🔊 Is conference season coming back?

This week, the United States began the historic rollout of the first approved vaccine for COVID-19, giving the country and the rest of the world some long-overdue optimism that this grim pandemic will soon come to an end.

On a simply human level, the relief in a future where family gatherings and social congregation are possible without fear of catching this deadly disease is cause for celebration. For marketers and professionals, it means one day soon we will be able to gather at offices, off-sites, sales trips, conferences and trade shows.

Several times this year we have surveyed marketers on their comfort level for attending live events absent an effective COVID-19 vaccine and each time they have told us that they would largely skip out on travel and in-person professional gatherings. But, with what is sure to be a long-term vaccine rollout having begun, we thought it was time to gauge whether those opinions have changed.

Please click here to take our short survey. It should take no longer than 5 minutes to fill out.

Nielsen surveyed over 350 marketers from around the globe and found that enthusiasm for digital was tempered by severe data quality issues and measurement challenges. Many of you feel you don’t have the right tools to measure and compare the ROI of your ad campaigns across all the channels you use. Download the “Nielsen Annual Marketing Report: The Age of Dissonance” to learn why marketers hold digital channels to a different standard than traditional channels

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Last week, Affinity Answers, the social engagement data provider, joined the ranks of Neutronian certified vendors, alongside Eyeota, Øptimus Analytics, ShareThis and TVision.

Seeking to bring clarity and trust to what has been called the ‘wild west’ of data collection and trading is a major challenge. We asked Neutronian CEO Timur Yarnall to explain the thinking behind the new initiative. “The vision is to be the equivalent of a credit score or a bond rating for marketing data,” said Yarnall. “We think that’s very important for the health of the eco-system, and ultimately good for consumers as well. It’s important, because all of us in the eco-system know that there are low quality data sets and data providers out there — and low quality can mean anything from unethically harvested to inaccurate data.”

The company and the platform were launched at the end of February, just before the COVID shut down. “COVID has actually accelerated our business. The pandemic brought things to a halt for many, but the shift to digital as a result has highlighted the lack of a quality framework.”

The approaching death of third-party cookies is also driving demand. “The possible solution is for brands, publishers and data providers to leverage their first-party data. That means, mix your first-party data with other data sets so you can get to scale. Without a quality framework like Neutronian, what are you mixing it with?”

Read more here.

Unlock actionable tactics to measure search marketing success at SMX Report, online February 23, 2021. Secure your spot for just $99!

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While 2021 still holds economic uncertainty, digital marketing leaders indicate that their agencies have been remarkably resilient, according to CallRail’s fall survey of 167 global marketing leaders who use its services. The findings show that most agencies will finish 2020 with higher annual revenues than in 2019.

Overall, agency leaders reported satisfaction across many different business areas, such as their talent and expertise, customer service and positioning. When asked about their ability to attain key growth metrics — like generating new client leads and closing new business — the majority of agencies also exhibited strong confidence that they can. While CallRail’s 2021 Outlook Report takes a much deeper dive into agency business practices, this article highlights some of the most interesting aspects of the research.

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Last week, LinkedIn announced it had started beta testing of ads in LinkedIn Stories for selected advertisers and for all members globally. The ads include both single image ads and full-screen video, and there are plans to launch more broadly in 2021.

Why we care. This clearly responds to the success of the Stories format across Facebook and Instagram, but leaves open the question whether LinkedIn’s audience will be receptive. Yuval Ben-Itzhak, President of social analytics platform Socialbakers, said in an email to us: “B2C brands have been successfully leveraging ads on Snapchat and Instagram Stories for some time as a tried and tested format that yields good results. But LinkedIn’s user demographics differ significantly from Snapchat or Instagram. LinkedIn targets a different demographic to Snapchat and Instagram. With a user base that’s more B2B focused and a demographic that skews much older than Snapchat or Instagram, it remains to be seen how well ads in Stories will perform versus the more traditional Feed ads.”