• Meta Platforms Inc. reinstated former President Donald Trump’s accounts on Facebook and Instagram Thursday after a two-year ban following the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol. Trump has not yet made any posts on either Meta-owned platform, or on Twitter Inc., where his account was restored in November. (CNN)
• Yahoo Inc. plans to lay off 20% of its workforce by the end of the year in a major restructuring of its unprofitable ad tech unit, which will include the sunsetting of its supply-side platform that enabled digital publishers to sell automated ads against their content. (Axios) News Corp. also announced it will eliminate 1,250 positions, or 5% of its total workforce, during 2023, as inflation and rising interest rates hinder its publishing businesses. (The Wall Street Journal)
• Interpublic Group of Companies Inc. reported organic revenue growth of 3.8% during the fourth quarter, driven by the auto and transportation sectors. The positive year-end results match those of other advertising holding giants, including Omnicom Group Inc. and Publicis Groupe SA. (Ad Age)
• Elon Musk reportedly fired a senior Twitter engineer after he suggested Musk’s waning public interest was why view counts on the Twitter owner’s tweets had lowered in recent weeks. Musk ordered the creation of the view counts feature, which formally launched in late December, as a way to demonstrate the platform’s vibrancy, but its plagued rollout appears to be having the opposite effect. (Platformer News)

Ad Execs Maintaining, Boosting 2023 Ad Budgets: Advertisers More Optimistic Than Agencies

MediaPost

Super Bowl Ads 2023: The Year When Brands Split Costs

Alex Weprin, The Hollywood Reporter

With the advertising market crumbling, blue-chip names are increasingly seeking partners to team up on expenses.

EMX Files For Bankruptcy

Anthony Vargas, AdExchanger

Digital ad marketplace EMX (ENGINE Media Exchange) and its New York-based parent company, Big Village, have filed for bankruptcy.

Yelp Reports Advertising Revenue Rose 15% In 2022

Laurie Sullivan, MediaPost

The company drove record advertising revenue from its Services businesses as well as from its sales channels, self-serve and multi-location services.

How brands and agencies are prepping this year’s hybrid Super Bowl war rooms

Kimeko McCoy, Digiday

Super Bowl Sunday is just mere days away and brands and agencies alike have once again locked and loaded their war room strategies, ready to react to the Big Game’s cultural moments in real time. 

Nelson Peltz Says Disney Proxy Fight Is Over

Lauren Thomas, The Wall Street Journal

Mr. Peltz said he is pleased with Chief Executive Robert Iger‘s corporate restructuring efforts and would pull back on his campaign to be added to Disney’s board.

Media company Ozy is attempting a comeback

Max Tani, Semafor

Ozy, the youth-focused media company that imploded in 2021 over a misleading pitch to potential investors, is raising money again — pitching itself as a “fresh,” “hip,” media brand for a younger generation.

Disney CEO Bob Iger Is Open To Selling Hulu

Jill Goldsmith and Ted Johnson, Deadline

Asked on CNBC about his plans for Hulu as a 2024 deadline to buy it in, or sell it off, approaches, he said: “Everything is on the table right now, so I am not going to speculate whether we are a buyer or a seller of it. But I obviously have suggested that I’m concerned about undifferentiated general entertainment, particularly in the competitive landscape that we are operating in, and we are going to look at it very objectively and expansively.”

Instagram Influencers Still Out Earn Their TikTok Peers

Phoebe Bain, Ad Age 

New Hashtag Pay Me report compares Instagram and TikTok influencer pay, coins a term for a new creator tier, critiques creator marketplaces, and more.

Madison Square Garden Moves Forward With Spinoff Plans and New Streaming Offering

Caitlin Huston, The Hollywood Reporter

Additionally, the company said its upcoming MSG Sphere in Las Vegas will feature a “debut original attraction from a leading Hollywood director.”

Peacock lets subscribers watch live episodes with their favorite stars in real-time

Lauren Forristal, TechCrunch

Peacock is launching a new interactive experience later this month that allows fans to livestream episodes alongside actors from the show who provide real-time reactions, commentary, and a live Q&A.

Peyton and Eli Manning Conquered the NFL. Now They’re Conquering Sports Media

Mark J. Burns, Morning Consult

Among self-identified sports fans, Peyton and Eli scored net favorability ratings of 60 and 55, respectively, making them the most popular NFL media personalities out of a list of dozens of media figures who regularly cover the league. 

Magazine Publishes Serious Errors in First AI-Generated Health Article

Jon Christian, Futurism

When the publisher of Sports Illustrated and Men’s Journal announced last week that its magazines would start to publish AI-generated articles, its CEO assured readers that the practice wouldn’t result in a decline in quality.

Native Americans renew protests of Kansas City Chiefs mascot

Terry Tang and Dave Skretta, The Associated Press 

Fights against the appropriation of tribal cultures and images have endured for decades — not just with the Chiefs. Native Americans say using iconography and words with Native connotations demeans them and perpetuates racist stereotypes.

Musk’s Twitter gets ‘yellow card’ for missing data in EU disinformation report

Natasha Lomas, TechCrunch

The first batch of reports by tech giants, adtech entities and others on how they’re tackling online disinformation in the European Union since the bloc unveiled a strengthened version of its Code of Practice last year have been published.

Shopify Revamps Shopping App, Heightens Competition With Amazon

Ann Gehan, The Information

Shopify announced a series of updates to its Shop app and launched a new “one-page” checkout Thursday, changes that put the e-commerce software giant in more direct competition  with Amazon’s marketplace.

Pinterest jockeys for position in platforms arms race for short-form video

Krystal Scanlon, Digiday

Pinterest wants in on the short-form video gold rush, and it’s willing to pay publishers big to do it — just take its recent deal with Condé Nast.

Microsoft, Google’s AI race points to shifting search power balance

Peter Adams, Marketing Dive

Google and Microsoft, two of the world’s most powerful technology firms, are expanding their artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities in search, a sign that the tech is quickly emerging as a key innovation battleground in 2023.

TikTok promises to ramp up fight against disinformation in EU

Foo Yun Chee, Reuters

Chinese social media company TikTok on Thursday pledged to do more to tackle disinformation on its platform by adding more safety features and broadening its fact-checking measures, spurred by the role played by state-controlled media and the war in Ukraine.

Twitter Blue users to get 4,000-character tweets – which may further irk advertisers

Kendra Clark, The Drum

Paying Twitter subscribers are getting more characters per tweet. To marketers dismay, they may soon see fewer ads in their feeds, too.

PayPal CEO Dan Schulman to leave at end of 2023, company begins search for successor

Jonathan Vanian, CNBC

Schulman, who became PayPal CEO after the split from eBay in 2015, notified the company of his decision to retire at the end of December. He will remain a member of PayPal’s board of directors, which is hiring a search firm to find a successor.

Anheuser-Busch InBev Shifts Its Ad Strategy as Drinking at Home Becomes More Common

Jennifer Maloney, The Wall Street Journal

The company’s global CMO says the giant brewer is also creating personalized marketing pitches for individual consumers.

Not so Fabuloso: 4.9 million cleaning bottles recalled because of bacteria exposure

Terry Castleman, The Los Angeles Times

A statement on Fabuloso’s recall site warned of a “risk of bacteria growth in the recalled products” because a “preservative was not added at the intended levels during manufacturing.”

From Jennifer Coolidge for E.l.f. to Fenty, beauty taps into Super Bowl marketing

Liz Flora, Glossy

Rather than typical beauty TV commercial fodder showcasing airbrushed perfection, brands are enlisting humor and trending celebrities for their creative marketing campaigns as they take on a space thought of as traditionally male. 

Wave of AI-based marketing startups arrives as Microsoft, Google rush AI-based products to market

Marty Swant, Digiday

As more artificial intelligence tools are being built for generating content — and getting an influx of investment and attention from tech giants like Microsoft and Google — startups in the marketing space are hoping to take advantage of this new AI wave.

Kia Super Bowl Ad Is Relatable, Despite Its Larger-Than-Life Stunts

Olivia Morley, Adweek

The light-hearted ad stands out from Kia’s recent purpose-driven Super Bowl spots.

US Senators Ask Shein About Forced Labor Concerns for Cotton

Sheridan Prasso and Olivia Poh, Bloomberg

Three US senators have written to the chief executive officer of Shein, China’s largest private online retailer, demanding information on whether the fast-fashion company sources cotton tied to forced labor.

Canada Goose to double physical footprint over the next 5 years

Dani James, Retail Dive

Investing heavily into its direct-to-consumer strategy, luxury apparel brand Canada Goose plans to more than double its existing brick-and-mortar presence over the next five years, according to a press release Tuesday. The company currently operates 51 permanent stores globally.

Chick-fil-A’s newest sandwich has no chicken in it

Jordan Valinsky, CNN

The aptly named “Chick-fil-A Cauliflower Sandwich” is being tested in three cities beginning next week, marking the chicken chain’s first-ever plant-based sandwich. Imitating the chain’s signature fried chicken sandwiches, the new offering uses a “tender filet cut” of cauliflower that’s marinated and breaded in the chain’s seasoning, then pressure cooked and served on a buttery bun with pickles.

Kellogg Opts to Keep Plant-Based Business Amid Category ‘Shakeout’

Deena Shanker, Bloomberg

About seven months after the packaged-food giant said it was exploring a possible sale of its plant-based division, Kellogg said Thursday that it would hold onto it as the category’s performance erodes — potentially reducing the business’s value and appeal. 

Welcome to the ‘rolling recession’ economy

Nicole Goodkind, CNN

While the broader economy has thus far escaped a National Bureau of Economic Research-designated recession, various segments have experienced their own cool downs and some economists say this perplexing phenomenon is the product of a “rolling recession.” That’s when an economic downturn sweeps slowly across the economy, impacting sectors one by one.

Mass Layoffs or Hiring Boom? What’s Actually Happening in the Jobs Market

Sarah Chaney Cambon and Ray A. Smith, The Wall Street Journal

Restaurants, hotels and hospitals are finally staffing up, more than making up for losses in tech and other sectors.