Snapchat is adding community conversations under the header Topic Chats. Aiming to stimulate public discourse on news, events and other trending topics, Snap will be aggregating the threads across the app in the coming weeks for users in the U.S., Canada and New Zealand. Chat shortcuts, search, the Stories page, and Spotlight videos will feature “a big yellow button” that says “Join the Chat” inviting users to the parley. Profiles will stay private to those who a user is not friends with, a feature intended to help avoid unwanted friend requests and direct messages. “This is new for Snapchat, because we’ve primarily focused on supporting private conversations rather than public ones,” Snap notes. Continue reading Snapchat Is Testing Public Conversations with ‘Topic Chats’

Amazon announced yesterday that its Prime Video service is introducing location-based interactive video advertisements in the U.S., allowing local businesses to reach target audiences in specific areas. The ad unit, Interactive Video Ads (IVA), will help advertisers customize national TV commercials with location-specific content such as local pricing and nearest business details based on state data and ZIP codes. The new format, expected to intensify the growing competition between streaming services and broadcasters, is part of a larger effort to bring more small businesses and local buyers to CTV. It also arrives as major streamers, including Prime Video, are pursuing new models such as pause ads. Continue reading Location-Based Interactive Video Ads Coming to Prime Video

Snap Inc. has secured San Francisco-based Perplexity as its new partner in artificial intelligence, with Perplexity’s AI-powered answer engine to become an in-app feature of social service Snapchat starting in early 2026. Snapchat’s community of over 943 million monthly active users will be able to converse with Perplexity, asking questions and getting “clear, conversational answers drawn from verifiable sources,” Snap explains. Perplexity will pay Snap $400 million over the next year through a combination of cash and equity, gaining access to Snap’s mobile-native audience, comprised of more than 75 percent of 13–34-year-olds in over 25 countries. Continue reading Perplexity Deal Will Bring Conversational AI to Snapchat App

Amazon Ads and iHeartMedia are expanding their partnership with a new programmatic audio offering that lets Amazon DSP advertisers access iHeart’s streaming audio portfolio. Advertisers using Amazon DSP can now extend their omnichannel campaigns across iHeart’s streaming audio portfolio to connect with listeners across devices like smartphones, smart speakers, tablets, game consoles and more. Access to iHeartPodcasts and broadcast radio stations will follow in 2026. The deal “brings Amazon’s trillions of shopping, streaming, and browsing signals together with iHeart’s millions of listeners across streaming audio for meaningful reach at scale,” Amazon says. Continue reading Amazon, iHeartMedia Target Programmatic Audio Streaming

Netflix is substituting a new metric for advertising reach, the monthly active viewer, or MAV, which quantifies the number of viewers gathering around the screen. This replaces the monthly active user (MAU) measurement, which measures by account, something Netflix feels is less accurate for the purpose of media buyers. “Our move to viewers means we can give a more comprehensive count of how many people are actually on the couch,” including friends and family, says Netflix President of Advertising Amy Reinhard. The streamer is also experimenting with dynamic ad templates that use mix-and-match creative elements based on viewer behaviors. Continue reading Netflix Offers Advertisers New Metric: Monthly Active Viewers

Spotify passed 700 million monthly active users in Q3, with subscribers hitting 281 million, a 12 percent increase over the same period in 2024. Total revenue was $4.9 billion, up 12 percent year-over-year, while net income surged 200 percent to $1 billion, attributed to price hikes, subscriber growth and strict cost management. The Swedish company surpassed analyst expectations on both the top and bottom lines. Revenue from premium subscriptions grew 9 percent in Q3. Advertising revenue for the period was down 6 percent, however, to about $515 million. Spotify recently integrated with ChatGPT so that users can get podcast and music recommendations from the popular chatbot. Continue reading Spotify’s Profits Surge 200 Percent for Q3, Topping $1 Billion

Amazon Q3 revenue was up 13 percent to $180.2 billion in the third quarter, compared with $158.9 billion in 2024. The AWS group that includes AI saw sales increase 20 percent year-over-year to $33 billion. The company reported that gross profit increased 38 percent to $21.2 billion for the quarter, due largely to consumer spending online and the demand for cloud computing. Amazon is the dominant player in the cloud space with about 30 percent of global share. However, investors have been cautious about AWS, which accounted for 65 percent of the company’s total operating income in Q3. Since 2022, competition has heated up with OpenAI’s ChatGPT signing on with Microsoft Azure. Continue reading AWS, Cloud and AI Help Drive Impressive Quarter for Amazon

Alphabet has notched its first $100 billion-plus quarter, with revenue of $102.35 billion, a 16 percent increase for the period ending September 30. The result exceeded analyst estimates of $99.89 billion. CEO Sundar Pichai noted the results marked a 100 percent increase in Q3 revenue since 2020, when it was $50 billion. “We’re firmly in the generative AI era,” Nadella said, noting diversification “with successful businesses in Cloud, YouTube and subscriptions.” The company was onboard with the trend in increased spending, upping its capital expenditure range from $85 billion to $91 billion – $93 billion for 2025. Continue reading Cloud and AI Drive Alphabet to First $100 Billion-Plus Quarter

Meta Platforms shares fell by more than 7 percent despite record revenue of $51.2 billion in an adverse reaction to accelerated AI spending. Sales were up 26 percent year-over-year, but net income of $2.7 billion was far below analysts’ expectations. The company attributed the net income miss to accounting changes resulting from the One Big Beautiful Bill Act even as it advised analysts of “aggressive” capital expenditure increases to come. Meta’s 2025 capital expenditure forecast grew from the existing estimate of $66 billion to $72 billion. Most of that will be spent on data centers and researchers, Meta said, indicating 2026 capex would be “notably larger” and could reach as high as $100 billion. Continue reading Meta Reports Sales Increase, Record Revenue of $51.2 Billion

London-based global marketing giant WPP has launched WPP Open Pro, a new edition of its flagship AI marketing platform, WPP Open, aimed at attracting “brands of all sizes” and helping them to plan, create and publish campaigns independently. The product stems from the Gemini-powered AI platform WPP built with Google — a relationship that has been extended by five years and includes a $400 million WPP spending commitment. The spend will drive WPP’s mission to expand the use of AI in its services and technologies. “This partnership will empower WPP clients with groundbreaking AI solutions, transforming how they connect with audiences and achieve business goals,” according to WPP. Continue reading WPP Rolls Out Open Pro AI and Extends Its Deal with Google

Amazon Web Services is building-out its programmatic ad offerings with AWS RTB Fabric, designed to optimize the high-speed, high-volume real-time bidding (RTB) auctions that power programmatic advertising for Amazon Ads and the company’s AdTech partners. The product has been in beta testing with select partners for months and now becomes “generally available,” deployed from North Virginia and Oregon in the U.S. East and West, and Singapore, Tokyo, Germany and Ireland, serving nearby areas with what AWS says is “single-digit millisecond latency” through a private, high-performance network. The idea is to make programmatic ad-buying cheaper and more efficient. Continue reading Amazon Bows AWS RTB Fabric for Programmatic Advertising

Netflix revenue grew 17 percent to $11.5 billion in Q3 versus the same period a year earlier, driven by membership growth along with price hikes and an increase in ad revenue. Net profit was up by almost 8 percent for the quarter to $2.5 billion, versus the $2.98 billion that was expected. The quarter was Netflix’s best-ever for ad sales, with that revenue expected to more than double this year over 2024. The new user interface it began rolling out in May is now available to 85 percent of TV devices and the company is beta testing an AI-powered “conversational search experience.” Continue reading Netflix Highlights Tech and Innovation in Q3 Earnings Report

DirecTV is bringing user interaction to its screensavers, which will offer things like shoppable ads, powered by generative AI shopping platform firm Glance AI. The experience will begin rolling out next year to DirecTV subscribers using Google Gemini TV devices. Glance AI says it developed the technology in conjunction with Google. Among the uses are “creating an AI feed of your favorite sports leagues on your idle-screens or helping your kids discover their next dream vacation.” Overall, Glance AI on TV will offer users the opportunity “to engage with content from hundreds of top American brands and millions of catalogs.” Continue reading DirecTV Partnering with Glance AI for Interactive Screensavers

YouTube is implementing a new Activation Partners program to help advertisers achieve better outcomes in CTV campaigns. The program connects brands, advertisers and agencies with approved third-party experts specializing in YouTube media buys, including campaign planning and management. The program aims to help marketers discover new resources that have been pre-vetted by Google, expanding perspectives and tapping alternative expertise by tapping a “collection of trusted third-party partners” that the social video company hopes will “help advertisers get the best results out of their work with YouTube.” Continue reading YouTube’s Activation Partners Program Supports Advertisers

Meta Platforms is launching new AI features including Business AI, a new sales concierge service that aims to guide customers “from discovery to purchase” with AI-powered messaging agents appearing on Meta ads, threads and your company’s website. Meta is launching the Meta AI business assistant, an AI chat experience that will help optimize campaign targeting and resolve account issues, via Ads Manager and Business Support Home. There are also new generative video tools and expanded access to Meta’s creator discovery APIs to matchmake businesses with influencers and other grassroots partners. The news was shared as marketers convene for Advertising Week New York. Continue reading Meta Boosts AI Ad Tools: Adds Brand Chatbots, Creator APIs