LinkedIn tees up ads for premium-publisher video

Today’s Social Media advertising rates are fluctuating as if by the wave of an occult hand:

↘️ YOUTUBE: $3.05 CPM |  ↗️ META: $7.60 CPM | ↘️ TIKTOK: $3.83 CPM

In this week’s edition: 

• 🌶️ Twitter/X goes Rated X

• Why Pinterest wants everyone to slowwww dowwwwn 🦥

•  🔥 Tumblr teases a bigger Blaze

But first…

🤝 Platform-Publisher Partnerships: Alive and Well!

📺 Media companies publishing video to LinkedIn can now sell 3- to 15-second long in-stream video ads on it via LinkedIn’s Wire Program, which launched in beta testing this week. LinkedIn has been testing the program with partners including the Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, and NBC Universal, as part of a larger push into news. Pricing was a fixed CPM of $50 during the alpha phase but will move to an auction model next month (LinkedIn takes a cut of publisher revenue via a rev-share model). Advertisers only gain access to the auction once they’ve closed a deal with the publishers.

Since 2022, Amazon has also been providing direct access to publisher inventory via Amazon DSP—which offers a variety of ready-made premium third-party inventory packages you can select for programmatic video, display, and audio campaigns. These private-marketplace deals are an alternative to placement-level targeting. Expect higher CPMs but potentially more scale going this route. And yes, you have full visibility into which publishers your ads appear with when serving on these PMPs.

The Inside Scoop🍦: Now trending in performance media

🐭 Disney Campaign Manager (DCM) — formerly known as the Hulu self-service platform — caused some confusion by advertising that they have Disney+, ESPN/ESPN+, and additional ad inventory available, in addition to their existing Hulu inventory. They’ve since clarified that the inventory will remain Hulu-only through the end of the year, with plans to expand to include other Disney properties in January 2025. 

• But also: Disney reps have shared that we’ll soon be able to serve ads against any of Hulu’s Top-50 shows for a premium, via direct booking — but hey, that means we’ll be able to get you on The Bear. 

• Pro tip: For agencies and brands buying direct, we also recommend digging into Hulu’s audience segments—more that 2500 are available beyond what’s included on the self-service platform.

🧑‍💻 Tumblr is teasing alpha tests of a new self-service advertising platform Blaze Pro, an upgrade from their Blaze post-boosting program. (Gupta clients: Ping us if you’re interested!)

🧷 Pinterest wants advertisers to focus on “passive attention.” 

• In contrast to “active attention”—which it describes as “conscious focus, produced by tactics such as big TV moments or high-impact digital”—Pinterest claims passive attention works as a “constant reminder” to “reinforce something that’s already been learned and keep your brand top of mind during the broader decision-making process.”

• Why’s Pinterest all-in on passive? Because it commissioned a new study that shows the platform drives 7x more passive attention than “other platforms.” Pinterest claims this shows that “when [users] come to Pinterst, they’re taking their time” — including when they scroll. The new study shows Pinterest users scroll 1.5x slower past ads than on other platforms.

🔗 LinkedIn is expanding Accelerate — its version of a fully-automated, AI-powered campaign — to include lead generation and website visits objectives. Additional campaign objectives are on their roadmap.

🌶️  Should Twitter/X now be . . . Rated X? In case you weren’t already worried about brand safety, this week, X updated its policy on adult content to note that “consensually produced and distributed adult nudity or sexual behavior” is now officially allowed in the app. 

🐘 The Elephant In the Room: Our weekly office poll!

Don’t ask Google which mushrooms to eat! You knew it would happen. Turns out that when Google turned on AI-generated summaries for search queries, the AI wasn’t fully baked — which led to the internet having a field day with AI Overview responses such as Google’s suggestion that we put glue on our pizza. Google has been playing catch-up ever since, making a dozen adjustments to prevent its Enhanced AI from telling searchers (falsely, obviously) that Barack Obama was America’s first Muslim president. While Google pronounced the issues fixed, the Associated Press followed up this week and found the answers still . . . off. When AP asked Google about which wild mushrooms to eat, Google returned answers that were “problematic,” according to the president of the Mycological Society of America. As we told you a few weeks ago: Google has already turned on ads for AI Overview. Proceed with caution.

What do you think: What’s your favorite Google AI hallucination? Let us know below, we’ll share the results next week.

Last week’s results: What's the best time to post on social media?

This was our most-voted poll of the year—and thankfully, we don’t have to move our send time!

🟨🟨🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️ Mondays from 11 a.m. to noon 

🟨🟨🟨🟨⬜️⬜️ Tuesdays from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. and 3 to 4 p.m.

🟨🟨🟨🟨⬜️⬜️ Wednesdays from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. 

🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 Thursdays from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m.

🟨🟨🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️ Fridays from 10 to 11 a.m.

Thanks for reading! We’ll be back next Thursday to fill your inbox with more tips, tricks, and treats from the addressable universe. In the meantime, stay up to date with the latest performance marketing intelligence by following us on Linkedin, Instagram, and X.