The second session of AudienceScience Summit this afternoon is a panel moderated by Quentin George, Chief Digital Officer of Mediabrands. Panelists include Dave Dickman, SVP of Digital Media Sales from Warner Bros. Television and Barbara Healy, VP of Online and Mobile Fulfillment at Tribune.
The theme of the panel was intended to address how these publishers manage their audience assets. But really the primary message I took away was that publishers are focusing on solution sells -- finding ways to sell more high margin offerings -- whatever these happen to be. I was expecting to hear more specifics about how they are working with publisher optimization solutions, or data management offerings. But it sounded instead that it was any and all efforts to create unique ad solutions, rather than just impressions.
Two points heard, one good, one bad:
1) Warner Bros talked about an alternative way to think about creative, empowering creatives to build original programming that airs on the Web and allows users to provide input into the plot and production that the program takes. This approach garnered premium sponsorship (from J&J) and helped creative resources feel a part of (and not irrelevant to) emerging media.
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