Articles by: "Sarah Hartland, Marketing Manager – Lineup Systems"

Reducing subscription churn is critical for advertising revenue

September 22, 2020 Sarah Hartland, Marketing Manager – Lineup Systems

The deluge of advertisement and subscription offerings can lead to rampant reader fatigue. In this digital age, subscription churn presents an ongoing problem for media companies. Benchmarks place the media and entertainment industry near the middle of churn averages, between 5-6%.

So, it’s no surprise churn is a big topic of conversation. However, what is less often discussed is the impact churn reduction strategies have on advertising revenue. Spoiler: Yes, they have a massive impact.

We’ve said before that subscription and advertising-based revenue models are the future of media. Unfortunately, though, some companies continue to underestimate the effect of subscription churn on advertising revenue and overall company value.

Understanding how these revenue models support one another empowers better decision making, presents opportunities for data sharing and cost reduction, and just generally improves performance. It all boils down to leveraging subscriptions data in your advertising sales and prioritizing churn reduction strategies that improve ad performance.

Modern ad sales boosted by solid subscriptions data

Ryan Holmes, Chairman and Co-Founder at HootSuite, points out that the average American consumer has seen a massive increase in daily advertisement exposure. In fact, since the 1970s, “that number has increased by a factor of 10 to upward of 5,000 ads per day.”

Highly engaged audiences are inherently valuable to brands. This is particularly true when compared with risky ad placements on social media, which can end up alongside fake news, or worse. These inundated audiences around the world require far more specialized, contextual advertising to build long-standing relationships with trusted brands.

At Lineup, we’ve long advocated for audience-based ad sales. But where does the best audience data come from? Subscriptions! Thus, when an advertising team can leverage subscriber data, particularly from loyal, long term subscribers, more effective strategies can be employed to target campaigns and better activate key audiences.

Customer data platform, Blue Conic suggests that most brands don’t actually leverage the power of this kind of first-party data to their full advantage: “Less than 5% of marketers say they’ve yet to realize 80% or more of the potential of their first-party data. They include information provided by their audience in some facets of their marketing but have yet to realize the desired ROI from the source.”

Effective churn reduction strategies impact advertising

Applying successful churn reduction strategies obviously benefits the subscription team with stronger retention rates to improve overall revenue growth for a company. However, successful reduction strategies also improve the impact of advertising revenue.

Prioritize personal experiences

Personalized subscriptions and ads are likely to mutually benefit each other. For example, subscriber data that builds stronger reader profiles and return-rates can, in turn, enable advertising teams to offer more insightful contextual targeting to a captive audience.

Successful advertising requires engaged audiences who trust the publisher’s content and return often. The act of subscribing indicates the difference between a casual web visitor and a true, returning, reader. And advertisers are eager to get in front of those eyeballs whenever possible.

In 2019, data management platform Cxense demonstrated this in the global market. Online marketing team members of major Danish advertiser Nordjyske Medier successfully leveraged personalized customer data to increase “click-through rates by 300 percent on average — while digital subscriptions grew by 50 percent in the same period.”

Personalized experiences are critical for turning casual web visitors into subscribers (whether paid or free). They are also essential for turning those subscribers into a fully monetized audience.

Build loyal audiences

If personalized experiences convert visitors to subscribers, the next step is ensuring those new subscribers stick around long enough to impact your bottom line. An individualized customer experience on both ends of subscription and advertising content creates deeper connections with audiences, making them likely to remain loyal to brands in the long term.

A loyal audience base attracts marketers because these kinds of audiences prove to be more responsive. Twenty years ago, many companies did not have the digital resources to so carefully segment, track, and individualize content for key audience groups in a relationship between subscriptions and advertisements.

But now, brands that can leverage cross-functional strategies and shared data insights to their advantage can build even greater loyalty to their high-quality content and ethical, reliable journalism. This approach builds strength across departments within media businesses so that everyone from audience teams to editorial teams has a basic understanding of marketing principles and can contribute meaningfully to the strength of your brand.

The result? Readers transform into brand advocates!

(Of course, systems like Amplio can strengthen brand loyalty by leveraging subscription data to the benefit of interested marketing teams.)

Understand why readers leave

When you understand the reasons readers cancel subscriptions, you’re also more likely to pick up on parallel reasons the same readers don’t interact with ads. It’s time to stop guessing why readers leave and start asking. Like many of the other benefits we’ve discussed so far, taking this integrated approach to discovery can benefit all teams and departments towards achieving collective company goals.

A solid approach to identifying at-risk subscribers is not only a marketing strategy, it’s equally critical for the success of your advertising sales team.

One goal, two revenue streams

Reducing subscription churn empowers you to focus on collecting better data from existing, long-term customers to the distinct benefit of advertising revenue. This approach can move a company from focusing merely on impressions, to actual impact.

Companies that retain more subscribers spend less time and resources strategizing against losses — as many businesses have had to do in the last year. Instead, they will be energized to use those resources for improved subscriptions and visibility to marketers.

Advertising | Revenue

The case for combined revenue models

June 15, 2020 Sarah Hartland, Marketing Manager – Lineup Systems

Subscription models have increased in popularity among growing numbers of publishers who are shifting their focus away from ad sales – and this trend has gained even more ground over the course of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Advertising revenue has taken a substantial hit over the past few months. Just one example is The New York Times, which estimated a 55% drop in ad revenue. Media organizations have gotten creative with their business models in an attempt to make up for this shortfall, offering readers more flexible payment options to drive up subscriptions.

Companies like BuzzFeed News and The Daily Beast have seen huge upticks in membership as a result, according to Digiday. In addition, publishers such as Gannett, The Washington Post, Time Magazine, and The Philadelphia Inquirer have amassed large coronavirus newsletter audiences—in some cases, twice the size of their regular lists.

“We’ve proven to ourselves that we can be far more agile with this product line,” Kim Fox, a product director at the Philadelphia Inquirer, told Digiday.

Subscription models have been wildly successful across a broad range of sectors. Publishers who pair this powerful strategy with their advertising revenue strategies will be most likely to weather the next wave of uncertainty to hit the media industry.

The future of media: advertising and paid subscriptions

Thanks to the massive amounts of data-driven transactions that occur on a daily basis, publishers and advertisers alike are better informed than ever before about their audiences’ behaviors and preferences. They now have the ability to create highly relevant and targeted advertising campaigns that maximize their budgets as well as their brands’ reach.

While advertising will continue to serve as a crucial revenue stream for publishers, subscriptions have proved their ability to act as a powerful complement to the ad sales model with exclusive, creative offerings that strengthen brand loyalty.

The subscription model has already prompted publishers to think outside the box of traditional advertising and explore partnerships like reward programs with brands. For example, U.K. publisher The Times runs a program called Times+ that features exclusive arts, culture, entertainment, and travel rewards from various corporate partners.

Subscriptions offer a win-win for publishers and their audiences because they give consumers the ability to choose the content they pay for, whether their interest is in current affairs, arts and culture, sports, or entertainment.

A longstanding tradition: selling content and ads

The business model of selling content as well as advertising isn’t new to the media industry. Newspapers have always charged newsstand prices, although they looked drastically different more than 100 years ago. In 1851, The New York Times’ first year of existence, a copy of the newspaper sold for 1 cent. It took nearly a century for the price to reach 5 cents in 1950, and by 1974, the price had increased to 20 cents.

Decades later, when the internet rocked the media industry and gave readers unprecedented access to news, there was great debate about whether it signaled the death of print media. Many news organizations didn’t survive the disruption. However, now that the industry has wrapped its head around the paywall system, publishers have been able to reinforce the monetary value of high-quality journalism.

Media companies are seeing the benefits of charging for content once again. For example, in 2019, News Corp Australia’s publications reached 500,000 paid digital subscribers. In the U.S., The New York Times reached 3.5 million paid digital subscribers that year.

“It shows more and more people are willing to pay more for our trusted, quality journalism,” Michael Miller, News Corp Australia’s executive chairman for Australasia, told NewsMediaWorks. “Premium content that resonates with our expanding audiences…is what will drive our long-term success.”

Although it’s a delicate balance, publishers can successfully sell both content and advertising by putting two important measures in place. First, publishers must ensure that ad placements don’t become too unwieldy, as to not alienate paid subscribers. They must also keep the cost of subscriptions reasonable to maintain substantial audience numbers worthy of attracting advertisers.

How combined revenue models drive success

Publishers who combine advertising and subscription models carefully are well positioned to reap significant rewards. This is especially true as first-party data becomes an increasingly essential commodity within the media industry in the face of growing data privacy regulations.

Subscriptions provide publishers with rich first-party audience data. That becomes an attractive selling point for advertisers seeking to maximize their investment in a contextually relevant and brand safe environment.

“Publishers need to focus on what they do really well, which is produce content. They can do native [advertising] and commercialize contextual targeting,” Bedir Aydemir of News UK said at Lineup Systems’ user conference last fall.

McClatchy CEO Craig Forman agrees that context is key to advertisers’ success in the future. And media organizations—particularly local publishers—can harness this trend to help brands reach audiences in meaningful ways.

“What often you can’t find in the world of digital advertising is the adjacency…that makes your advertising important in context,” Forman told Digiday. “And at this time where local is the success story of the emergence, McClatchy and others are doing everything we can to partner with local brands to show them that the trusted environment of local news is where they need to be.”

At The Washington Post, a new digital advertising tool is helping the media company evaluate “brand suitability” in various contexts.

“This particular display product utilizes the real-time messaging of a brand’s social posts and targets them to an audience in the right context. With a news environment that is changing so quickly, this allows brands to be more relevant with their voice,” chief revenue officer Joy Robins told The Drum.

As media organizations continue to innovate, combined revenue models that blend advertising and subscriptions will undoubtedly become even more powerful.

Perspectives

5 Ways to repurpose the same journalism to diversify revenue

March 30, 2020 Sarah Hartland, Marketing Manager – Lineup Systems

As multi-channel has given way to omnichannel distribution, publishers no longer seek print readers or digital readers. Instead, they recognize that they must reach the same reader across mediums to have a real impact. Print, digital, audio, video, social media, smart speakers, connected cars – the sheer number of news mediums can be daunting. As multi-channel has given way to omnichannel distribution, publishers no longer seek print readers or digital readers. Instead, they recognize that they must reach the same reader across mediums to have a real impact.It’s official: multi-channel has given way to “omnichannel”. Publishers no longer seek “print readers” or “digital readers,” instead they recognize that they must reach the same reader across several mediums to have a real impact. Print, digital, audio, video, social media, smart speakers, connected cars – the sheer number of news mediums can be daunting. As multi-channel has given way to omnichannel distribution, publishers no longer seek print readers or digital readers. Instead, they recognize that they must reach the same reader across mediums to have a real impact.It’s official: multi-channel has given way to “omnichannel”. Publishers no longer seek “print readers” or “digital readers,” instead they recognize that they must reach the same reader across several mediums to have a real impact. Print, digital, audio, video, social media, smart speakers, connected cars – the sheer number of news mediums can be daunting. As multi-channel has given way to omnichannel distribution, publishers no longer seek print readers or digital readers. Instead, they recognize that they must reach the same reader across mediums to have a real impact.It’s official: multi-channel has given way to “omnichannel”. Publishers no longer seek “print readers” or “digital readers,” instead they recognize that they must reach the same reader across several mediums to have a real impact. Print, digital, audio, video, social media, smart speakers, connected cars – the sheer number of news mediums can be daunting.

True omnichannel publishers have recognized that repackaging the same journalism in multiple ways is the secret to keeping up and presents revenue opportunities previously unimagined. Every new platform or trendy format will ultimately rely on the same storytelling and the same six questions: who, what, when, where, why and how?

Poynter Institute fellow Mike Wendland talked about the concept of “convergence” all the way back in 2002, sharing the example of the Tampa Tribune – an early experiment in “repurposing” journalism:

“In Tampa, the TV station, the newspaper and the Website are all owned by the same corporation, Media General. On a daily basis, TV reporters do their stand-ups and then write bylined newspaper stories. Newspaper reporters write their stories and then appear before TV cameras to do “talk-back” debriefings or their own stand-ups. And everybody — reporters, editors, photographers — ‘repurpose’ their work for the website.”

Now, such a practice is commonplace for large media organizations and increasingly accessible for local media. While there are plenty of vehicles, old and new, for journalism, there are five that should be used in tandem to share the same work from your newsroom:

1. Interactive Online Articles

Enhancing print edition articles with interactive elements online is a great way to engage readers with the same journalism. The Washington Post published this Coronavirus simulator in multiple languages to help bring their other reporting to life. It’s the same data that support their other stories, but the visual, interactive elements draw the reader in, keep them engaged and encourage them to subscribe.

David Leonhardt from The New York Times commented on the unique power of interactive journalism to not only repurpose the same facts, but spur on additional content, saying: “One of the less obvious benefits of interactive journalism is the way in which it generates its own follow-up articles.”

2. Podcasts

Considering our busy lives and tendency towards multitasking, is it any wonder that more than half of US adults listen to podcasts daily? Podcasts represent a great opportunity to repurpose a story and dig a little deeper, perhaps taking readers behind the scenes or sharing more historical context.

James Rooney, VP of Revenue Technologies at The New York Times, shared with the audience at Lineup Systems’ 2019 User Conference how his team leverages The Daily in this manner:

“We publish several hundred articles a day, and one of those articles each weekday becomes the basis for The Daily podcast. During that podcast, one of our esteemed journalists, Michael Barbaro, gives the story behind the story. He interviews the journalist who wrote it and other people who were involved in that piece of content. So, from that one piece of content, that original journalism, we actually have two more degrees of revenue opportunities. And within those, we can diversify the revenue streams even more. “

3. Video

Video journalism can range from highly produced packages to simply capturing a podcast recording session on camera. You already know the benefits of video journalism – after all, it’s not new. What is new is short-form, quick packages shared across a variety of platforms (more on this in a moment), and the barrier to entry is lower than ever before.

Jon Savitt from Huff Post explored the impact of video on journalism, and neatly explained that the reduction in time from an event occurring and a smartphone user reading the story means “we all need to get better at being multimedia producers.”

4. Social Media

“Social media” is a huge category with many separate platforms and formats, making it a great tool for repurposing other content. Add images over podcast audio for a quick, easy to produce video. Share individual packages or user generated content. As many ways as your team can slice and dice other content, social media platforms are a great way to experiment.

Looking for inspiration? Here’s how other news media organizations dominate on:

5. Voice Search

By the end of 2020, voice searches are expected to make up half of all online searches. Currently, 65% of smart speaker owners between the ages of 25 and 49 speak to their devices at least once a day. Knowing that voice technology will become the primary way the next generation of consumers will search for and buy products means publishers must prepare their web content to rank for organic voice search.

Voice queries are longer than traditional text-based searches, and most are questions. According to Search Engine Watch, the top questions people ask their smart speakers are who, what, when, where, why and how – the foundations of journalism!

To take advantage of this channel, make sure your online articles clearly and concisely answer these questions in layman’s terms, and you’ll be killing two birds with one stone.

Advertising | Uncategorized

Compete or collaborate? Two approaches to dealing with walled gardens

November 20, 2019 Sarah Hartland, Marketing Manager – Lineup Systems

Publishers are rightfully concerned with the fact that huge search and social companies dominate today’s digital advertising market. Typically, they have reacted to this state of play in one of two ways: by either trying to compete with these so-called walled gardens, or by joining forces with them.

But which approach leads to the best results for advertisers? Should publishers give in meekly to the “can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em” mentality that’s been lining the pockets of these companies for well over a decade? Or should they take stock, take a stand, and find profitable ways to compete against them?

We’re in a unique age of digital domination

The advent of digital has brought with it a dilemma for publishers and their advertisers. It is possible to reach a wider audience than ever before. In most cases, that means they need to pay for exposure with the globe’s biggest and most influential big tech firms, Google and Facebook.

However, many publishers are embracing the challenge of taking on these closed publishing ecosystems. They have confidence in their methods, and they want to prove to their customers that their brand is in fact in safer hands when it’s away from the monopolistic claws of the duopoly.

Others, however, believe that the walled gardens created by such companies make it nigh on impossible to compete for reach in the wider market. And some of them look to inter-provider collaboration as a way to guarantee results for their customers (and keep their business afloat).

The case for competition

A growing percentage of today’s publishers are hesitant to collaborate with big tech because they’ve been burned by them in the past. And many they don’t trust platforms to deliver the exposure and brand-safe contexts that their advertisers need.

The topic of trust has come to the fore in recent years. A series of antitrust investigations have been exposing the monopolistic practices of big tech, particularly in the US, where 50 state attorneys recently opened general investigations into Google’s advertising policies.

High fluctuations in traffic from these providers hasn’t improved their reputation for stable, consistent results, nor has the withdrawal of many features from these platforms that were intended to help publishers share, and profit from, their content. Facebook’s Instant Articles, for example, died a rather untimely death after just two years thanks to inconsistent reporting and a lack of opportunity for monetization.

The technical challenges involved with cooperating with these companies are also proving to be barriers to successful collaboration. Many big tech firms, not least Facebook, expect publishers to build their own separate content injection API, a process that is costly, time-consuming and inconvenient.

Data driven

In fact, walled gardens are notoriously cagey with their data as a whole, making it difficult to remove and activate key information from their own systems and thereby rendering it incompatible with other aggregation platforms that might have better (read: more relevant) features for publishing houses.

This has led to many publishers relying heavily on their own primary data as their main insights to the market. Doing so might be restrictive, but the upside is, at least the company in question has complete control over how much of this data is released, and who sees it.

Experience matters

When considering the case for competition, we also need to look at the way in which the buying public respond to ads from various channels. Research has proven that people are sick of screens covered with paid search ads, but are receptive to advertising in the context of trustworthy content. A report from Nielsen goes so far as to say that local media receives three times higher consumer trust and 2.5 high positive sentiment compared to ads from high market-share platforms, suggesting that ads from magazines, TV and newspapers are less annoying to (and thus more successful with) consumers.

The case for collaboration

Google and Facebook not only dominate the publishing space, they’re directing it. It could be argued that they are doing a lot of the hard work by blazing the trail. Thus, all collaborators need to do is keep up – and use the features and innovations delivered via their marketplaces to the advantage of their advertisers. A key argument for collaboration is that shared data equals better data. Having access to the insights shared by walled gardens benefits the whole of market. That is, if this data hasn’t been manipulated for these companies’ own gain, of course.

And here we are, back to the elephant in the room. The issue of trust. Those who are still keen to collaborate should be encouraged by the fact that some big tech CEOs, including Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, do appear to be addressing publishers’ concerns head on.

Yes, more needs to be done when it comes to levelling the playing field for publishers. (And proposed policies such as the Journalism Competition & Preservation Act are going to go some way to alleviating publishers’ concerns.) But the fact remains that these companies lead the market because they have nailed a model that, for the most part, works. According to a survey from Adform, some 13% of publishers even believe that walled gardens simplify revenue generation and the distribution process. Despite the bad press, there are publishers out there who are happy with what’s on offer and who will keenly collaborate.

Finding the best approach

Both approaches have their own merits. The only way that publishers can decide whether they want to compete or collaborate with Google and Facebook is to consider their long-term goals, then determine how the features on offer from each platform will help them achieve them. They also need to think about where they stand on content sharing and control, data ownership, and the availability and accuracy of their reporting metrics.

And there’s no reason why publishers can’t adopt a dual strategy that allow them to compete and collaborate in equal measure. After all, collaboration doesn’t mean giving in to big tech. It just means keeping their biggest adversaries onside – and using access to big tech’s products and policies to better inform their own strategy.

Can we really compare news publishers with big tech firms?

Regardless of the relationship they have with Google and Facebook, smaller publishers must remember that they offer something different to the tech giants of today. They’re unique from big tech in three important ways:

Advertisers trust them, because they have control over where their ads appear.
They can not only prove campaign ROI, but also deliver recommendations that add value to their offering. It’s an element of personalization that Big Tech struggles to emulate at scale.
Crucially, they the capabilities to deliver omnichannel campaigns in a much more agile way than the bigger firms. This is key in a market that’s increasingly embracing the combined power of digital, print, OOH and events advertising channels.

There is most definitely an argument for publishers to focus to their own strengths, not big tech’s well-documented weaknesses.

Perspectives | Revenue

Yes, publishers can compete with Google (here’s how)

September 30, 2019 Sarah Hartland, Marketing Manager – Lineup Systems

As antitrust investigations envelope tech giants like Google and Facebook, some publishers may be lulled into thinking that their competition with Big Tech is fading. It’s certainly encouraging to see that Google may be held to account for their monopolistic practices. However, it’s unlikely to change the fundamental battle between publisher and platform. Google will continue to profit from news delivery and aggregation, and marketers will still funnel large portions of their budgets to stay at the top of search results. But to say that Big Tech is here to stay is not to admit defeat. This David and Goliath battle will surely rage on, and there are plenty of ways publishers can win along the way.

If Google escapes all 50 state attorneys general investigations unscathed, will the pressure from publishers and legislators be enough to force change? The likelihood of any specific outcome aside, this recent news has led to a fascinating game of “what-ifs.” Well beyond mere speculation, this exercise is helpful for legislators, publishers and tech giants alike.

So, what changes if Google loses?

Whether Google faces fines or recent scrutiny leads to legislative changes, most agree that Google will have to make fundamental changes in the coming years. Since News Media Alliance reported that Google made $4.7 Billion in 2018 from aggregated news content, calls for Big Tech to begin sharing a piece of that revenue pie have grown louder and more insistent.

Proposed policies like the Journalism Competition & Preservation Act would enable publishers to collectively negotiate directly with Big Tech platforms to “improve the access to and the quality of news online”. Senators John Kennedy (R-LA) and Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) introduced this legislation in June, a key tenant of which is the establishment of a 48-month “safe harbor” (a.k.a. regulation-free period for Google) for publishers to “band together to negotiate with dominant online platforms.”

One must wonder what is preventing publishers from doing this now, and what would be achieved. You’ve armed David with a slingshot, but where is the stone? For some, it is hard to believe four more regulation-free years for Google would lead them to start paying publishers for their content.

Either way, publishers must emphasize how they compete

If the changes on the table are unlikely to move the needle for publishers in a significant way, can publishers compete with Big Tech? Yes! And they should. The challenge for ad sales teams is to learn how they stand out against Big Tech digital advertising and be prepared to clearly articulate this to advertisers.

Too many local publishers are unprepared to compete with Google and Facebook, and believe their only option is to partner directly with their biggest competition. What they fail to realize is that if they could only communicate to advertisers why they should add local advertising into their marketing mix, they could tap into an important revenue source.

In the eyes of marketers, how do publishers differ from Big Tech?

Here are four difference that publishers can capitalize on:

1. Trustworthiness

DCN has long emphasized the importance of quality, trustworthy content. And this is not just for the sake of readers and the future of journalism, but also because these factors are critical for advertisers. Due to the “black box” nature of Big Tech algorithms, campaigns from trusted brands may end up in distasteful corners of the internet. This is not only embarrassing for reputable brands. It can have a detrimental impact on their bottom line.

In contrast, publishers are not only focused on the quality of their content, but they vet their advertisers as well. Marketers need not fear their ad campaign showing up next to pornography or propaganda. The trust that readers place in a quality publication is extended to the brands that advertise there. And this value is nearly impossible to replicate on Facebook or Google.

Ad sales teams must be prepared with the facts about ad fraud and why trustworthiness is critical for campaign success.

2. Audience data

Advertisers don’t want to purchase impressions or ad space – they expect access to specific audiences. Google makes this easy. Do you? Publishers have an opportunity to show advertisers that they can leverage their first-party data for a better user experience and higher-quality, audience-driven campaigns.

If your publication is behind a paywall (in full or in part), you already know the value of your first-party subscriber data. Be the opposite of Google’s algorithmic black box. The more transparent you can be, the more value marketers will see in your audience.

3. Omnichannel campaigns

Advertisers want easy to understand campaign options, a clear understanding of campaign ROI, and they want doing business with a publisher to be easy. With the right tools, publishers can deliver on all these things – but they must go one step further.

We’ve shown that publishers can compete head-to-head on trustworthiness and quality data. But what can publishers offer that Big Tech cannot? Omnichannel campaigns that cross mediums and deliver clear results. Who else can combine digital and print with OOH and events?

As publishers diversify their revenue streams, they must be careful to train sales staff to understand the uplift these additional channels can provide for advertisers.

4. Marketing expertise

More and more publishers are adding marketing services to their offerings, and it’s no wonder. Research from Borrell Associates indicates that agencies and advertisers alike look to media companies for marketing expertise. This means your sales teams need to be prepared to be that expertise. The consultative selling approach has been proven effective. However, it requires a dedication to understanding the latest trends and recognizing how your products and services can help advertisers capitalize on them.

Time will tell if Google and Facebook will be held to account for their monopolistic practices. Regardless of how policies change, publishers must recognize that they’re already able to compete with Big Tech. It is critical that ad sales teams understand what differentiates them from the Googles and Facebooks of this world. If they can, they’ll become an invaluable resource to reputable brands and local advertisers.