Retail News CRM

Tag: Advertising

  • Visual Studio Singapore Builds Regional Agency Across Four Countries

    Visual Studio Singapore Builds Regional Agency Across Four Countries

    Raymond He has expanded Visual Studio Singapore from a three-person shop into a marketing agency spanning four countries, building the business after working part-time jobs as a teenager.

    Published on Nov 8, 2026, the company now employs about 50 staff across Singapore, Indonesia, China, and the Philippines, handling experiential campaigns, spatial design, and brand installations for corporate clients.

    He founded the agency alongside partners after completing national service in Singapore, starting operations as a three-person outfit before turning it into his primary wealth-generating venture.

    Expanding From Three People to Regional Footprint

    He founded the agency alongside partners after completing national service in Singapore, starting operations as a three-person shop. The business developed from local event support into an integrated contractor handling exhibition stand fabrication, physical retail pop-ups, and commercial project management.

    Revenue produced by the business remains He’s primary asset, financing operational reinvestment alongside personal holdings in US-listed equities, index funds, payment networks, and technology firms. The company’s expansion beyond Singapore targeted high-density corporate event and retail activation hubs, where multinational brand spend increasingly demands on-the-ground project oversight.

    Operating Pressures in Asia’s Brand Display Market

    Regional agencies operating across Southeast Asia face sharp margin compression from escalating material costs, cross-border logistics tariffs, and fragmented supplier chains. Competing marketing and physical production outfits across ASEAN have consolidated workshops to counter rising labour rates in primary hubs like Singapore.

    By stationing dedicated project management teams in China and Indonesia, Visual Studio avoids reliance on third-party fabrication middlemen for overseas pop-up rollouts. The trade-off sits in overhead management: maintaining payroll across four regulatory jurisdictions leaves mid-sized agencies vulnerable whenever brand marketing budgets pull back during macroeconomic lulls.

    From Freelance Painting to Cross-Border Contracts

    He started working at age 10 by translating for his father’s freelance residential painting jobs in Singapore, later taking jobs in car polishing, dishwashing, and shopping mall security before earning a diploma in civil and structural engineering from Singapore Polytechnic.

    “My most valuable asset is my business, as it generates cash flow that supports my other investments and growth.”

    The company enters the coming fiscal year managing multi-market corporate buildouts across Southeast Asia, with client retentions in Indonesia and the Philippines serving as the operational barometer for further headcount growth.

  • ShopX Launches Global Retail Media Group Across 27 Markets

    ShopX Launches Global Retail Media Group Across 27 Markets

    ShopX has launched as a global retail media group combining Shopfully, Flipp and MEDIA CENTRAL into a unified parent organisation reaching 400 million shoppers across 27 markets, including Australia.

    The combined business employs more than 1,000 people and works with thousands of retailers and consumer packaged goods brands. While the parent entity centralises technology and scale, each of the three regional businesses continues operating under its established commercial brand.

    Led by Group Chief Executive Officer Michael Silverman and Group President and Chief Operating Officer Stefano Portu, the platform targets a USD $200 billion global retail media sector where spending remains heavily tilted toward e-commerce rather than physical checkouts.

    Consolidating Store-Led Ad Spend

    Each of the three regional businesses retains its standalone operating brand and existing commercial accounts. The parent entity pools backend engineering, measurement tools and cross-border audience data.

    Physical shops account for roughly 80 per cent of all retail transactions globally, climbing to nearly 90 per cent for fast-moving consumer goods. In Australia, Shopfully research tracks 83 per cent of shoppers researching products online before completing transactions inside brick-and-mortar stores. Connecting those digital search signals to checkouts remains a central operational hurdle for consumer goods suppliers.

    Global retail media ad spending has reached USD 200 billion, though brands spend most of that capital across e-commerce marketplaces rather than physical storefronts. ShopX aims to capture those budgets by aggregating multi-retailer inventory instead of forcing advertisers to negotiate separate data-sharing agreements with individual supermarket operators.

    Management and Platform Integration

    Group Chief Executive Officer Michael Silverman leads the executive board alongside Group President and Chief Operating Officer Stefano Portu. Jaclyn Welsh serves as Group Chief Financial Officer, while Ingo Wienand retains his position as Chief Executive Officer of MEDIA CENTRAL alongside a board seat at the parent group.

    Aggregators provide consumer brands with scale across catalogue apps, publisher networks and digital circulars that single supermarket operators struggle to replicate independently. The risk sits in data verification, because closed-loop attribution for physical checkouts requires point-of-sale integration that supermarket chains guard closely.

    The Race for Off-Platform Budgets

    Major grocery operators run proprietary retail media units to monetize their first-party loyalty card records. Intermediaries like ShopX offer an alternative channel for mid-tier retailers that lack the software budgets required to build bespoke ad networks.

    Consolidation has driven the company’s expansion to date, with the constituent businesses completing 10 acquisitions prior to unifying under the ShopX umbrella.

    Stefano Portu, Group President & Chief Operating Officer, ShopX, said: “What we have built so far is the starting point. Most shopping still happens in stores, and most of it is invisible to the brands that pay to influence it. At ShopX, we are here to change that by connecting shoppers, retailers, brands, and publishers around physical retail.”

    Expansion Targets

    The operating units previously built independent footprints, including in Australia, through digital catalogue syndication. Unifying them allows global brand manufacturers to run single international advertising campaigns across shared retail networks.

    Management plans to deploy fresh capital into attribution software, enter additional geographic markets and target further acquisitions to absorb fragmented local promotional platforms.

  • ByteDance’s PineDrama Enters Top 10 Free iPhone App Charts in Three Countries

    ByteDance’s PineDrama Enters Top 10 Free iPhone App Charts in Three Countries

    ByteDance has taken PineDrama, its overseas short-drama platform, into the top 10 on the iPhone free-app charts in the United States, Brazil, and Thailand, according to a report by Jiemian News published in October 2026.

    Operated independently by a dedicated team inside TikTok’s business division rather than by the group behind Hongguo Short Drama, the application has maintained steady download momentum since its rollout.

    Unlike competing services such as ReelShort and DramaBox that depend on paywalls and micro-transactions, PineDrama adopts the completely free-to-watch ad-monetized structure pioneered by Hongguo Short Drama, capitalizing directly on TikTok traffic to bypass expensive third-party user acquisition.

    Cutting Out the Paywall

    Unlike established overseas short-drama platforms such as ReelShort and DramaBox, which rely on paid viewing models, PineDrama has adopted the free-to-watch approach used by Hongguo Short Drama, monetizing its content through advertising.

    TikTok’s traffic gives PineDrama direct access to a large audience, while its competitors rely more heavily on paid user acquisition through third-party platforms. This creates a gap in user acquisition costs and efficiency.

    Drawing From Online Fiction IP

    Content is another key advantage. Most of PineDrama’s short-drama producers currently come from China, and many have experience operating on Hongguo, Douyin, or TikTok. Meanwhile, the platform is also working to attract local overseas producers and expand its supply of original content.

    ByteDance’s ecosystem also offers a relatively mature IP partnership model. Producers can obtain licenses from the platform’s content library or distribute original scripts independently. For production teams, established cooperation procedures can reduce the time and effort required to negotiate individual deals.

    According to one producer, around 70% to 80% of the IP used in the AI-generated animated dramas made by their team comes from Tomato Novel, ByteDance’s online fiction platform. Compared with relying entirely on original scripts, established IP can reduce uncertainty in content selection. The platform’s tiered authorization system also gives producers a pathway to move from promising titles to premium IP.

    When traffic, IP resources, and production capabilities form a closed loop, ByteDance is building more than just a short-drama app. It is creating an integrated system for content production and distribution.

    The Margin Squeeze on Third Parties

    At the same time, intensifying competition in China’s short-drama market is pushing more production teams to seek growth opportunities overseas.

    One producer noted that computing power accounts for a significant share of AI-drama production costs in China, while paid traffic acquisition also requires substantial investment. On TikTok and PineDrama, some productions can attract considerable viewership without additional spending on promotion, and overseas revenue-sharing returns can be more attractive.

    However, the revenue figures cited by individual producers reflect specific experiences and should not be taken as representative of the industry as a whole.

    From its free viewing model and IP partnerships to its global content strategy, PineDrama is extending the short-drama ecosystem advantages ByteDance has developed in China to international markets.

    The key question going forward is not simply how many downloads the platform can generate, but whether it can consistently produce hit titles and build a sustainable content supply chain and monetization model overseas.

  • FamilyMart Hires Lady Gaga for Nationwide Japan Recruitment Drive

    FamilyMart Hires Lady Gaga for Nationwide Japan Recruitment Drive

    FamilyMart launched a nationwide recruitment campaign featuring Lady Gaga across Japan on September 25, marking the convenience store chain’s 45th anniversary. The promotional push runs across approximately 11,600 stores equipped with the chain’s in-store digital network, FamilyMart TV.

    The television commercial features the American pop singer styled in an outfit inspired by the retailer’s store uniform and signature striped socks, demonstrating daily store duties in a monochrome setting. FamilyMart is pairing the broadcast spot with exclusive interview segments on its internal digital signage network, where Gaga discusses convenience store work and workplace individuality.

    Screen network and store reach

    FamilyMart is utilizing its proprietary FamilyMart TV network to deliver the recruitment messaging directly to shoppers and prospective store employees at the point of sale. Deploying the video content across 11,600 outlets gives the chain immediate nationwide reach inside high-footfall metropolitan hubs and regional locations alike.

    Using in-store retail media for human resources and brand positioning turns standard customer checkouts into direct recruitment channels. Convenience chains throughout East Asia increasingly use digital signage networks to promote private-label merchandise, app downloads and staffing needs to the same foot-traffic base.

    Changing the convenience store workforce

    Convenience store operators across Japan face severe labor shortages caused by demographic contraction, forcing chains to rethink shift structures, store automation and recruitment appeals. FamilyMart has framed this campaign around attracting workers who want a flexible workplace where staff can embrace individuality.

    Rival operators Seven-Eleven Japan and Lawson have responded to the same demographic headwind by expanding self-checkout kiosks, testing automated night operations and loosening traditional dress codes. For franchisees, staffing stability remains the single largest operational expense and risk to maintaining 24-hour schedules.

    Design push follows Azabudai Hills flagship

    The campaign follows a string of design-oriented branding projects by FamilyMart. In July, the operator opened a flagship store directed by fashion designer Nigo at Tokyo’s Azabudai Hills complex, showing updated apparel lines and experimental retail layouts.

    Pairing high-profile cultural partnerships with core convenience operations shows FamilyMart attempting to elevate its brand equity above routine neighborhood commerce. That strategy supports its Convenience Wear private-label apparel business, which has turned everyday items like socks and basic garments into high-margin revenue drivers across its domestic estate.

    What to watch in Japanese retail labor

    Japan’s convenience store sector continues to measure recruitment yield against rising minimum wage adjustments across prefectures. Operator disclosures in upcoming quarterly earnings will show whether digital recruitment pushes translate into lower franchisee turnover or reduced store operating costs as competition for frontline staff intensifies.

  • McDonald’s Australia Removes TV Ad for Breaching Child Targeting Standards

    McDonald’s Australia Removes TV Ad for Breaching Child Targeting Standards

    McDonald’s Australia has removed a television advertisement promoting its Birdie’s Brekkie Meal after regulators found it breached advertising standards for targeting children.

    In October 2026, the Ad Standards Community Panel upheld complaints against the campaign, ruling that its cartoon animations, bright colours, and catchy song held significant appeal for younger viewers.

    Nostalgia Defence Fails Watchdog Review

    McDonald’s defended the creative by arguing the ad featured adult settings without children and was only placed in broadcast slots where predicted child viewership did not exceed 25 per cent.

    In formal submissions to the watchdog, the chain said the ad featured adult work settings such as construction sites, offices, and morning commutes. Media buys excluded time slots where children under 15 made up 25 per cent or more of the forecast audience. The company also argued packaging used a retro diner format rather than a Happy Meal toy or children’s incentive.

    Regulators rejected those arguments after reviewing viewer complaints. The panel found the product failed to meet the Food Standards Australia Nutrient Profile Scoring Criteria for healthy classification. That categorised it as an occasional food.

    Animation and Colour Palette Scrutinised

    Panel members found the creative execution overpowered the adult broadcast placement. The commercial showed Birdie flying across real-world backdrops. Urban streets turned into animated cartoon sequences, and Birdie steered a flying commuter bus into a drive-thru.

    A vibrant palette, cartoon sound effects, a theme song, and visuals like a pink blended beverage created strong appeal for minors. Viewers also reported seeing the broadcast during standard dinner hours. That increased child viewership beyond baseline projections.

    Children would naturally respond to the cartoon format and meal presentation even without recognising the legacy character, the watchdog concluded.

    Fast-Food Marketing Under Regional Pressure

    Fast-food chains across Asia-Pacific face tightening boundaries on how animated mascots and legacy intellectual property appear on television and social media. Retro characters carry operational risk when watchdogs assess visual appeal separately from target demographics.

    The ruling sets a strict precedent for quick-service operators and creative agencies. Nostalgia campaigns using cartoon animation will struggle before advertising review boards if the food fails standard nutrient profiling models, even without toys included.

    Repeated Regulatory Setbacks in Australia

    This breakfast ad withdrawal follows a separate ruling against McDonald’s in August. Ad Standards forced the chain then to amend television and digital commercials promoting its McDelivery service after finding the campaign misleading.

    McDonald’s accepted the breakfast ruling and withdrew the commercial from broadcast networks across Australia. The company confirmed it will maintain compliance with Australian Association of National Advertisers codes across active campaigns.

  • Taiwan Launches Singapore Transit Campaign to Drive Repeat Tourism

    Taiwan Launches Singapore Transit Campaign to Drive Repeat Tourism

    Taiwan Tourism Administration launched an outdoor advertising campaign across Singapore’s transit network on September 22. It targets repeat visitors after logging 1.35 million trips from the city-state between 2023 and 2025.

    Branded wraps and station takeovers cover public buses, taxis, and Mass Rapid Transit stations under the theme Taiwan 100 Ways.

    Singapore-born illustrator Tiffany Lovage designed the artwork. Visuals group activities under three categories: ecology, lifestyle of health and sustainability, and food. Featured itineraries highlight surfing, diving, hot-air ballooning, and trips on the Taiwan Railway Administration’s Haifeng and Shanlan scenic tourist trains.

    Targeting Repeat Travellers Beyond Taipei

    Officials are steering the campaign toward central and southern destinations instead of northern urban hubs. Singapore residents who visited Taiwan in the past three years can claim targeted incentives.

    Commuter ads connect to an online travel personality quiz and a prize lottery for return flights and merchandise. Travellers register through a dedicated portal to enter.

    Transit Media Strategy in Singapore

    Regional tourism offices across Asia-Pacific are channeling media spend into high-frequency commuter corridors. Singapore ranks among Southeast Asia’s highest-spending outbound leisure travel markets per capita.

    Funneling passengers toward regional services like the Haifeng and Shanlan lines channels spend into local rail operators, regional hospitality providers, and suburban retail corridors. The strategy eases crowding in Taipei while supporting regional small businesses.

    Outbound Demand Trends

    Passenger traffic between Singapore and Taiwan grew steadily through 2024 and 2025 to reach the 1.35 million cumulative total cited by the agency. Direct flights and visa-free access continue to drive frequent return visits.

    Campaign placements will run across transport networks through the fourth quarter as destination marketers compete for year-end holiday bookings.

  • The Warehouse Starts Turnaround Push Across 84 New Zealand Stores

    The Warehouse Starts Turnaround Push Across 84 New Zealand Stores

    The Warehouse rolled out a nationwide brand campaign across 84 stores in New Zealand on August 23, targeting market leadership through an operational turnaround.

    Created with advertising agency TBWA New Zealand, the campaign runs under the banner This Is Warehouse Country across television, digital channels, social media, outdoor billboards, and in-store displays.

    Rebuilding Market Position

    The push anchors a broader transformation program at the discount department store group. Content in the campaign draws on four decades of customer milestones and household memories to rebuild foot traffic and loyalty across the store network.

    Trading conditions across Australasia have forced discount operators to defend value credentials as supermarket chains and global online platforms squeeze general merchandise margins. The Warehouse previously relied on category expansion and price promotions to protect market share, but the latest shift centers on core brand equity.

    Execution Across Network

    All 84 branches are participating in the rollout, aligning physical merchandising with national broadcast assets. The group continues to recalibrate its wider store fleet and merchandising mix under the ongoing restructuring plan.

  • ANA Introduces Framework to Standardise Retail Media Measurement

    ANA Introduces Framework to Standardise Retail Media Measurement

    The Association of National Advertisers (ANA) has unveiled a new framework designed to tackle measurement challenges within the rapidly expanding retail media sector. This initiative comes as over US$100 billion is now invested globally in commerce media, with retail media networks struggling to provide consistent and comparable performance metrics across platforms.

    The ANA’s Retail Media Measurement Standardization report proposes a path towards a unified measurement ecosystem. It advocates for common standards across diverse retail media networks, increased transparency in performance calculations, and a greater reliance on independent third-party measurement providers. Leading brands, including PepsiCo, Hershey’s, Clorox, Kimberly-Clark, Mondelez, Bayer, and Intel, contributed to the framework’s development through the ANA’s Retail Media Working Group.

    Addressing Fragmentation in Retail Media

    Retail media has become one of the fastest-growing segments in the media mix, attracting significant brand investment. However, the fragmented nature of the ecosystem makes it difficult for marketers to compare the effectiveness of their spending across different platforms. This new framework seeks to establish a foundational measurement standard, allowing brands to better understand what truly drives results and to optimise their media strategies more effectively.

    For retailers and brands operating in Asia-Pacific, where e-commerce and digital retail media are also experiencing explosive growth, standardisation is crucial. As platforms like Lazada, Shopee, and regional supermarket chains expand their advertising offerings, consistent measurement practices would enable brands to allocate budgets more strategically and demonstrate clear returns on investment across diverse Asian markets. This move by the ANA provides a potential blueprint for similar efforts in the region, helping to mature the retail media landscape.

    Call For Transparency And Independent Verification

    The framework highlights three key areas for improvement: the establishment of common measurement standards that all retail media networks can adopt, enhanced transparency regarding how performance metrics are calculated and presented, and a wider acceptance and use of independent third-party measurement solutions. These recommendations aim to instill greater confidence among advertisers and foster healthier competition within the retail media space.

  • Australian Retail Media Growth Needs Surgical Approach, Not Broad Strokes

    Australian Retail Media Growth Needs Surgical Approach, Not Broad Strokes

    Australian retailers and brands are being urged to adopt a more precise, data-driven approach to retail media, moving away from traditional broad-stroke advertising. Experts from Omnicom and Flywheel Australia highlight that significant growth in the Australian market is often missed by conventional spending, which fails to identify specific products, shopper segments, and critical moments that drive compounding sales.

    According to Mohammad Heidari Far, Managing Director of Flywheel Australia, the unit of precision required for effective retail media is much smaller than most current strategies allow. He emphasizes that treating diverse shopper groups, such as grocery, marketplace, and quick commerce customers, as a single audience is a misstep. Instead, surgical growth begins with identifying the initial product a customer buys, as this ‘point of market entry’ can predict their long-term value (CLTV) to the brand portfolio.

    Targeting Hidden Growth Pockets

    This refined approach relies on connecting product-level purchase data directly to a customer’s identity, transforming targeting from probabilistic guesswork into a near-deterministic process. An example cited involves a consumer health group with two related brands. Cross-purchase analysis revealed that 24 per cent of new-to-brand customers for the first brand bought a product from the second brand within three months, often on a different day, showing a sequential path that a single-brand view would not typically detect.

    Such insights allow brands to deliberately engineer customer journeys rather than leaving them to chance. Other insights reveal that shoppers who convert more than a day after seeing an advertisement tend to have larger basket sizes, indicating that plans solely focused on same-day returns may undervalue their most valuable customers.

    using Data and Automation

    In Australia, precision data access varies significantly. While Amazon offers self-service access to product and customer signals, similar insights from other major retailers typically require collaboration with their internal media teams, introducing potential delays and interpretation layers. Far suggests that brands should utilize mature environments like Amazon to develop frameworks and ‘muscle memory’ for precise targeting, preparing them to exploit similar capabilities as other retail media networks in the region evolve.

    Managing thousands of micro-segments manually would be overwhelming, so automation is key. Flywheel Commerce Cloud provides a standardized layer that handles repeatable decisions, freeing human teams to focus on critical judgement calls, such as identifying key ‘front door’ products or strategic cross-brand paths to fund. This blend of automation and human insight proved effective for the consumer health brand, which re-sequenced its plan around these signals for a major sales event. By retargeting first-brand buyers with the second brand at opportune moments and applying negative targeting at pharmacy retailers to ensure incremental sales, the brand saw new-to-brand sales rise by 47 per cent and return on ad spend more than doubled year-on-year. This precision also led to a fall in cost per click during peak trading due to hour-by-hour bidding adjustments.

    The Australian retail market is highly concentrated, with five major retailers commanding roughly a third of all sales. In this environment, brands that can surgically identify and pursue growth opportunities will gain a competitive edge over those with broader, less targeted spending. The focus shifts from simply measuring sales volume to understanding customer entry points that can build sustained growth over several years.

    Retailers across the Asia-Pacific region, many of whom are developing their own retail media networks, could benefit from similar data-driven strategies. As e-commerce penetration and digital advertising grow across markets like Southeast Asia and India, the ability to turn broad customer data into actionable, surgical campaigns will be a crucial differentiator for brands seeking to optimize their marketing spend and deepen customer relationships.

  • Apple stops advertising on “X” again

    Apple stops advertising on “X” again

    Citing its sources, Axios says that Apple has stopped advertising on the platform for the second time since Elon Musk purchased Twitter. This time the decision to stop spending ad money on what is now known as “X” came after Musk endorsed an antisemitic conspiracy theory that was posted on the site. 164 Jewish rabbis and activists demanded that companies like Apple, Google, Amazon, and Disney stop advertising on “X”.

    Apple, a major advertiser on “X,” has joined IBM, Disney, Sony, Warner Bros. Discovery, Lionsgate, and Paramount Global. A report by Media Matters for America says that certain advertisers, including Apple, IBM, Amazon and Oracle, had their ads on “X” placed next to posts considered to be from far-right subscribers.

    In response to a post on “X” that claimed Jewish communities support “dialectical hatred against whites,” Musk replied, “[y]ou have said the actual truth,” The comment by Musk drew a rebuke from the White House. White House spokesperson Andrew Bates said, “It is unacceptable to repeat the hideous lie behind the most fatal act of Antisemitism in American history at any time, let alone one month after the deadliest day for the Jewish people since the Holocaust.”

    “X” CEO Linda Yaccarino responded to the criticism via a tweet in which she wrote, “X’s point of view has always been very clear that discrimination by everyone should STOP across the board — I think that’s something we can and should all agree on. Regarding this platform — X has also been extremely clear about our efforts to combat antisemitism and discrimination. There’s no place for it anywhere in the world — it’s ugly and wrong. Full stop.”

    Musk purchased Twitter last year paying $44 billion for the social media platform. After changing the name of the site from Twitter to “X,” the multi-billionaire revealed plans to turn “X” into a multi-functional “super app” like China’s WeChat which offers social media capabilities along with mobile payment features. But if “X” is unable to keep some of its high-spending advertisers, it will need to find some new sources of income besides X Premium.

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  • Deliveroo Launches New Advertising Platform

    Deliveroo Launches New Advertising Platform

    Deliveroo today announced the launch of its new advertising platform, Deliveroo Media and Ecommerce, in Hong Kong. From now, brands will be able to advertise to Deliveroo customers with relevant offers across its app, on Deliveroo’s website and as part of social media, email and push notification campaigns.

    For the first time, advertising is planned for Deliveroo’s order tracker page, with new formats to launch over the coming months, alongside sponsored search listings.

    Currently Deliveroo partners are able to make use of Deliveroo’s advertising services, with sponsored positioning for restaurant or grocery partners for example. The new advertising platform means consumer FMCG brands will be able to advertise to millions of highly engaged Deliveroo customers.

    Deliveroo’s network of delivery-only ‘Editions’ kitchens and rapid grocery delivery ‘HOP’ stores are also part of Deliveroo’s new advertising proposition, enabling brands to get relevant content or samples into consumers’ hands as their meals and groceries are delivered to their door. 

    Nick Price, Interim General Manager of Deliveroo Hong Kong, said “Deliveroo has over seven million monthly active consumers globally, so we have an engaged and valuable audience for brands to connect with. Our new advertising platform will enable restaurant and grocery partners to tell their story emotionally and effectively whilst ensuring Deliveroo customers continue to receive a food-first experience. Done in the right way, both of our advertising activities can improve the customer experience by helping consumers to discover content they want in an engaging way, as well as helping merchants to drive incremental demand.”

    Advertising on Deliveroo will include partnerships with restaurant partners as well as FMCG companies. This will be done in a way that is mindful of the consumer experience, which is Deliveroo’s priority. Consumers will continue to receive a food-first experience in-app and Deliveroo intends to provide more space to enable restaurant and grocery partners to tell their story emotionally and effectively to Deliveroo consumers via the platform. The advertising solutions will sit within this context.

    With a food delivery marketplace in 10 markets, and with over 162,000 restaurants and 20,000 grocers on the platform, Deliveroo Media and Ecommerce is well positioned to connect brands with over seven million monthly active consumers.

    Deliveroo Media and Ecommerce was launched in the UK last Summer and has made an encouraging start, with advertising revenue reaching an annualised run-rate of £55 million or 0.8% of GTV in Q2 2023, reflecting that this is an effective way for merchants to drive incremental demand. Some of the popular brands that successfully utilised the advertising platform in the UK include Coca-Cola, Unilever, Reckitt and PepsiCo.

    Deliveroo is working with Criteo, the Commerce Media company, who will supply the advertising technology and media sales services.

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  • Vietnamese tired of advertisements popping up online

    Vietnamese tired of advertisements popping up online

    Vietnamese Internet users find online advertisements tiresome and do not want to watch them, a survey by YouGov has found. In a poll of 2,429 digital users, last December the British online market research and data analytics firm found that 47 percent of respondents always skip or want to skip online ads and 43 percent find the ads “annoying.”

    Only 25 percent said they are “interesting.”

    Thue Quist Thomasen, CEO of YouGov Vietnam, said: “Our survey also shows that even though most people remember seeing online ads, they are significantly less likely to recall clicking on ads or buying products after seeing ads.

    “In my view, the online marketing industry in Vietnam is largely, and fairly, preoccupied with tracking ad frauds and viewability. But marketers often pay insufficient attention to the metrics that truly matter, such as impact and quality, which are the key elements that drive advertising success.”

    Soames Hines, CEO of Ogilvy Vietnam, one of Vietnam’s largest creative agencies, said:”The survey’s results confirm what I have been thinking about digital advertising in Vietnam: There are so many ads nowadays that it’s hard for scattered branded banners to be effective across different websites.

    “What brands want are great campaigns that win the hearts and minds of consumers. Tiny banners and seemingly haphazard five-second videos just won’t be enough for brands to get what they want.”

    With 21.5 percent average annual growth in 2020-25 digital advertising in Vietnam is a booming business, according to the ‘Vietnam Digital Marketing Trends’ report released last year by digital marketing firm Novaon Ads.

    Advertisers are expected to spend $934 million on digital advertising in 2022, according to Statista, a German company specializing in market and consumer data.

    Vietnam has among the highest number of Internet users in the Asia Pacific. According to Statista, as of January 2021 the country of 96 million had around69 million Internet users.

    “Advertisers are often too focused on delivering ads as efficiently as possible while forgetting about the creative aspect of digital advertising,” Carl Söderblom, vice president of operations & business development at Swedish company Adnami, said.

    “This, in turn, results in low impact, ineffective ads. With high-impact ads, advertisers can … ensure they… are effective at driving results as well.”

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  • Samsung starts removing advertisements from its first-party apps

    Samsung starts removing advertisements from its first-party apps

    Samsung has started removing ads from its first-party apps. The company held a ‘town hall meeting’ back in August at which time we quoted Samsung’s mobile chief TM Roh who said, “We decided to delete ads from basic apps such as Weather, Samsung Pay, and Samsung Themes.” Samsung eventually released an official statement confirming the removal of the ads.

    The new versions of these apps sans advertisements were first spotted by Samsung customers in South Korea who posted the news in the company’s Community Forum. A comment from a Samsung executive announced that the ads were removed from the Health app on October 1st. The executive said, “This is the Samsung Health Operation Manager. Please note that the banner at the top of the Samsung Health app will not be provided from October 1.

    Even though Samsung has only confirmed that it was removing ads from the aforementioned first-party apps in its home country of South Korea, U.S. users have also seen ads disappear from these apps as well. Banner ads have been removed from Samsung Pay, the previously mentioned Health app (which used to show advertisements for Samsung’s line of smartwatches along with workout tips), and the Weather and Theme apps. For example, the Weather app has replaced the banner ads it used to show at the top of the screen with the temperature and forecast.

    It should be pointed out that while the banner ads are no longer seen on the Samsung Pay app, there is still a “Featured section” that includes offers. But that is in line with the app’s use as a mobile payment system. If the ads do not disappear from the first-party apps on your Samsung handset, you might need to “force stop” them to remove them from these apps.

    To force stop the app on your Samsung device, go to Settings > Apps and scroll to find the name of the app that you want to stop. Tap on the name of the app and tap on “Force stop” located in the bottom right corner. A pop-up menu will appear stating that if you stop the app, errors could occur. Tap on “OK.” Reopen the app and the ads should be gone.

    Samsung is not the only smartphone manufacture to include ads. Xiaomi and Oppo are two such companies to include them with their UI. But Samsung was hearing from customers who didn’t want to shell out $1,800 for a premium phone like the Galaxy Z Fold 3 only to feel that Samsung was trying to convince them to spend more money on their products. The removal of the ads is taking place via a server-side update which means you should not expect a new update to be sent your way OTA.

    While Samsung offers other first-party apps, the firm has yet to announce that ads will be dropped from these titles as well. Still, it would be a good look for Samsung if it were to finish the job and offer all of its own apps without ads on a global basis. Some Samsung customers also noted how cluttered first-party apps look with the ads included.

    At the time Samsung announced back in August its plan to drop the ads from the four basic first-party apps, the company said, “Our priority is to deliver innovative mobile experiences for our consumers based on their needs and wants. We value feedback from our users and continue our commitment to provide them with the best possible experience from our Galaxy products and services.”

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  • McDonald’s hit with breach of advertising rules over Instagram mix-up

    McDonald’s hit with breach of advertising rules over Instagram mix-up

    Ad Standards has found that McDonald’s Australia breached rules for distinguishable advertising, as set out in the Australian Association of National Advertisers (AANA) Code of Ethics, Section 2.7.

    The breach occurred in an Instagram post by @southaussiewithcosi, which featured a man, woman and two children in matching McDonald’s pyjamas and holding McDelivery bags. Andrew ‘Cosi’ Costello, who fronts the Instagram account, is also a co-host of SAFM’s breakfast show on the Hit Network in Adelaide.

    The post, which has since been deleted, had the following caption: “Verified @maccas_sa have been serving South Australians for 50 years. How cool is that? Tonight we are celebrating their birthday with delivery and my girls are wearing the @peteralexanderofficial limited edition maccas PJ’s”.

    In one of the complaints submitted to Ad Standards’ community panel, it was noted that it was unclear whether it was a sponsored post or not as it did not contain the hashtags #ad or #sponsored.

    In McDonald’s initial response, the company argued that the code was not applicable in this case as the products provided were gifts, and there was no formal agreement with @southaussiewithcosi to post on social media.

    In its response, McDonald’s said: “McDonald’s has a partnership with SAFM, which is a commercial radio station that broadcasts to Adelaide. McDonald’s gifted the products as a gesture of goodwill and to support SAFM. The talent in question is part of the breakfast radio crew with SAFM and has his own personal brand/TV show called ‘South Aussie with Cosi’. McDonald’s does not have any commercial relationship with “South Aussie with Cosi” or the talent directly. As such the content posted on the account ‘South Aussie with Cosi’ is entirely outside of the McDonald’s reasonable control.”

    McDonald’s continued: “Unlike the previous cases that the panel has determined, in the current case it is not reasonable to assume that the motivation to provide free products is that they will post about the products or otherwise draw the attention of their followers to the brand given that McDonald’s does not have any affiliation with ‘South Aussie with Cosi’”.

    McDonald’s also highlighted that if the post was found to be advertising, it was distinguishable as another brand is mentioned, the caption refers to McDonald’s delivery service and 50th-anniversary celebrations, and both the products and label on the products are clearly visible.

    A majority of the panel found the post did meet the definition of advertising as while the advertiser did not have direct editorial control over the post, “the influencer was motivated to publish positive content about his employer’s sponsor, and in the context of the relationship would not, for example, have posted similarly about a competitor to the employer’s sponsor”.

    The panel further found that tagging the brand in the caption was not sufficient to distinguish the post as advertising, as per its Practice Note for the Code. The post needed to be clear, obvious, and upfront as sponsored content.

    McDonald’s responded to the finding: “McDonald’s takes its responsibility as an advertiser seriously. We are disappointed with the outcome of the complaint, however, we respect the final decision from the panel. We have communicated with the influencer, and the influencer has agreed to remove the post.”

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  • The rise of location-based advertising in a digitalized world

    The rise of location-based advertising in a digitalized world

    With the rise of IoT and connected devices as companies innovate to drive profitable growth, location data is becoming an increasingly important asset across myriad industries such as retail and logistics, where consumers are reached out to based on location data to create enhanced customer experiences.

    Compounded by the pandemic, there has been a widespread interest in harnessing location data as countries fight to contain the spread of the virus through contact tracing. In many countries worldwide, telecom operators have been sharing aggregated location data with the health authorities to help them access the effectiveness of prevailing measures. Countries such as China and South Korea are even using mobile data locations to track the location of quarantined individuals.

    Dubbed the backbone of connectivity across industries during this pandemic, the telecommunications industry has been witnessing heightened traffic and has amassed vast location data that can add real value internally and externally in a digitalized world.

    Globally, the location-based services market in APAC will experience the highest growth in the coming years. Of which, location-based advertising (LBA) accounts for a large part of this market across all regions.

    According to the Location Based Marketing Association (LBMA), the public’s perception of location data now goes beyond selling to include raising public health awareness as governments rely on location data during this pandemic. In Asia-Pacific (APAC) for instance, 79% of surveyed companies viewed location-based services ad targeting data as valuable. Of the location-based technologies, APAC utilized Bluetooth technology the most, followed by beacon technologies, Wi-Fi and GPS.

    As e-commerce is beginning to replace more brick-and-mortar, and as we’re recording an increase in smartphone penetration along with a more robust app landscape as businesses embrace digital transformation, the location-based market will continue to note an upward trend.

    The popularity of social media by consumers has also contributed to LBS across all industries in recent years. In the retail industry, for instance, geofencing has been a popular marketing strategy to drive customer loyalty through mobile apps. Businesses can present ads, promotions and coupons based on where their consumers are geographically located.

    With the rapid digitalization across business verticals, progressive businesses are recognizing the increased value of combining both location and timing to support more advanced marketing strategies and new market opportunities, utilizing real-time location-based marketing to effectively reach out to consumers. According to Research and Market, the global LBA market is expected to reach US$163.5 billion by 2026, representing a CAGR of 18% between 2020 and 2026.

    Location-based marketing outperforms traditional marketing methods. In a saturated or highly competitive market, for instance, operators can leverage real-time messaging to upsell or cross-sell products or services, sending promotional messages to subscribers when they are near or enter a specific store. Using geo-targeting, well-timed advertising campaigns not only facilitates enhanced service delivery but also yields higher conversions, greater success and ultimately, maximum return on investments. This is also one way to drive consumers away from competition to gain a larger market share.

    With plans to scale as digital services become more intertwined in our lives than ever before, Uberall recently announced an acquisition of a location marketing company in the US to further scale its businesses.

    Driven by the same agenda, Telenor Pakistan announced a partnership with Starcom earlier this month to monetize postpaid and prepaid customers’ data using location-based marketing. Currently, Pakistan does not have a data protection law.

    Location-based advertising is effective throughout a consumer’s journey, from purchase, to engagement and retention. Needless to say, location is just one factor, albeit an important one. Augmenting location with human-centric data, such as consumption patterns, comes into play in advanced analytics to tailor personalized services experiences.

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