‘A big step forward’: Fairfax and Google enter programmatic advertising and tech partnership

Making their inventory available through adx…. wow.

Australian publishers definition of Innovation: turning on a pipe that should have already been on

This is not news worthy

That ducking sound is blood rushing over Dracula’s teeth.

This is something that’s been going on with Google and many other pubs for years. Now Fairfax have finally caught up they are depicting this as some sort of market leading innovation. Hilarious.

Hywood describes anything he doesnt really understand on the digital front as “innovation”. This is much the same as when Fairfax moved their sites onto WordPress (a couple of years after News did same thing) and he described this as cutting edge innovation .

confused. they just got appnexus and now they’re moving back off it?

@ it’s nigh. Appnexus was decision made by Old Guard Google is decision made by New Guard. New team reverses all decisions of Old team. Standard practice.

I think you’re right. Fairfax have lurched from Google to Appnexus and back to Google, let’s hope they get this one right finally and stop wasting people’s time. Google seem to have unending patience for this publisher

Why not try hire an actual AdTech specialist who knows the technology, how to plumb it in and has been in the mechanics not selling it.

Come to mention it there seems to be a distinct lack of AdTech leaders in major publishers in Australia; SBS, MCN, Seven, News the list goes on, think of all the cash left on the table. That cash that could be used to pay bills you know to support profits.

Even if you have to pay upwards of $250k a year an ad technology gun is well worth it, why do a not bad job when you can do a better job.

“A big step forward’ for Google!

Why would a leading Adtech specialist want to work for a TV station? There is your answer. It isnt about the money, it’s about inventing and keeping ahead, isnt it?

Greg, you do not yet realize your importance. You have only begun to discover your power. Join me, and I will complete your training.

Why? To help tackle some of the challenges they have. Its in the best interests of the industry that TV Stations and media owners do an effective a job at monetising content on IP channels.

Would certainly help deliver a dream not sell one and disappoint.

I sense adversity to a bit of hard work

@Try This. It’s a good suggestion and noble idea. Generally speaking, you will find these publishers have the ad tech guns in their teams but they hardly have the decision-making power to make the difference. It’s a situation that has not changed for a very long time despite of the so called technological advancements and focus more on data in the industry because the industry is still full of BS where decisions are made by “relationship builders”. On the other hand, I have seen ad tech people run the business and makes the decisions but this goes into pear shape because they just do not understand anything outside the technology world. I do believe (and I truly hope) that many organisations realise this already but are simply finding it difficult to solve for. #optimistic. It’s not really that hard IMHO, we just need to remove the BS – and I see that as the number one problem more than the challenges in technology, fraud, etc – and we will probably find our industry will be in a much better place.

“We are stepping up and understanding the future.” Language like this used by their CEO is an insight into someone who doesn’t comprehend the economics of their business and gives little thought to fundamental issues.

I can only speak on behalf of one of those major publishers, but I can assure you that our AdTech staff numbers sit at around 10% of our total workforce and skew more towards the leadership team in seniority.

Seems pretty smart actually. Fairfax benefits from loads of demand via Google and can shave direct sales team costs as a result. Advertisers /agencies who want to buy progromatically on a premium publisher can do so. Helps Google address all those brand safety issues it and FB are facing. Those who stand to lose out of deals like thus are the middlemen – agencies – currently taking cuts from all and sundry simply for buying ad space. And on that note, Fairfax also just announced they are winding back agency teams to focus more on industry verticals and client-direct deals. So agencies are being squeezed out from both ends ……

Look I do agree

The intersection between tech and commercial is the sweet spot, finding people who sit in that spot isn’t as hard as it’s made out to be. Like you say the problem is the decision making power given to those people if any really. I’ve sat in that position and witnessed first hand the future and foundational sacrifice to go after the next dollar today and not worry about tomorrow.

Where I struggle the most is seeing the answers to business problems held by people in those businesses or kept out of those businesses by senior level executives who have a fear of being exposed or hiring people smarter than them.

Recruiters driving for their commissions also doesn’t help the right people get into the right jobs, I’d like to know how many times the right candidate hasn’t made it to the interview stage with the company because of the recruiters role.

Everyone talks about transparency and you’ve hit the nail on the head it’s the BS factor coming out of people’s loutha driving it.

Mumbrella you are great at facilitating comments on posts in a timely manner (Adnews are shocking), can you help make sure the grammar is right 😉

Who’s responsible for this abomination with the ads stacked on top of one another? http://weather.smh.com.au/loca.....nsw/sydney

Fucking useless.

I suspect Hywood has a file of banalities that he drops randomly into every utterance. My personal fave is his commitment to quality journalism as the centre of the Fairfax world. There is also his constant assertion of strategic thinking. Remarkable governance. Etcetera. The man could become a personal installation in the Museum of Spin and Cliche.

And “restructuring” their own sales team [again] because of it.

For all the yawning talk of robots and AI, here’s a real world current example of it: Fairfax is being automated by Google and people are losing their jobs because of that.

Somewhat inevitable but a big mistake for Fairfax nevertheless.

Define Adtech staff – are they individuals who have been in the weeds and hands dirty with the ability to actually understand the tech?

80% of the people who claim to be Adtech specialists aren’t but they are gray at talking and the other 20% will be your ops people who are the future of adtech (most likely the ones whose opinions fall on deaf ears)

Now we have outsourced our sales business to Google we should probably outsource our executive management as well. Great cost savings and no doubt smarter strategy.

@spin – hywood’s mot du jour is “innovation”. Uses it every chance and to describe any change Fairfax makes, big or small, good or bad. When it comes to digital , he wouldn’t know innovation if he fell over it. Just regurgitates whatever his So-called innovators feed him

3 standard display formats and a bottom leaderboard? Sounds like you are from an agency, calling everyone else useless while offering no solutions that benefit commercial considerations and the audience

The fact they can’t turn their product (respected / curated journalism) that people want (evidenced by the fact they have an audience on desktop and mobile) into a profit shows a failure to understand what digital advertisers want (and the digital duopoly offer) and a failure of their current platform to deliver it.

Although it is nice the way they’ve got the ads to crash into each other at the top of the page to give the feeling of a WordPress.

Footer leaderboard rendering off screen and dragging down the viewability whilst adding nothing is very modern too. Are you going to tell them GDN doesn’t pay for non-viewable ads?