Author Archives: markpilip

Talent > Systems

Posted on Wednesday, 13 June 2018 8:47 am

“Any industry that values systems and processes over talent is an industry in decay.” Wrote Bob Hoffman today, reminding us that the adtech, martech, …aaS, and whatever other stuff we’ve cobbled into a tech stack isn’t our secret sauce. Like … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , ,

Default Power

Posted on Thursday, 5 April 2018 10:37 am

Facebook recently said that most of the 2 billion people on their platform had their personal data scraped. The reason, aside from Facebook’s appallingly sloppy controls over access to data, is defaults. Yesterday, Mark Zuckerberg admitted that most people kept … Continue reading →

Posted in Behavioral economics, Data, digital marketing, Security | Tagged , , , ,

The Forgotten Boolean NOT

Posted on Tuesday, 3 April 2018 9:02 am

I spent last week in Glasgow and London, with a UK SIM card temporarily in my phone. As part of my daily routine of checking Twitter, I learned that many social media advertisers and agencies have forgotten how to use … Continue reading →

Posted in Data, digital marketing, Direct Response, Media, Social Media Marketing, Tactics | Tagged , , , , , , ,

Were You the Same in 2014?

Facebook is pumping out a lot of spin these days. They’re trying to make us forget they ran (and continue to run) a massive, unregulated surveillance operation. They’re trying to distance themselves from Cambridge Analytica in any way possible, before … Continue reading →

Aside | Posted on Friday, 23 March 2018 8:42 am | Tagged , , , ,

Algorithms: Recipes for Disaster

Posted on Thursday, 22 March 2018 8:15 am

When we purchase digital advertising, we place our faith in the algorithms–a fancy word for “recipes”–used to determine things like the final price of the inventory, which creative is shown, and the frequency at which those impressions are shown. There’s … Continue reading →

Posted in Data, digital marketing, Education, Leadership, Media, Strategy | Tagged , , , ,

Attacking You With Retargeting

Posted on Wednesday, 21 March 2018 9:06 am

WebKit recently updated WebKit to address “An attacker seeking to track site visitors can take advantage of the user’s HSTS cache to store one bit of information on that user’s device.” in an interesting and understandable technical blog post by … Continue reading →

Posted in digital marketing, fraud, Leadership, Privacy, Security | Tagged , , , ,

Who’s Viewing Your Ads? Maybe Your IoT Security Camera.

Another day, another case of IoT security lapses. When buying digital media, you should always ask “how many humans are viewing my ads, and how can you prove it to me?” This article from Threatpost describes the extreme lack of … Continue reading →

Aside | Posted on Tuesday, 13 March 2018 1:57 pm | Tagged ,

Reduce Spend, Increase Reach? Wait, This Can’t Be Right…

P&G eliminated 20% of their most ineffective spend and generated 10% more reach, according to this article in AdWeek. Wait, that doesn’t fit the narrative about digital media. It’s all supposed to be about good, cheap media, reaching the right … Continue reading →

Aside | Posted on Monday, 5 March 2018 5:27 pm | Tagged , , ,

Programmatic: Buying or Media?

Posted on Monday, 5 March 2018 8:46 am

I’ve been asked a couple of times if I’m pro- or anti-programmatic. My answer, sometimes to the asker’s frustration, is “it depends.” Whether or not a medium works for you depends on many things. The first, and most fundamental question … Continue reading →

Posted in digital marketing, Media, Travel | Tagged , , ,

The #1 Ingredient in AdTech “Special Sauce”…

Posted on Friday, 2 March 2018 9:45 am

…is Russian dressing*. In other words, there really isn’t anything secret. Good …aaS products are good because they have good people and process. The technology is mostly generic. Takeaway: Make marketing and advertising technology decisions on people, not the algorithms. Because … Continue reading →

Posted in Leadership, Philosophy | Tagged , , ,