfaces isn't the model itself but stitching together data scattered across disconnected ad-tech systems.

Adwanted brings direct mail and door drops into regional media planning tool

Adwanted has integrated direct mail and door-drop data into its regional media planning platform, enabling advertisers to evaluate mail alongside channels such as radio, cinema, publications, and out-of-home advertising.

Design on Display at Australian House & Garden's 2026 Top 50 Rooms Awards

An awards night at the Sydney Opera House recognised fifty rooms and the interior design and architecture practices behind them, from a magazine's annual survey of the field.

KFC Fans Trade Gold For Sauce in Pawnshop-Inspired Pop Up

A pawnshop-styled pop-up in New Zealand invited fans to trade gold for sauce, handled end to end by one agency across experiential, media relations, creative and content.

Editor's noteThe stunt cost little beyond staffing two days in Ponsonby, yet it borrows scarcity and novelty from Liquid Gold's earlier Australian frenzy to manufacture local buzz. The open question for the category: whether a pawnshop gimmick with no purchase requirement converts curiosity into repeat sauce sales once the store closes.

Gen Z Leads Australia's Physical Retail Revival as Chemist Warehouse Capitalises on “Friendfluence”

Platform research puts Gen Z store visits up forty-four percent year on year, with the local managing director arguing products are now found, checked and celebrated inside group chats first.

Editor's noteThe relevant signal for retail marketers isn't that Gen Z returned to stores, it's that they never left their phones inside them. Nine in ten shoppers using price-comparison or group-chat behavior mid-aisle means the purchase decision is still happening on a screen, just one synced to a physical location and a friend group.

What Machinima and Gaming Subcultures Tell Us About The Feral Evolution of Creative Instinct

A studio creative argues the industry looks for talent in far too few places, after a visual effects house referenced a montage he had cut as a teenager inside a gaming subculture.

Saatchi & Saatchi Wins Australian Retirement Trust Pitch

An Australian pension fund has moved its account to a new agency, which will now be asked to evolve the brand platform built by the incumbent it has just replaced.

Editor's noteAccount moves matter less than what happens to the idea left behind, and this one comes with an inherited brand platform the new agency has been asked to grow rather than replace. That is the harder of the two briefs, and it is usually the one that decides whether a win lasts.

Publicis Groupe NZ Promotes Jayde Hill to GM, People and Culture

A holding company has promoted from within to fill its New Zealand people and culture role, which its regional talent chief presented as evidence the internal bench is deep enough.

Jim Ingram and Brad Collett Pick AUNZ's August Work of the Month

Two creative leaders picked their favourite Australian and New Zealand work of the month, drawing from three agencies, in a monthly selection run with the region's creative awards body.

Shift 20, Bus Stop Films Formalise Partnership with 'The Full Frame'

Two organisations have formalised a partnership giving Australian brands one route to hire deaf, disabled and neurodivergent cast and crew, rather than each advertiser working it out alone.

Mark Molloy Directs Yacht Heist in 3 Minute Blockbuster For MLC

An Emmy-nominated director has made a three-minute heist film for an Australian superannuation brand, the centrepiece of a campaign running one hundred and seventy-one assets over eighteen months.

Uber CEO cites need for ‘simpler’ company in layoff memo; Tim Cook says goodbye to Apple employees

Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi announced a workforce reduction despite strong results, Apple's Tim Cook wrote a farewell memo ahead of John Ternus's succession, and Meta dropped AI-usage metrics from engineer performance reviews.

Be prepared for unexpected reactions when sending change messages

Brooke Wilson of CVS Health told Ragan's Employee Experience Conference that internal teams must anticipate employee anxiety and personalize messaging when announcing organizational changes, rather than treating updates as routine.

Marketers say usage rights are driving up the price to work with creators

Marketers and creator-marketing agencies say undefined usage-rights terms and inconsistent pricing structures are inflating costs of creator partnerships, prompting calls for standardized contracts and clearer scope definitions before deals close.

Editor's notePrice disputes usually trail a market that has scaled past its contracts. Creator deals reaching that point says less about any one negotiation than about how fast informal arrangements became load-bearing infrastructure for brand budgets. Whoever drafts the next agreement is now writing rules a market has already outgrown.

Rapid AI changes mean GEO is a weekly job now

MarTech reported AI search summaries cut click-through to results to 8% from 15%, prompting SEO, PR and content teams to treat generative engine optimization as continuous weekly monitoring.

PR's earned media moment: Why AI is fuelling optimism, not fear

UK PR leaders report growing demand for earned media as AI-generated content proliferates, arguing agility, authenticity, and human storytelling now differentiate brands more than social metrics.

Editor's noteOptimism in a trade survey is usually noise. This one has a mechanism behind it: if generated content is abundant, the scarce thing becomes third-party credibility, and earned media is the only channel that supplies it. Whether agencies can price that is the open question.

How to find the weak point stalling AI adoption

Ragan's 2026 survey found 98% of communications teams use AI, yet fewer than 20% have integrated it strategically; an advisor outlines methods to diagnose the specific readiness gap stalling adoption.

Why your thought leadership keeps failing

PR Daily's Allison Carter argued genuine thought leadership requires executives to risk being wrong, citing Mark Zuckerberg's AI-optimism op-ed and Jamie Dimon's shareholder letters as debatable positions.

The clock is ticking on major green claims reform

The EU's Empowering Consumers for the Green Transition directive takes effect September 27, banning unsubstantiated eco-friendly and offset-based carbon-neutral claims, with fines up to 4% of turnover.

Editor's noteA deadline with a penalty attached outranks everything else in the section. From the twenty-seventh, unsubstantiated green wording and offset-based carbon-neutral claims stop being a reputational risk and start being a four-percent-of-turnover one, which moves the review out of marketing and into legal.

PR Stunt Watch: Low-flying planes, flirting billboards and a very expensive bar of soap

PRmoment's stunt roundup covered a million-dollar Dr Squatch scavenger hunt with streamer IShowSpeed, Airlink's disputed rugby-match flypast in Cape Town, and billboard sparring between two drinks brands.

Media Briefing: What to expect at the Digiday Publishing Summit, September 2026 edition

Digiday's September Publishing Summit in Key Biscayne convenes executives from the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Reuters and Axios on AI licensing revenue and search referral declines.

Why Qatar's F&B brands are outgrowing generalist PR agencies

Rachel Morris launched Morris Communications, Qatar's first PR agency dedicated to food, beverage and hospitality brands, arguing generalist agencies move too slowly for the sector.

Editor's noteSpecialist agencies appear when a sector's volume justifies one, so the launch is a market signal as much as a business story. The claim underneath it, that generalists move too slowly for food and hospitality, is a pitch, but it is a testable one.

Bring more of the leader into leadership storytelling

Brunswick's Jenny Westfall says leaders should choose storytelling formats matching their personality, citing a personal video series that outperformed other internal communication channels.

Future of TV Briefing: How strong are the fundamentals of the creator economy, really?

Digiday's Future of TV briefing examines signs the creator economy is cooling, citing data that half of marketers mispriced influencer fees and many now believe they overpaid.

Late Night Cravings Spark Wild Encounters for DoorDash Canada

DoorDash Canada and agency Hard Work Club released two surreal late-night films directed by Nick Ball, dramatizing delivery drivers' odd nocturnal encounters for the Nighttime's a Trip campaign.

Silverpush Partners with Happydemics to Measure Contextual Advertising Against Brand Performance

Contextual advertising firm Silverpush partnered with Happydemics to independently validate brand-lift outcomes, reporting early campaign results showing brand-image gains of 120% versus a 44% benchmark.

CARAVAN Signs with Little Bird

Charlotte-based production company CARAVAN, known for Nike and Meta campaigns, joined Becca Falborn's Little Bird roster for East Coast representation, expanding the two-year-old agency's production network.

Editor's noteRepresentation moves are trade news, and this one leads because of what it says about where production work is being won. A shop with Nike and Meta credits choosing a two-year-old agency for East Coast coverage is a bet on relationships over scale.

System1 & Advertising Association’s August Ads of the Month

System1 and the UK Advertising Association highlighted Dolmio, Kopparberg, and Dairylea as August’s most effective ads, citing humor, distinctive brand assets, and emotional engagement as key drivers of long-term advertising effectiveness.

3 steps for building a stakeholder map

Providence Health communications chief Alan Shoebridge outlined a three-step framework for building stakeholder maps, covering identification, one-on-one assessment and regular updates during annual planning.

Snickers Says Even Your AI Chatbot Isn’t Itself When It’s Hungry

Snickers has extended its iconic “You’re Not You When You’re Hungry” campaign to AI chatbots, launching a digital candy bar called Hungr.AI that users can “feed” to chatbots when they give poor or bizarre responses.

Editor's noteA fifteen-year-old campaign line applied to chatbots, and it works because the joke was always about behaviour, not hunger. We ran it as the day’s creative lead because it shows how a durable platform absorbs a new medium without changing its idea. Watch whether the AI gag ages as well as the original.

Something Old, Something New; The Robots Aren’t Always Right

Retail media networks are evolving beyond Amazon-style playbooks to pursue new advertising budgets, while a CRM data study highlights ongoing data-quality issues affecting marketing performance and AI-driven workflows.

The Telegraph’s next podcast play: video, events and paid memberships

The Telegraph, now owned by Axel Springer, is expanding podcasts into video, live events and planned paid memberships after audience grew 161% and homepage video views more than tripled.

Spotify Takes Playlists to the Streets in Reactive Uncommon OOH

Spotify’s new“Playlist It” campaign turns user-created playlist titles into hyperlocal billboards across New York, Los Angeles, and Miami, celebrating playlists as a form of self-expression and connecting music culture to specific places and moments.

Editor's noteSpotify put users’ own playlist titles on billboards in the neighbourhoods they were made for, and it led Advertising & PR because the creative was already written by the audience. Hyperlocal out-of-home with copy the customer wrote is the whole brief done in one move. For OOH planners, relevance is cheapest when you borrow it from the people walking past.

Following Meta’s $17 Billion Settlement, Media Buyers Say: Don’t Touch That Dial

Media buyers expect Meta’s landmark teen-safety settlement to reshape digital advertising and platform practices, as new restrictions on teen engagement, notifications, and usage set precedents likely to influence social-media companies, regulators, and marketers.

Where Have All The Meta Employees Gone?; The Trade Desk Goes Agentic

The Trade Desk’s push into agentic AI with a new centralized interface, and efforts by publishers such as USA Today to restructure content for AI-driven discovery and consumption.

Editor's noteA roundup led the section for one item: The Trade Desk putting an agentic layer over its buying platform. If the interface starts making the trades, the agency planner becomes a supervisor of a machine. Beside it, publishers reshaping content for AI discovery. Together they describe where the next ad dollar gets decided.

AI won’t replace media agencies. It will redefine what clients value most

AI will automate executional media tasks, but agency value will increasingly stem from strategic judgment, transparency, accountability, and business impact. As AI commoditizes operations, clients will prioritize partners that offer trusted counsel and measurable outcomes.

Apple Maps Has Ads Now. They Might Not Be Terrible, but You Can’t Turn Them Off

Apple Maps is now showing sponsored business listings in the US and Canada. While the ads are relatively unobtrusive and privacy-focused, users cannot disable them, marking the end of Apple Maps’ longstanding ad-free experience.

Future of TV Briefing: Which agency team(s) should be responsible for YouTube Shorts?

As YouTube Shorts attracts greater advertiser spending, agencies are struggling to determine ownership between TV/video and social teams. The debate reflects changing media boundaries, campaign measurement challenges, and the platform’s growing importance within video strategies.

Dentsu expands and consolidates its commerce and retail media offering under new leadership

Dentsu reorganized its commerce and retail media unit under new brand-side hires, consolidating shopper marketing and media into one offering as US commerce media spend grew 25% year over year.

USA Today Co. is reformatting content to attract more AI licensing deals

USA Today Co. is restructuring web content into machine-readable formats to win AI licensing deals and visibility in answer engines, while continuing to block most unlicensed AI crawlers by default.

Australian OOH Industry Reports 6.5% Revenue Growth as Digital Share Expands

Australia’s out-of-home advertising sector reported first-half revenue of A$744.1 million, up 6.5% year over year. Digital formats generated 77.1% of income, highlighting continued growth driven by technology, measurement improvements, and expanding industry participation.

Editor's noteA category still counting on digital's takeover to carry growth reads differently once digital already accounts for three of every four dollars spent. Once that expansion is the baseline rather than the story, the real question becomes what keeps the category growing when the easy conversion is already finished.

Programmatic Gets An Agentic Brain

Butler/Till and PubMatic ran a fully autonomous, Claude-driven CTV campaign that cut supply-chain costs 80% and lifted impressions 40%, as agentic AI begins replacing manual DSP workflows in programmatic buying.

Editor's noteAutonomous media buying has been promised for years and demonstrated rarely. This is a run with numbers attached: an eighty percent cut in supply-chain cost and forty percent more impressions, which makes it evidence rather than a vendor claim, whatever one thinks of the sample size.

VIOOH Expands Programmatic DOOH Access in the US with Screenverse Partnership

VIOOH has partnered with Screenverse to expand programmatic digital out-of-home (DOOH) advertising in the U.S., giving media buyers access to more than 38,000 screens and 7.7 billion monthly impressions across major markets.

WPP files to seal Foster complaint, arguing allegations ‘immaterial’ to case

WPP asked a New York court to seal parts of Richard Foster's amended $100m whistleblower complaint, arguing details of a Sony rebate probe are confidential and immaterial, ahead of a planned motion to dismiss.

Westin Hotels and Resorts Reclaims Sleep as Power in 'Own Your Mornings'

Westin Hotels and BBH Singapore launched “Own Your Mornings,” repositioning sleep as a source of power rather than passive rest, spanning film, OOH, and print across Asia Pacific markets including Japan and India.

How India’s Iconic Transparent Soap Bar Is Proving It Has ‘Nothing to Hide’

TBWA\Lintas built a campaign for Pears soap around its 200-year-old transparent bar, filming the factory process to position the brand's literal transparency as proof of quality and ingredient honesty.

Gummy Brands Fight It Out for Their Place on the Shelf

Gummy supplement brands are intensifying shelf competition as the category, projected to reach $40 billion by 2031, shifts marketing toward skincare-style rituals and daily habit-building rather than basic health claims.

Digest: Apple Trains Its own AI Model For China; Walmart Connect Adds Negative Keyword Controls For Sponsored Ads

ExchangeWire’s roundup highlights Apple developing a China-specific AI model with Alibaba’s support, Walmart expanding advertiser controls through negative keywords, and Experian fully integrating Audigent into its marketing services business.

Editor's noteA digest led the section because its three items belong together: Apple building a China-only model, Walmart giving advertisers negative keywords, Experian absorbing Audigent. Each is a large platform accepting that one global product no longer fits every market or every buyer. That is the pattern worth carrying into any regional media plan.

Performance Agency Chief Media Acquires 2 Firms to Beef up Amazon and TikTok Expertise

Chief Media, an independent performance agency, purchased Amazon consultancy AMZ Advisers and social specialist Reach Social, expanding e-commerce and TikTok capabilities for cross-selling to existing agency clients.

Nielsen’s The Ref, But Its CEO Says Buying DV Is About Playing Offense

Nielsen CEO Karthik Rao stated the company plans an acquisition to shift strategy toward offense after traditionally serving as industry referee and measurement provider.

By the numbers: Wall Street’s tough assessment of ad tech

Wall Street has negatively assessed publicly traded ad tech companies despite digital advertising market growth. AppLovin and Trade Desk experienced significant stock declines following Q2 earnings reports.

Silverpush Launches Global Contextual Podcast Segments for YouTube Video Ads

Silverpush announced a new contextual intelligence product enabling advertisers to reach exclusive podcast inventory on YouTube through video advertising campaigns.

Walmart’s Wall: Will The Vibe Deal Make It Meta, Or Another AOL?

Walmart's acquisition of Vibe positions the retailer as a potential walled-garden advertising platform, raising questions about whether it will achieve Meta-like success or face AOL-like obsolescence in the digital marketplace.

Editor's noteThe Meta-or-AOL framing is the right question, and nobody in retail media is asking it out loud. Walmart has the first-party data and the shelf; what it lacks is the daily habit that makes a walled garden worth walling. This ran because that gap is the whole bet. Watch the ad-load numbers, not the deal terms.

Hinge is getting into audiobooks now

Dating app Hinge released its first audiobook featuring authors writing about real couples who met on the platform. The audiobook expands the company's No Ordinary Love marketing campaign centered on authentic relationship narratives.

Editor's noteA dating app publishing an audiobook sounds like a stunt until you notice what it does: it turns testimonials into a format people give hours to. That is why it ran in Advertising & PR rather than as a curiosity. The measure to watch is whether the campaign line survives outside the audiobook.

Ad Tech’s Last Neutral Party Just Picked A Side

Publicis Groupe's $2.167 billion acquisition of LiveRamp raises concerns about the company's neutral position in the industry as a connector between competing agencies, brands and platforms for data and identity management.

Editor's noteIdentity infrastructure only works if everyone trusts it, which is why ownership matters more here than price. A holding company now owns the layer its competitors route data through, and the question for every rival agency is not whether Publicis would abuse that, but that they must now ask.

Netflix, get that man out of your billboard

Netflix's live-action billboard advertisement for The Last House has sparked public attention and discussion about the emerging trend of interactive, real-world promotional campaigns from streaming platforms.

Editor's noteA man living on a billboard is a stunt, and stunts usually earn a mention rather than a lead. This one led because streamers are moving promotion into physical space at exactly the moment digital attention is costing more. Watch how many of these get measured properly rather than counted in press coverage.

BMW's controversial Spider-Man advert could be even more damaging than the Jaguar rebrand

BMW's Spider-Man advertisement draws criticism and comparison to Jaguar's recent rebrand controversy, with both facing customer backlash over surprising creative decisions.

Editor's noteTwo premium brands, two creative decisions that surprised their own customers, and a comparison that is fairer than it looks. Jaguar changed its identity; BMW borrowed someone else’s. We led with it because the second mistake is easier to make and harder to notice from inside a marketing department. Watch the dealer reaction.

Lollapalooza 2026 Photo Tour: 10 Experiences from Chicago’s Grant Park

Lollapalooza 2026 attracted nearly 400,000 fans to Chicago's Grant Park despite rain and flooding. More than 45 partner brands created festival activations including Bacardí, Chase, Coca-Cola, Listerine, Motorola, Neutrogena, and others.

5 Ways PR Teams Can Optimize Visibility on Claude

PR teams should understand Claude's behavior to optimize visibility strategies, as the AI answer engine conducts thorough research before recommending brands and cites sources differently than competitors.