Context Control Summit Recap

IAS hosted the first Context Control Summit last week to discuss contextual marketing and the ever-changing 2020 digital ecosystem. With news stories about COVID, global social injustices, and election season, brands have had a difficult time finding suitable environments.

“Content creation is accelerating at a rate that we have never seen before,” said IAS Chief Revenue Officer Chance Johnson, “and brand strategy needs to stay ahead of the breaking news trends that we see on a daily basis. As marketers try to address these issues at a global scale, tech providers have to work together to solve the challenges of tomorrow.”

Tony Marlow, IAS Chief Marketing Officer, kicked off the summit with IAS research focused on CTV, the death of the cookie, and the power of relevance. Then, Chance Johnson and Sarah Martinez (IAS SVP of Sales) hosted their own exciting groups of panelists. Johnson chatted with Tony Chen (of Channel Factory) and Will Luttrell (of Amino Payments) about collaboration, and utilizing the technologies at hand to better connect with audiences. Sarah Martinez sat down with Sargi Mann (Havas Media) and John Marshall (HP) to address the new advancements in contextual marketing. Additionally, panelists discussed the possibilities contextual relevance technology has to offer, as well as the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead. To wrap it all up, Craig Zeigler, IAS VP of Verification Products and Glenn Perera (IAS Product Strategy Manager for EU) covered the bases on all of the new IAS products available in the market today.

Key takeaways:

• Contextual relevance means being mindful about where your message can be found. Audiences want to see brands recognizing their consumers as actual people.
  • By tapping into the power of emotion and semantics at a page level, advertisers can build a competent segue from content to ad. Using contextual relevance to their advantage helps build the ideal relationship with consumers.
  • “The reason to go into the contextual aspect is to be cognizant and be mindful of what your audiences are sensitive to. Ultimately, brands are trying to reach and engage their audiences. Those people have perspectives and opinions, and they would like to see brands say “you understand me as a person… not just a binary code of 1 or 0.”’ – Sargi Mann
• Cookies are the way of the past. And a costly way at that.
  • A staggering majority (90%) of consumers have access to and use Connected TV, “which doesn’t even use cookies”, says Tony Marlow.
  • “We got reliant on cookies,” John Marshall of HP said, “and then, within the next year, cookies are going to go away…. It is really important to attach your brand to websites and content that is premium, is relevant, and in context. Now that we have technology to help with that, that’s a huge time saver.”
• Not all campaigns are the same.
  • 74% of consumers want to see ads that match page content. Where is your ad traffic coming from? Collaborating with publishers to hone in on the source of traffic makes it easier for brands to match ads with suitable content.
    “[Your] video ad does not need to do 10 things at once because this is a job of the search ad, or the banner ad, or the social ad. We are at the point where we’re not looking at all of these jobs in isolation but as a beautiful alchemy and cumulative effect of each other.” – Sargi Mann
• “Suitable” partnerships unlock innovation and drive the industry forward
  • Solutions created from collaboration, such as Channel Science and Total Visibility, build a more sustainable advertising ecosystem. To continue innovating, the digital advertising industry will need adaptable solutions, valuable partnerships, and cross-industry collaboration.

Contextual relevance in digital advertising is about an industry-wide team effort. The simultaneous collaboration between consumers, brands, publishers, and third-party verification partners creates an effortless online experience of familiarity and thought leadership. To watch our Context Control Summit and learn more about our contextual technology, fill out the form below to watch on-demand.

Here is the agenda with timestamps to each session:
An Introduction to the Context Control Summit | Sarah Elliott | 00:00 – 01:44
Welcome to Context Control | Lisa Utzschneider | 01:44 – 08:11
The Power of Context | Tony Marlow | 08:28 – 50:21
Audience Polling | Sarah Elliott | 50:21 – 57:20
The Power of “Suitable” Partnerships | Chance Johnson with Tony Chen & Will Luttrell | 57:20 – 1:26:52
Brand Suitability & Beyond | Sarah Martinez with Sargi Mann and John Marshall | 1:27:16 – 1:59:01
Product Q&A | Craig Ziegler & Glenn Perera | 1:59:58 – 2:14:31
Key Takeaways | Sarah Elliott | 2:14:31 – 2:17:57