Morning Update: Lancome sells on Snapchat; The search for Sorrell’s replacement; BBC and ITV at loggerheads; ad industry narcissism
AdWeek: Target and Lancome Produce Snapchat’s First Ecommerce Ads
After slowly testing more interactive ads in recent months, Snapchat is open for ecommerce. Lancome and Target started running shoppable ads today within Cosmopolitan’s Discover channel—the hub of the app where media brands publish daily stories.
Like Discover’s other ads, Lancome and Target’s promos appear between Cosmo’s articles and videos, each with a 10-second call-to-action instructing viewers to swipe up for more. Copy on Target’s ad reads, “New products every week”. Swiping down pulls up a loading page with Target’s mobile site where people can shop the products featured in the ad—like plant stands and water bottles.
Campaign Live: WPP confirms search has begun for Sorrell’s successor
WPP has begun to look at external candidates to replace Sir Martin Sorrell as the chief executive of WPP, the company confirmed today. In its 2015 Annual Report, the company’s chairman, Roberto Quarta, sought to assure shareholders that the company is preparing for life after Sorrell, who has led the company since founding it in 1985.
Quarta said: “At some point we all leave our jobs. The question is when. Whether, in Sir Martin’s case, that happens tomorrow, in one, two, three, four or five years, or even over a longer period, we have already begun to identify internal and external candidates who should be considered.”
The Guardian: Government could ban BBC from showing top shows at peak times
The BBC is on a collision course with the government over reported efforts to bar it from showing popular shows at peak viewing times. The culture secretary, John Whittingdale, is widely expected to ban the broadcaster from going head-to-head with commercial rivals as part of the BBC charter review.
He is due to publish a white paper within weeks that will set out a tougher regime as part of a new royal charter to safeguard the service for another 11 years. ITV has complained about licence fee money being used to wage a ratings battle with it and other channels funded by advertising.
Campaign Live: Ad narcissism: why our industry should put down the mirror
Kate Nettleton, a strategy director at Bartle Bogle Hegarty, on why advertising should end its obsession with the reflecting pool. As an industry, we’ve become obsessed with trying to answer that question by holding a mirror up to consumers.
Transfixed by a desire to reflect who we think they are, and arrogant enough to presume we’re creating an accurate reflection. Like Narcissus we have fallen in love with the image of our consumers beamed back to us from the glow of our TV screens and tablets.
Ogilvy has created a graphic film for NGOs Hong Kong Shark Foundation and WildAid that reveals the cruel manner in which sharks are harvested for their fins.
The film highlights the practice of removing the shark’s fins and then throwing the animal back in the ocean to die, with the bride and groom from a Chinese wedding playing the role of sharks finners.
Niemanlab: The Wall Street Journal website — paywalled from the very beginning — turns 20
“From the very beginning it was very clear we needed to cover all the same concerns and sensibilities of the print Journal even though we were online and even though we were a young staff.” The Wall Street Journal has (almost) never been free to read online. When the full website — then called the Wall Street Journal Interactive Edition — officially debuted online 20 years ago today, it was free for a few months.
“It was always the case that the Journal was going to charge for its online edition,” Dave Pettit, the Journal’s editor for specialised news products and events, told me. “We launched in April and in August they launched the subscription. The trial period was free — the earlier prototype was also free — but there was always the expectation that business news content, in particular Journal content, would be behind a subscriber paywall.”
The Onion: Tips For Maintaining Journalistic Integrity
Mumbrella Asia: Proximity boss Richard Fraser named Southeast Asia president of BBDO
Long-serving BBDO group executive Richard Fraser has been appointed Southeast Asia president.
Fraser will retain his existing role of MD for Asia, Middle East and Africa at Proximity, BBDO’s sister digital and direct agency, in addition to his new duties overseeing the network’s six offices in the sub-region. The Southeast Asia head role has been vacant since the elevation of Jean-Paul Burge to head up APAC, replacing Chris Thomas, a year ago.
