News Corp reveals content marketing agency Sudden.ly
News Corp has used its annual Come Together industry showcase to promote the company’s increasing sophistication in helping brands talk to its many audiences.
In a series of presentations which barely touched upon traditional display advertising, the company unveiled a string of initiatives around content marketing and native advertising, along with brand extensions in the food category.
News Corp revealed that it would be launching standalone content marketing agency Sudden.ly, which will create social content for brands to use on their own channels, rather than the publisher’s mastheads.
Smith will lead Sudden.ly
The agency – labelling itself a “dedicated digital newsroom for brands” – will be run by Simon Smith who rejoined News Corp in March last year, after five years with Fairfax Media.
During the Come Together session, Smith cited Woolworths as an early client which has tapped into the company’s content marketing capabilities.
Smith said that News Corp will be able to help brands with understanding how to get the attention of distracted consumers. He said: “The battle for time is the battle of our time.”
And the company revealed that it has also appointed Smith’s former Fairfax colleague Andrew Sidwell, as head of strategy.
Sidwell: Opted for News Corp over ARN
Late last year Sidwell was announced as joining Australian Radio Network as head of customer solutions, but before starting in that role he was persuaded to join the News Corp team instead.
Sudden.ly will operate across Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Adelaide.
A further announcement saw the launch of News Native Network under the leadership of Julian Delany, MD of News Digital Networks Australia (News DNA). News Corp claims that NNN will be Australia’s largest premium native network, allowing brand content to reach all of News Corp’s audiences.
Delany: ‘The right content’
Delany said: “News Native Network gets the right content in front of the right people at the right time.”
News Corp is also pushing further into audience targeting through the use of data. It said it would be extending its News Connect targeting platform with the launch of Customer Match.
Cameron King, MD of digital revenue at News Corp, said: “News Connect Customer Match allows brands to upload their own data to match their customers with News Corp audiences.”
He said that with Facebook’s decision to stop allowing brands to match their data, News Corp now offered the biggest platform to use Quantium’s credit card and supermarket data to target consumers.
The company also announced a data sharing partnership with entertainment ticketing brand Ticketek.
“No other data set, at this scale, gives a better view of Australians’ discretionary spend,” said King.
However, King said that News Corp would be transparent with brands about where all retargeting data comes from. He said: “The only black box data I’ve heard of is recovered after a disaster. We’ll have a glass box.”
A further announcement saw News Corp’s integrated solutions sales team rebranded as NEWSamp.
And the company will be expanding its food porfolio further with the launch of Delicious.TRAVEL for travelling foodies.
The event – being held in Melbourne this week and in Sydney in a fortnight – was helmed by News Corp’s chief operating officer Damian Eales and national sales MD Lou Barrett.
“We are Australia’s trusted storytellers and our ability to leverage that capability for our clients is what distinguishes us from other media companies,” Eales said.
Eales: ‘Trusted storytellers’
Barrett said: “We are more than media and we want clients to know they can trust News Corp to connect and engage with consumers and to deliver on what we promise.”
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Tim Burrowes founded Mumbrella in 2008. He worked on Mumbrella until 2021. At various points he was editor, content director and editor-at-large.
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Come Together
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Damian Eales
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News DNA
News Native Network
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SUDDEN.ly
Another year. Another new logo to announce….
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Remember ‘Made’? Never made a dollar. News Corp is acting like a business 5 years ago.
http://www.adnews.com.au/adnew.....g-division
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Um, isn’t this just “News Corp Studios” (launched at the News upfronts three years ago) under another name, and under another manager?
http://www.newscorpaustralia.c.....rp-studios
An exciting new initiative? Nah, same old, same old. Just a new name/logo/manager
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I’m from within the industry (as opposed to being a client/brand) and News have a bewildering array of different content agencies and solutions.
Confusing and messy..
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So I guess Medium Rare is cooked ?
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Great sales guy. Poor leader. A decent idea destined to fail.
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“News Connect Customer Match allows brands to upload their own data to match their customers with News Corp audiences.”
Not if they are EU users after 25 May.
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Because what we need is another content marketing agency. Christ, how out of touch are you News.
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Why compete with medium rare – who have done this well for years. Especially when they are your partner?
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It’s rare that you see such a collection of people come together who are more able to get existing revenue lines and reallocate the numbers against an expensive project of theirs to give it the illusion of success and feed off the work of other people. Whoever is monitoring where the money comes from – compare it to previous years figures from the same clients.
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