Social media giant Snap has extended its long-term partnership with Channel 4, creating a new series with a built-in Augmented Reality (AR) component.

As part of the extended partnership, the pair will collaborate on new ‘Snap-first’ content, which includes providing select content from Channel 4’s Paris 2024 Paralympic Games coverage.

Short-form clips of Channel 4’s most popular programmes will continue to be made available via Snapchat, including First Dates, Married At First Sight UK, Hollyoaks, Celebs Go Dating, Made In Chelsea, SAS: Who Dares Wins, Tattoo Fixers, Mashed, Celebrity Cooking School, The Big Celebrity Detox, and Absolutely Dyer.

“Having collaborated with Channel 4 over the past five years, our renewed and expanded partnership is a key part of our strategy to bring diverse and relevant content from world-class media brands to our UK community,” Snap Head of UK Partnerships Lucy Lake said.

“With the exciting year ahead in sports, the opportunity to bring the Paralympics content to millions of Snapchatters is very exciting, building on our sports offering platform-wide.

“We’re excited to continue to deepen our relationship with Channel 4, working to deliver exciting new formats and continue to innovate together.”

The new partnership with Snap supports the delivery of Channel 4’s Future4 strategy to prioritise digital growth over linear ratings, diversify new revenue streams and focus on partnerships.

Channel 4 Senior Distribution and Partnerships Lead of Commercial Innovation, Joe Harbinson added: “This partnership furthers our bid to serve young audiences and typifies the approach we are taking to reach viewers, wherever they are.

“Not only will we continue to innovate in how we adapt formats of our existing programming on new platforms, but we will also innovate by creating bespoke content to maximise the benefits of every platform for viewers and advertisers.”

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The ‘Lingo Bingo’ game, which is part of a larger integrated campaign, aims to reward the common mobile behaviour of ‘second screening’ by asking viewers play a spot of bingo on their mobile devices while watching the show.

“This exciting new partnership with Three is TV sponsorship at its best,” said Rupinder Downie, Brand Partnerships Leader at Channel 4. “The innovative and creative cross platform campaign aligns the brand with one of Channel 4’s most popular and much-loved shows across linear, digital and social and we look forward to playing Lingo Bingo on Friday nights.”

Throughout the series, viewers will be asked to choose and comment three words or phrases from a bingo card posted on Three’s social pages with the hashtag #ThreeLingoBingo. These three selections will be based on the words or phrases viewers predict will be said on the show. Once a viewer’s three words or phrases have been said, they will be automatically entered into a draw for the chance to win prizes such as a Samsung Galaxy S21, Samsung Galaxy Buds Pro, and cash prizes.

The social media game will run across Three UK’s Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram pages. It will kick-off this evening (26 February) during the latest episode of Gogglebox.

Three’s wider campaign includes a Gogglebox hub on the Three Website, Gogglebox running across retail AV, idents, and live tweeting throughout the show each week.

“Gogglebox is one of the UK’s most loved shows, and we know how excited everyone is to watch the new series, particularly as much of the UK remains in lockdown,” said Aislinn O’Connor, Director of Marketing for UK and Ireland at Three. “The partnership began at the start of the year and has provided a great opportunity to drive positive brand association with a mainstream audience. We can’t wait to showcase our new idents for the first time this Friday – which looks at playful insights around TV viewing and phone behaviour – as we believe that it perfectly complements the Gogglebox tone.”

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Aldi, Asda, Co-op, Iceland, Lidl, M&S, Sainsbury’s, Tesco, and Waitrose & Partners have teamed up with Channel 4 to unite against hate. On Friday 27 November, all the supermarkets will air ads one after the other across two ad breaks on Channel 4, each carrying the hashtag #StandAgainstRacism.

“As an anti-racist organisation, we are incredibly proud to stand together with Sainsbury’s and our retail partners against racism, using our national platform to call out the unacceptable reaction to Sainsbury’s Christmas advert,” said Verica Djurdjevic, Chief Revenue Officer at Channel 4.

The ad break takeovers will begin with bespoke introductions from Channel 4 explaining why the broadcaster has joined forces with the retailers to take a stand. The ads will occur at around 8:15pm during Bake Off: An Extra Slice and at 10:15pm during The Last Leg – both breaks will feature the 60-second version of Sainsbury’s’ ‘Gravy Song’ ad.

The supermarkets will also make their stand on social media, where the ad breaks will be published at the same time as the TV activity is broadcast on Friday evening.

“We strive to be an inclusive retailer and we’re proud to unite with our industry colleagues to stand up against racism,” said Rachel Eyre, Head of Brand Communications and Creative at Sainsbury’s. “We’re passionate about reflecting modern Britain and celebrating the diversity of the communities we serve, from our advertising to the products we sell. Sainsbury’s is for everyone and we are committed to playing our part in helping to build an equal society, free of racial bias and injustice. With collective action, together we can drive change.”

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The ‘Unseen Kingdoms’ campaign, which kicks off simultaneously on Channel 4 and E4 tonight (20 November) at 8:10pm, will tell the stories of young women through spoken-word poetry from Rasheeda Page-Muir across Channel 4’s linear, digital, and social channels.

“We’re really proud of this unique partnership with The Body Shop that not only brings a meaningful series to Channel 4’s highly engaged youth audience across our social channels but takes that story and places it at the heart of the brand’s powerful TV ad campaign this Christmas,” said Sophie Lloyd, Branded Entertainment and Creative Leader at Channel 4.

The 60-second TV ad campaign is an edit created from the two-part ‘Unseen Kingdoms’ social series which will launch on Channel 4’s YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram accounts from 27 November. This ad, as well as the social series, will highlight The Body Shop’s Christmas charity partnership with End Youth Homelessness.

“It has been a tough and turbulent year for many, especially for those without the safety and comfort of a home,” said Linda Campbell, UK and ROI Managing Director at The Body Shop. “The Body Shop is proud to be working with End Youth Homelessness this Christmas and help raise vital funds to support vulnerable young women find a safe and secure place to call home. Many women who experience or are at risk of being homeless can often find themselves hidden and their voices unheard, so its been wonderful working with Channel 4 whose vision and platform has helped bring these tough stories to the fore in a powerful, thought-provoking and uplifting way.”

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The Trade Desk will offer access to Channel 4’s inventory programmatically, giving advertisers the means to target 23m viewers across connected TV (CTV) and other devices.

“We’re delighted to be integrated with The Trade Desk,” said David Amodio, Deputy Head of Digital and Innovation at Channel 4. “The partnership enables our advertisers an important choice when buying brand safe broadcaster video programmatically across multiple platforms.”

In order meet regulatory rules, The Trade Desk will transfer a Clearcast clock number through the bidstream, meaning the origins of each ad will be clearly identifiable.

“As advertisers recognise the data-driven potential of CTV advertising to maximise ad relevance and improve the viewer experience, this partnership with Channel 4 represents a further boost in their ability to execute,” said Patrick Morrell, Director of Partnerships EMEA at The Trade Desk. “Broadening access to Channel 4’s inventory for brands across the open internet means better targeting for brands and greater revenue for broadcasters.”

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Teffaha promoted to UK MD at Sublime
High-impact advertising marketplace Sublime has appointed Emir Teffaha as UK managing director. He will be joined by Eddie Boyle as commercial director and Lucy Zakrzewska as head of publishers.

Teffaha joined Sublime as account director when he launched its London office in 2014. He has more than 15 years’ experience in the advertising industry, having previously worked for financial, lifestyle, and political publishers. In his new role, he will be responsible for developing strategic partnerships to build the company’s extensive network of brands and publishers.

“I’m thrilled to have the opportunity to increase Sublime’s impact in the UK market,” said Teffaha. “Lucy’s addition to the team and Eddie’s promotion are key pillars in Sublime’s journey to be a premium branding platform. I look forward to working with the new team and continuing to drive Sublime’s success in the market.”

Similar to Teffaha, Boyle joined Sublime in 2015 as account director from adQuota, a Scandinavian mobile ad firm. He will now work alongside Teffaha to identify new opportunities and expand Sublime’s reach.

Meanwhile, Zakrzewska joins the company from Collective, where she was responsible for overseeing global and UK publisher relationships. At Sublime, she will focus on forming strategic premium partnerships to scale Sublime’s reach across desktop and mobile formats.

“I’m excited to be joining such a dynamic and creative company at the forefront of digital advertising,” said Zakrzewska. “I look forward to growing and strengthening Sublime’s relationships with premium publishers in the UK market.”

Channel 4 brings in Cameron as CPO
Dave Cameron has been announced as Channel 4’s chief product officer, officially taking up the role on 13 May. The new role, which will report into chief commercial officer Jonathan Allan, will lead responsibility for the All 4 product and All 4 systems delivery.

Cameron will attend executive group meetings and will work with execs across the business to set digital product strategy and develop Channel 4’s digital capabilities. 

He is currently director of TV experience at Sky, where he has been part of the leadership team responsible for the product roadmaps of Sky Q, Sky+ and Sky Store, the launch of Sky Soundbox and the design and launch of voice services on Sky Q.  Prior to this role, he was deputy head of Sky Sports Digital, delivering Sky Sports’ first generation of native mobile apps on iOS and Android. He started his career as a developer with British Airways.

“Channel 4 has a long track record of creative and commercial innovation and I’m thrilled to be working with Alex [Wall], Jonathan [Allan], Ian [Katz], Keith [Underwood] and teams across the business to ensure its digital product development continues to be an industry leader,” said Cameron.

Leed arrives at Yolt to head up marketing
Yolt, a third-party provider of open banking technology, has hired Cristel Lee Leed as chief marketing officer. The hire coincides with Pauline Van Brakel’s change of position to chief product officer.

Leed will be responsible for leading the Yolt’s growth in key global consumer markets by overseeing the strategic planning, development and execution of Yolt’s marketing and customer initiatives for all its B2C and B2B activities.

She joins from Nutmeg, where she was interim chief marketing officer, and brings over 15 years of global marketing experience, having led successful brand launches, scale up’s and transformational marketing efforts on executive teams for high profile brands such as WWF, giffgaff, Lulu.com, Virgin and Centrica Telecoms.

“Cristel and Pauline’s appointments, coupled with other Executive role changes, reflect our greater ambition to give everyone the power to be smart with their money and I am very excited to work with such a talented team,” said Frank Jan Risseeuw, Yolt CEO.

Programmai picks Van Heesbeen to lead product
Predictive marketing platform Programmai has appointed Joost van Heesbeen as head of product in its London office to lead the expansion of their product & services.

Van Heesbeen’s experience in ad tech stretches back five years, working with MiQ and Nielsen he helped grow their product and programmatic trade desks.

“The potential of Programmai’s predictive marketing platform is huge. Take advertising as one example, most brands & retailers optimise for creative or bidding decisions. With Programmai, you get away from using one or two data points, as it learns from a vast set of complex interactions in client data. This produces audiences to acquire & retain customers with great efficiency. Incrementality has been talked about for some time now, but no one has tried to tackle it head on. Programmai is doing just that,” said Van Heesbeen.

“I was initially attracted to Programmai as a contractor to set up the Client Success division. Interacting with our clients it became clear we could build on our value proposition by creating a UI for them as well as putting more focus on the incrementality of our models. Having worked with the highly talented and experienced team since January, I see a big bright future for us.”

Clifton becomes CEO of TMMG
The Mission Marketing Group (TMMG), a marketing communications and advertising group, has appointed James Clifton as group CEO with immediate effect.

The newly created role will see Clifton take responsibility for leading and building TMMG’s brand throughout its next phase of growth and delivering sustainable shareholder value. Working closely with TMMG’s agency heads, Clifton will drive and facilitate strategies for growth across the Group, including further cross-agency collaboration, while continuing the development of the Group’s extensive range of specialisms and skills.

Clifton joined TMMG board in 2012, when his BigDog Agency was acquired by the Group. Most recently, he was appointed chair of TMMG’s integrated agencies business unit in addition to his role as CEO of the Group’s IIoT asset tracking business, Pathfindr.

“It is well documented that we are in uncertain times, especially in the Advertising industry. But while other Groups have been struggling, 2018 saw TMMG deliver its eighth consecutive year of growth,” said Clifton. “Thanks to our unique proposition and quality of talent I believe we have the opportunity to significantly increase in size, reach and capability in the coming years.”

WorkMobile promotes Fairweather
Graham Fairweather has been promoted to client services manager at data capture specialist WorkMobile. Having worked at Workmobile for the past 11 years, Fairweather was previously in charge of the companys support and testing activities.

In his new role, he will be responsible for ensuring high client satisfaction levels and utilising his excellent product knowledge and understanding of the capabilities of the WorkMobile solution to improve its interface with existing and new customers.  

“WorkMobile is a fantastic place to work, which is why I have continued working here for over the past ten years,” said Fairweather. “During this time, I have gained vast knowledge and understanding of the product and our clients’ requirements so look forward to helping to tailor our service and providing professional support to our customers in this new role.”

Petit joins Esomar Foundations board
Frédéric-Charles Petit has added to his roles as CEO of ITWP Group, founder and CEO of Toluna, and CEO of Harris Interactive Europe by joining the Esomar Foundation board. This decision is part of the partnership agreement signed by Toluna Group for Esomar Foundation’s webinar programme.

Petit’s mission is to revolutionise the way brands and consumers engage with one another, with the ultimate objective of transforming the market research industry into a real-time, mass market and social experience.

“The work that the Esomar Foundation is doing is aligned with my vision for the consumer insights industry,” said Petit. “Our goal is to democratise market research, and by supporting the Esomar Foundation, and work, we can ensure that developing markets have access to the power that consumer insights provide.”

The Esomar Foundation is the charity arm of Esomar, a global industry association of market, social, and opinion research.

Confiant adds two execs
Advertising security firm Confiant has appointed Amir Dodeja as chief operating officer and John Murphy as chief quality officer.

Dodeja will be charged with providing vision & direction to drive the company’s growth, marketing and business development. He previously led strategy at SimpleReach (acquired by Nativo), providing vision and direction across product, sales, operations, marketing, data science, and customer success. Earlier in his career, he led digital audience development and analytics at Time Magazine.

“Advertising security is a growing threat, and Confiant is the only company that has a vision for how to deliver maximum protection to the industry,” said Dodeja. “At Confiant, I have a tremendous opportunity to address that threat with a thriving company, proven product suite and a world-class team.”

Murphy, who joins with almost two decades of digital advertising experience, will play an integral role in the company’s product strategy, driving the industry forward on quality and developing new ways to empower publishers and platforms with control over the ads they serve. He most recently oversaw all aspects of marketplace quality, including ad quality, traffic quality, and policy, at OpenX. Prior to that, he held a variety of quality and policy roles at Yahoo. Murphy was also previously co-chair of the Trustworthy Accountability Group’s (TAG) Anti-Malware Working Group, where he helped to develop and roll out the TAG Anti-Malware guidelines.

“Confiant’s emphasis on security and transparency is unparalleled in the space,” said Murphy. “I am excited to join Confiant at a time of rapid growth and leave an indelible mark on the industry.”

Imperatore and MacIntosh join ZypMedia
Local-first, AI-powered enterprise software platform Zypmedia has added to its senior team, appointing Luigi Imperatore as senior vice president of finance and Charel MacIntosh as senior vice president of over-the-top (OTT) channel strategy and sales. Both Imperatore and MacIntosh will report to chief executive officer and co-founder Aman Sareen.

Imperatore will oversee the Company’s entire financial operations including planning, budgeting, and strategy.

He has worked with companies operating in the digital and technology space, including advertising and media, for over 15 years. His corporate experience includes Publicis, Omnicom, and Tapjoy. Most recently he served as CFO for 19 York, where he led the development of financial plans and provided strategic insight into the organisation’s operations and business plans.

MacIntosh will be responsible for managing all OTT sales channels, developing and managing the company’s channel partner strategy and collaborating on the development of new OTT products.

She has spent her 20-year plus career managing high-value relationships among top-tier agencies and clients. Most recently, she served as senior director of Sales, at Premion, Tegna’s OTT ad solution. Prior to that, she held management positions at Westwood One, Comcast Spotlight, and iHeartMedia, as well as running her own media consulting firm and graphic design company.

“Both Luigi and Charel have a tremendous amount of experience working for high-growth, digital-focused ad tech businesses, and will be a great asset to our expanding team,” said Sareen. “In addition, they will be instrumental in helping ZypMedia provide traditional media companies with the opportunity to offer OTT and digital media offerings to the hundreds of thousands of small businesses that they serve.”

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The investment – which will come through the joint company owned by the four parties, Digital UK – will help to build on Freeview Play through developments such as the launch of a mobile app, and improvement of content discoverability and navigation.

The new mobile app, launching later this year, will enable viewers to access live and on-demand content through Freeview Play on a range of smartphones and tablets. Meanwhile, Digital UK and Freeview will introduce a restart functionality to enable users to start from the beginning of a programme that they’ve joined midway through, as well as introducing voice search navigation.

 “As the UK’s TV landscape becomes increasingly impacted by global players, this new commitment from our shareholders is a major boost for UK viewers,” said Jonathan Thompson, CEO of Digital UK. “Building on this spirit of collaboration, we will not only safeguard free-to-view TV but reinvent it for a new age of viewing.”

It was recently reported that the BBC, ITV, Channel, and NBC Universal are in talks over the possibility of creating a British TV streaming service to dive deeper into the battle with Netflix and Amazon. However, these talks remain in their very early stages.

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The talks, which are believed to also include NBC Universal, are still in their early stages and no real direction has yet to be confirmed, The Guardian reports.

Several options are on the table in the discussions including using the BBC’s iPlayer as the master brand, creating an all-new video on-demand service, and the possibility of expanding BritBox – the ad-free subscription video on-demand service launched in the US at the end of 2016 by the BBC and ITV.

Should the group of broadcasters choose to go down the route of creating a new subscription service it would bear similarities to a project named ‘Kangaroo’ that they worked on way back in 2007.

Project Kangaroo was a video on-demand service from the BBC, ITV, and Channel that was eventually blocked by the UK’s Competition Commission in 2009 for being too much of a threat to the UK’s nascent video on-demand market.

Fast forward just under a decade and it looks like that decision was the wrong one – with the UK’s video on-demand market dominated by the US’s Netflix and Amazon Prime Video, which are subscribed to in 8.2m and 4.3m UK households respectively.

“With streaming services like NowTV, Amazon and Netflix racking up the subscribers, it won’t shock many that BBC, ITV, Channel 4 and potentially NBCU are considering pooling their combined power to launch a new service,” said Pauline Robson, Managing Partner at MediaCom. “The plan to join forces is interesting and isn’t something we’ve seen on this scale before. It won’t be easy to take a group of competitors and create a great joint service out of it but if it works, it’s a hugely positive move for the media industry and certainly for viewers.

“I’m sure the main streaming services are watching with interest but I wouldn’t expect a new service like this to spell an end to their growth – competition drives innovation and quality and the likes of Sky and Netflix aren’t short of either.

“For this new streaming partnership to reap any kind of success, though, it needs to create compelling content to rival the likes of Westworld and Stranger Things. Consumers are increasingly watching on-demand – our own research shows young people watch on-demand video most often, more than live TV. And with the impending launch of 5G, easier streaming access on smart TVs and a recent explosion in TV series culture, the timing could not be better. However, with Netflix’s focus on unique content and Amazon’s next-day delivery service tied in to their Prime Video offering, the British broadcasters will have to offer something very unique to fight alongside these behemoths.”

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Channel 4 will become the exclusive UK partner in the European Broadcaster Exchange (EBX), enabling advertisers to book pan-European campaigns across its All 4 streaming platform and equivalent services operated by Frances TF1, Germanys ProSiebenSat1 and Mediaset, which operates in Italy and Spain. According to EBX, the unified VOD services reach over 160m viewers a month.

Channel 4, which broadcasts Great British Bake Off, Catastrophe, First Dates and Gogglebox, has seen use of its All 4 service increase over 20 per cent year-on-year, to more than 60m monthly viewers. As part of joining EBX, the broadcaster has taken a 25 per cent stake in the joint venture for an undisclosed sum.

To accompany the news, Channel 4 has also announced that it is offering 100 per cent targeted advertising across All 4 across every channel, including mobile, tablet, games consoles and smart TVs. At its 2018 Upfronts event, the broadcaster revealed it will have first party data available for every All 4 viewer early next year after mandatory registration is introduced across all platforms, significantly increasing the scale of its personalisation and targeting capabilities.

“From next year every All 4 advertising opportunity will be personalised or targeted which has proven success for brands reflected in our double-digit year-on-year revenue growth for the last several years,” said Jonathan Lewis, head of digital and partnership innovation. “And All 4 continues to grow as record-breaking numbers of registered viewers loyally return to the biggest range of entertainment on any on-demand service available for free.”

“Channel 4s decision to run commercials across their video-on-demand services is a direct pushback to Facebook and Googles duopoly of digital advertising,” said Josh Krichefski, CEO of MediaCom UK. “Both companies – which must now be seen as media organisations as much as they are tech organisations – already eat up 90 per cent of every new £1 spent on digital advertising, and Channel 4s online video growth has opened up new possibilities to challenge the big hitters.

“This growth is reflective of a trend towards VOD services, not least among young people, where our research showed teens are watching TV on demand most often – more so than live TV. And Channel 4 can pull on a pool of content to take advantage of, including the likes of Great British Bake Off and Gogglebox to sate consumer demand of all ages.”

Join us at the 2017 Effective Mobile Marketing Awards Ceremony, taking place in London on Thursday 16 November, to mix with the industrys best and brightest, and raise a glass to the years best campaigns and solutions. To find out more, and to book your place, click here.

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The platform will enable donors to send a text message to donate either £5, £10, or £20 – which will be charged to their mobile phone bills – to the charity. It launches today (25 September) alongside Stand Up To Cancer’s Great Canoe Challenge, which sees a handful of people who have been affected by cancer row five marathons in five days, with a little help from celebrities along the way.

“We know that our supporters are increasingly keen to give via their mobile phones,” said Ana Maria Flores, senior programme manager for Stand Up to Cancer at Cancer Research UK. “In 2016, 80 per cent of donations to Stand Up To Cancer were text donations. It is important to us that we use the most reliable, robust and user-friendly mechanic possible to cater to this growing demand.”

Stand Up To Cancer has also teamed up with Bauer Media to broadcast shows across its portfolio of UK radio stations. These radio shows, along with on-screen programming, will be supported by the text-to-donate mechanic.

“Cancer Research UK clearly recognises the growing consumer trust in mobile payments and the simplicity of text-to-donate,” said Clare Charles, client director for media and charity at Fonix. “We’re looking forward to seeing the results and the difference that it makes to the Stand Up To Cancer campaign.”

If youd like to know how you can donate to Stand Up To Cancer, click here. If you want to know how you can get involved in fundraising of your own, click here.

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