Next to Now: On Streaming, Targeting, and Cheating

    NATIVE AD PERFORMANCE Commenting on a study of native advertising click-through rates, Media Post is surprised to see that native ads do better on mobile. We are not. Mobile remains the best platform for high engagement—and not just because of mistaken clicks: “The research found that click-through rates (CTR) for premium native ads […]

Next to Now: Does the Marketing Funnel Still Work?

MARKETING PINBALL The CMO of Publishers Clearing House writes on Ad Age about the death of the marketing funnel and the birth of marketing pinball. The article’s focus on brands means it’s only moderately useful for book publishers, but it’s still a good read about the current state of the customer journey—instead of traveling along a […]

Next to Now: The News from SXSWi, Influencer Marketing & More

Spring 2016 unfolds with exciting new marketing platforms, a digital shout-out for an old but effective ad platform, new developments in looking at what readers want and more . . .     SXSW INTERACTIVE Adweek points to the hot topics at the recently concluded SXSWi, and they’re not a surprise, but they do underscore […]

Next to Now: The View from Here

Thanks to Digital Book World for hosting another engaging conference on the state of the art of book publishing in a digital world. Verso’s Tom Thompson enjoyed the smart, focused crowd on hand for his Master Class on Paid Digital Media and the packed audience for his panel on the Book-Buyer’s Journey with deeply insightful colleagues […]

Next to Now: Trying to Chart New Oceans of Data & More

PODCASTS CONTINUE TO GROW Digiday has an interesting article about the evolution of podcasts and the need for improved measurement. Measurement is still not there yet—even the link within the article to NPR’s proposed measurement guidelines is broken. But we expect it to happen. Fun fact from this article: NPR is working on a podcast that’s like […]

New Year New Next to Now

LONGER TWEETS: THUMBS UP OR DOWN? The 140 character limit has been a defining feature of Twitter from the beginning—so it’s no surprise that the announcement that the company plans to extend that limit to as many as 10,000 characters has inspired mostly shrugs and scowls from users. AdWeek outlines six ways longer Tweets could […]