Former WPP Chief Martin Sorrell has indicated that he was pretty much gobsmacked by the flurry of events in March and early April that led to his departure at the holding company after decades at the helm. 

In the aftermath of his exit, the Wall Street Journal and the Financial Times ran stories with lots of details about the company investigation leading up to his departure including reports that he treated underlings badly and that he may have used company funds to pay for a prostitute. 

Sorrell has denied all wrong doing and last week at Cannes said that WPP ought to investigate leaks from the company that ended up in the news reports. (Sorrell of course has been known to use the media to maximum advantage himself throughout the course of his 30-plus year reign at WPP.)

Earlier today WPP confirmed, in response to a new FT story that it has hired outside lawyers to investigate leaks of confidential company information in the wake of Sorrell’s departure. 

"WPP confirms that one former and two current employees have received a total of six emails between them from an anonymous source hiding behind a ProtonMail account based in Switzerland. WPP has passed these emails to external legal counsel who are providing advice for the benefit of WPP and the three recipients.” 

The firm added that "WPP is aware of the original source of the subject matter of the emails, which is a former employee's mobile device used for work and handed in when the employee left the Group.” 

All very cryptic I know, but the FT reported that it too had been the recipient of the emails, which it did not disclose verbatim but which apparently aided the publication in its previous reporting on the matter. 

And while Sorrell has denied wrongdoing, he has also declined to get into the specifics surrounding his departure, citing a confidentiality agreement. 

Lots of questions remain unanswered of course, including how Sorrell defines “wrongdoing.” Is it wrong to scream at subordinates and call them idiots, as the FT has reported? Well, it’s not illegal, I guess, in most jurisdictions. And some CEOs are known as “screamers.” 

Is it wrong to cavort with a prostitute? It’s a loaded question with lots of moral ambiguities and not a discussion we’ll get into here. (I do know my wife has definite opinions on the subject however.) 

There’s a pretty unambiguous line I think when it comes to using your expense account for such extravagances, although WPP hasn’t indicated what it did or didn’t find in the course of its investigation. One of the leaks of course was that the company investigation addressed whether Sorrell used company funds for that purpose. 

It will be interesting to see what WPP discovers via this latest investigation. Of course it may decide not to disclose the details. Wouldn’t be the first time, would it?

Evergage has launched a service that it says enables firms to send targeted surveys. 

The new tool, SmartSurveys, includes a Voice of the Customer (VoC) survey tool that allows brands to ask contextually pertinent questions tailored to each customer, and use the response data to improve individual experiences, the firm says.

For example, the brand could push out or trigger an email survey targeted to an individual based on the person’s behavior on a website. It could also change the person’s web, app or email experiences based on the response, Evergage adds.

In another instance, a financial services firm might determine that a person is interested in an automobile loan, based on behavior across the firm’s channels. In a future website visit, the person can be asked the question: “Are you still interested in auto loans?” The website can then be tailored based on the response.

The product is designed to help firms ”engage customers with targeted surveys that make sense -- using the information gleaned to immediately present helpful, relevant experiences that improve relationships,” states Evergage CEO Karl Wirth.

Wirth adds that it can be annoying "when you open a site or app, and a survey immediately pops up, before the company has actually earned the right to survey you. Oftentimes, the questions are generic, and irrelevant to your session activity and overall interests, and the data collected goes into a black hole.”

Publishers ClearingHouse is using SmartSurveys to “strategically engage our users with targeted, entertaining surveys, while continually enriching our member profiles with explicit data on their interests and affinities,” states Sal Tripi, AVP of digital operations and compliance for Publishers ClearingHouse and its online propertyPCH.com.

According to Evergage, SmartSurveys allows users to:

• Target surveys by sending questions to audience segments and individuals based on their behaviors  firmagraphic details and geography. 
• Employ a variety of question types and response formats, including radio buttons, checkboxes, Boolean, drop-down lists, text fields, ratings and images.
• Act on response data immediately -- Rule-based or algorithmic personalization can trigger a follow-up email or message to a website or mobile app.
• Deliver surveys across channels -- These can be sent via email campaigns, websites, web and mobile apps, and email campaigns.
• Utilize real-time reporting for active surveys 
• Ask timely questions during several visitor interactions instead of presenting a long survey on the first visit 
• Brand surveys. 

Google has invested a $22 million Series A funding round for KaiOS Technologies, which develops an emerging operating system for smart feature phones.

The two companies also agreed to collaborate to make the Google Assistant, Google Maps, YouTube, and Google Search available to users running KaiOS, a Linux-based mobile operating system. These apps are being developed specifically for the KaiOS platform, which is entirely web-based, using open standards such as HTML5, JavaScript, and CSS. 

“This funding will help us fast-track development and global deployment of KaiOS-enabled smart feature phones, allowing us to connect the vast population that still cannot access the internet, especially in emerging markets,” wrote Sebastien Codeville, CEO of KaiOS Technologies, on the company’s website.

A video on YouTube, which appears to have been uploaded by KaiOS, explains the company’s mission. The idea behind this phone and operating system, according to KaiOS, is to give basic internet access to the 54% of the world’s total population who go without and 19% are not connected due to a lack of infrastructure. The remaining 35% cannot afford it. The average price of a smartphone -- about $120 -- is not affordable to people living in emerging markets, and KiaOS wants to change that.

KaiOS, a spinoff from Firefox OS, emerged after Mozilla ended the development of its smartphone operating system in early 2017. Since it was open-sourced, other companies began using the code. Google sits on that list of developers of applications for KaiOS. The OS runs on a handful of devices that includes Alcatel OneTouch Go Flip, Reliance Jio JioPhone, and Nokia 8810 4G.

KaiOS works closely with manufacturers like TCL, HMD Global, and Micromax and has partnerships with carriers such as Reliance Jio, Sprint, AT&T, and T-Mobile.

The company’s team operates from locations in San Diego, Hong Kong, Taipei, Shanghai, Paris, and Bangalore.

Emerging technology is constantly changing, opening new paths for brands to truly connect with consumers. With the rise of shoppable media, augmented reality, voice services, wearables, mobile wallets and chatbots (the list goes on), brands are seeking new and interesting ways to enhance the consumer experience.

Shoppable Media: In the Moment

There’s a constant race to accurately connect marketing to sales, and shoppable media provides another avenue for brands to do just that. In-platform shopping provides a new touchpoint that can drive sales while shortening the consumers path to purchase. We know consumers are more apt to purchase in the moment rather than being redirected to an external environment. Interactivity can turn passive users into engaged ones and engaged consumers into brand loyalists.

What’s Working

The number of shoppable advertising units available is growing across all mediums. While technology like VR/AR came out in a limited and linear sense, primarily impacting gaming, shoppable media opportunities are robust, particularly on social media. Retail brands, of all kinds, can easily bridge this gap with visually appealing shoppable ads that are easily swiped through on mobile devices. With the evolution of shoppable ads, influencer integrations may chance, too, to account for this new medium.

At its current infant stage, shoppable media supports categories beyond what you’d expect from a new emerging technology. CPG, a rather predictable segment based on habits and trial, can even leverage shoppable content. For example, Amazon Fresh brilliantly partnered with Meredith Corp. to make recipes shoppable with CPG items directly added to a cart to be purchased. And in addition to static shoppable ads, shoppable video is also making its mark. Brands like Hulu allowed viewers to watch a movie preview and then buy tickets to that movie with their remotes. 

Traditional broadcast still has a perception of drawing only awareness and lacking deeper analytics tied to sales. Advanced TV is growing in scale and on the cusp of changing that by bringing shoppable content to premium networks. A simple example is the ability of “New Girl” fans using the Fox Now iPad app to buy items seen in the sitcom.

This capitalizes on consumers habits to use multiple screens while viewing TV and enables TV advertisers to be one step closer to a sale. Another interesting partnership merging multiple emerging technologies is Univision partnering with ACTV8me allowing viewers to send offers directly from TV or radio broadcast to their mobile wallets. Trade publications have already created another buzzword for this action: T-commerce.

Applying Shoppable Media to Your Business Strategy

So, how can shoppable media go from a concept to a reality for brands? 

• Treat shoppable media as content providing value to consumers rather than as a direct response tactic.

• Emotionally connect through the creative, serving timely content that capitalizes on relevant cultural trends.

• Stay on brand and ensure executions are seamless with other owned and shared channels such as retail, website and customer service.

• Get tracking and tagging in order and tied to CRM when possible to obtain a full understanding of results and implications.

Technology impacts all of our lives, both marketers and consumers alike. The future of shoppable media is about as predictable as the weather or the stock market. But with this new way to connect, we’re seeing advanced targeting capabilities that tie customer data from brick and mortar stores, to e-commerce, to CRM/loyalty and beyond to these new shoppable environments for brands to truly understand the short and long-term business impact.

We’re witnessing a massive transformation of advertising technologies. Advertisers modify their marketing strategies, adjust new ad placement approaches, and maximize ROI with new ad formats. 

Brands are no longer chaotically placing banners throughout websites. Instead, they embrace interstitials, rewarded videos, and expandable ads, achieving the desired effect without harming the user experience. 

According to a survey we conducted, brands are trying to align the revenue generation with an ad campaign stage, the device platform and core website usability. 

In three months, a wide array of ad formats, types and sizes has been analyzed, as were inspected impressions served through the platform and the way each influenced the campaign effectiveness in general.

Cross-platform ads are better ROI-makers

Here are the key findings:

• Advertisers who use different ad formats on different device platforms obtain higher ROI than those who stick only to one format and platform. For instance, displaying campaigns across mobile and desktop platforms is a tactic that elicits 20% higher ROI than serving impressions solely on a PC.

• On average, it takes two additional ad types to add to the overall ad spend to increase advertisers’ ROI by 70%.

• The massive investment in one format may eliminate the returns and cause the effectiveness of the ad campaign to decline.

• Interstitials, expandable, video, and native ads are among the best-performing ad formats, generating the highest click-through rates in 2017. They are on track to maintain that rate in 2018.

Effectiveness by format and size

Collected statistics also helped to determine the key click-through rates for the featured ad formats and define the best ad sizes that generate better views and CTRs. This way, native ads gained (10.4%), thehighest CTR among all ad formats, followed by full-screen interstitials (5-7%), video (1.7%), and expandable ads (1.2%).

Large rectangle (36*280), medium (300*250), leaderboard 728*90, half-page (300*600), and large mobile banner (320*100) sizes appear to be among most effective. However, in selecting the ad size, advertisers also based their decisions on standards applied within certain ad formats.

The geo analysis has shown that there may be significant disparities in the effectiveness rates, according to the countries where the ads were served.

Thus, the average CTR for video ads sometimes shows fluctuations. While scoring globally at 1.7%, in the Middle East, it showed the highest (5.9%) and lowest (0.3%) rates in North America during the period. The other example, the CTR rate of expandable rich media banner ads, reached peak highest rate in Latin America (1.2%) while in Australia and New Zealand, the bar sometimes was only as high as 0.1%.

Creative matters 

As ad tech matures, new formats appear on the scene, and the old ones lose their effectiveness. In order to adapt to the ever-changing ad landscape, it is essential to give the user experience to the highest priority and think ahead to what will complement website usability. Luckily, today’s publishers and advertisers can plan and analyze campaign effectiveness and apply different ad types for different campaigns using ad buying platforms.

Many more deals for mobile seem to be crucial components of overall sports rights fee deals with TV networks.

CBS just made one -- an extension of its overall NFL streaming media deal -- now running concurrently with its TV contract, which goes through 2022. This mobile deal is for airing Sunday afternoon NFL games.

NFL games shown on the broadcast network have been available to subscribers of CBS All Access, the network’s streaming video service, since December 2016 -- but not on mobile. That belonged to Verizon, which ended this past season.

CBS joins other big media companies in the mobile move extensions: ESPN for “Monday Night Football,” NBC for “Sunday Night Football” and Fox for its “Thursday Night Football” package and its Sunday games.

All this comes with an immediate positive for traditional TV viewers -- live, premium TV content is more valuable because viewers can’t fast-forward through commercials.

Still, nothing is clear cut.

For example, NFL has seen around a 10% drop in viewership of regular-season games last year. Even then, sports leagues will continue to seek even higher rights fees in future. But it isn’t only because of live TV content; it is about who they want to target.

Sports leagues on traditional linear TV networks may have had demographic issues in recent years -- older, somewhat less desirable viewers to some marketers. But research shows mobile means younger, more sought-after viewers.

Mind you, lots of other traditional TV content, when migrating to digital platforms, attracts younger viewing. I’m guessing this would include everything from CBS’ “Madame Secretary” to NBC’s “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit” to ABC’s “Dancing with the Stars.”

Still, there isn’t much overall scale here.

It’s a long-term play when TV networks can get a double whammy by going after sports content on digital platforms: High premiums for live, fast-forwarding TV content and a younger viewership.

Now the key questions: Will millennials like sports as much as baby boomers and greatest-generation viewers? Will it be enough to secure a lucrative media formula for TV advertisers?  

According to Nielsen studies, food and beverage retail is the next big sector that will feel the influence of digital shopping. 23% of U.S. shoppers bought groceries online in 2016, an increase of 20% versus just two years prior, and adoption has only accelerated since then, says the report. At this rate of growth, Nielsen and the Food Marketing Institute (FMI) estimate that Americans’ total online grocery spending will reach $100 billion between 2021 and 2023.

In order to support this growth, writes Nielsen, and address the unique challenges of online food shopping, companies are pioneering new ways of getting orders into their customers’ hands, says the report. Home delivery is currently Americans’ preferred fulfillment option, with 69% of households saying that it appeals to them in a recent Nielsen and FMI survey. But the emerging “click and collect” model (pickup from your local store or other location after placing an order online) is one to watch, says Nielsen. In fact, Millennials, who can be a leading indicator of future trends, prefer click and collect over home delivery.

Are all retailers ready to offer these consumers’ their preferred fulfillment model as Millennials’ incomes and household sizes grow? Asks the report. According to Nielsen and FMI’s survey of brick-and-mortar FMCG retailers, the answer is no. One-third of retailers surveyed indicated that they are not equipped to support click and collect. What’s more, 36% don’t have a website or mobile app that enables online purchases.

According to the report, retailers can address this gap and take advantage of the demand for click and collect by focusing on three areas: 

• Who to target, 
• What to offer them 
• Where to reach them

Today, four out of 10 online shoppers in the U.S. are using click and collect, according to Nielsen Homescan data. On average, they make a pickup trip every six months, and spend $58 per trip. Click and collect attracts a broader shopper base than online shopping in general, and it skews highest among middle-income families and consumers aged 18-44.

Nielsen Homescan data shows that, compared with all online shopping, the typical click and collect shopping basket is heavy on edibles like meat, produce, dairy and frozen foods. Dry grocery is important too: it’s included in 50% of click and collect shopping trips. 

Mass merchandisers are today’s most popular click and collect retailers, says the report, with the highest combination of online shopper penetration and sales dollars. As grocers and other retailers get in the click and collect game, they should consider implementing the model at stores in metropolitan areas, suggests the report. Nielsen Spectra mapping reveals that those locations benefit from high concentrations of nearby click and collect shoppers and are likely to deliver the best return on investment, concludes the Nielsen Click And Collect study.

For additional data and information, please visit Nielsen here.

Last week we looked at an impressive mobile point-of-sale (mPOS) forecast from Jupiter Research.

But those estimates pale in comparison to those for the broader field of mobile contactless payments.

Worldwide, the number of mobile contactless users will exceed 760 million by 2020 -- up from an estimated 440 million in 2018, Jupiter calculates.

Before the end of 2018 alone, contactless payment transactions are set to exceed $1 trillion, according to the research firm.

That encompasses every type of payment card, and mobile and wearable devices, which are increasingly becoming the norm around the world, according to research author Nitin Bhas.

Therefore, “The attendant payment infrastructure is also becoming well established,” Bhas notes in the new report. “Indeed, in markets such as Europe, contactless payments are becoming the preferred method of in-store payments.”

Around the world, contactless card payments are strongest in the Far East, China" and Europe -- accounting for 78% of global transaction volume in 2018, according to Jupiter.

Among other subcategories, pay services -- including Apple Pay, Samsung Pay and Google Pay -- will reach 450 million by 2020, per Jupiter.

Other OEM Pay users -- including the likes of Huawei Pay, Xiaomi Pay, Fitbit Pay and Garmin Pay -- will exceed 20 million by 2020.

Meanwhile, while more than 200 banks deployed HCE-wallet services in 2017, the technology is expected to drive future growth in markets around the world.