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Deep Dive 10 min read
AMI CPD: 0.5
 

First they copied product, now they're lifting the whole playbook – and innovating harder: Private labels' $46bn strategic expansion has brands deeply worried
By Nadia Cameron - Editor - Marketing | Associate Publisher

Coles and Woolworths are among a growing and diverse set of retailers injecting hundreds of millions into private-label range expansion – not just for revenue growth, but customer stickiness, trust and loyalty. They’re no longer just chasing price-conscious consumers: Today’s own...
News Plus 6 min read
AMI CPD: 0.5
 

Striking reversal: Gen Z surge back to physical retail while boomers pile into ecom; Temu, Shein hit with swing from value to quality; 39% using AI chat search in purchase journey

By Paul McIntyre - Executive Editor

In a striking challenge to broad industry consensus that Gen Z and the younger set are the segments to watch for online shopping and entertainment trends, analysis of 1.5bn shoppers globally from aggregated Salesforce customer data should sound alarm bells...
Super Cannes ‘25 | Partnered by QMS 3 min read
 

‘If marketers play safe for fear of losing their job, they will lose it anyway’: McDonald’s, Kimberly-Clark, Philips CMOs on staying alive in marketing, what they want from agencies
By Brendan Coyne - Associate Editor

Three top marketers at McDonald’s, Kimberly-Clark and Philips suggest “creative business transformation” is the key to keeping industry alive – and that applies to agencies and consulting firms. Which means some operational and strategic tweaks. Plus the trio offered some...

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Industry Contributor 2 min read
 

AI transforms agency remuneration: Shift from time-based to value-driven models urgently required
By Jen Davidson - Managing Partner | Tumbleturn Marketing Advisory

Agency holding groups are piling into AI. Problem is, remuneration models haven't caught up. Without a major rethink about how agencies get paid by brands, expect more profit warnings, as
Super Cannes ‘25 | Partnered by QMS 5 min read
 

Zenith ANZ CEO Jason Tonelli flags gamers, influencers and creators - linked to centralised identity - the masterplan for Publicis Groupe’s alternative media ecosystem, with cheaper reach
By Paul McIntyre - Executive Editor

Publicis Groupe is building an alternative media and audience reach network to legacy media channels, leveraging the $650m in influencer and creator platform acquisitions it has made in the past year...
News Plus 3 min read
 

Hyland v Havas Media Australia: CEO Virginia Hyland exits, takes holdco to Federal Court over alleged breach of workplace rights
By Kalila Welch - Senior Journalist

UPDATED: Havas Media Australia chief Virginia Hyland is leaving the French holding company and lodged a Breach of General Protections claim with the Federal Court. The case in recent days...
News Plus 6 min read
AMI CPD: 0.5
 

‘We had those cuts, now we are hiring back creatives’: Prudential’s brand, creative VP on crucial AI lessons, 18 months in – and the mistakes to avoid
By Nadia Cameron - Editor - Marketing | Associate Publisher

Prudential’s story of adopting AI to improve brand creative and the content supply chain approach came from a place many marketing teams will be familiar with: How to do more...
Deep Dive 9 min read
AMI CPD: 1
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‘People’s jobs will be changed’: Salesforce global CMO on how AI agents are the new digital labour force, rapidly reshaping marketing; plus the ‘false precision’ of brand attribution
By Paul McIntyre & Brendan Coyne

It’s less than a year since Salesforce launched autonomous AI agents into the wild. But the bots are already reshaping business functions. In the US, online accounting platform 1-800 Accountants,...
Market Voice 3 min read
 

The future is direct: nurturing media through engaged audiences, not scrolling ghosts, as AI reshapes search
By Pippa Leary - Managing Director & Publisher Free News & Lifestyle, News Australia | Partner Content

AI-powered search is reshaping web economics, says News Australia’s Pippa Leary. Direct traffic is now crucial – but it is also eight times more valuable than anything gained from social...
News 2 min read
 

ARN and Mi3 join forces for new audio-podcast partnership
By Staff writer

ARN has teamed up with Mi3 as its official audio partner. Under the agreement, ARN’s iHeart will produce, create and distribute all Mi3’s podcasts, expanding the reach of Mi3’s leading...
News Plus 8 min read
 

Rogue agents: As CEOs pile into AI, IBM says autonomous bots ‘must be performance managed like humans’
By Andrew Birmingham - Martech | Ecom | CX Editor

There's a curious contradiction emerging in the way global CEOs are leaning into AI. IBM’s 32nd global CEO study reveals that almost two-thirds of chief executives believe they have no choice...
Industry Contributor 4 min read
 

The 60/40 rule is losing relevance, especially for challenger brands
By Lyndall Spooner - Founder & CEO, 5D

The 60/40 rule has value, but only when applied with nuance. When it becomes a one-size-fits-all template, it’s just lazy, says 5D Founder and CEO, Lyndall Spooner. Perhaps it’s time
News Plus 8 min read
 

Roids, rage, relevance: How an agency village went super granular via BVOD, YouTube and digital OOH to hit swing voters in federal election
By Kalila Welch - Senior Journalist

If you think media has gone nuts over the last five years, try running a federal election campaign. It’s a five-week vortex of everything the industry is grappling with “but...
Industry Contributor 3 min read
 

How Cloudflare’s move to block AI crawlers changes the game for content creators – and could scupper synthetic research
By Nico Neumann - Associate Professor | Melbourne Business School | Founder, marketingscience.today

Cloudflare's move to block AI crawlers by default has massive implications, says Melbourne Business School Associate Professor Nico Neumann. The winners? Content creators. The likely losers? Those relying on synthetic
News Plus 10 min read
 

‘My brief was blow shit up’: Why The Iconic cut performance budget for brand and averted crisis – loyalty, retail media, MMM incoming
By Andrew Birmingham - Martech | Ecom | CX Editor

When Joanna Robinson walked into The Iconic as (she assumed) an interim CMO, she inherited a brand running out of road. Sales were down, brand equity was in retreat, and...
News Plus 7 min read
AMI CPD: 0.5
 

Fear, loathing and existential crisis: CMOs at Ikea, The Iconic, IBM plus Thinkerbell, EY on AI adoption – and where next
By Nadia Cameron - Editor - Marketing | Associate Publisher

Being perceived as a cheat or doing something wrong by bringing AI into your work, naggy cognitive bias against change, wanting to belong and feel valued – these very real...
News Plus 9 min read
 

NOW Finance marries brand strategy and martech overhaul to drive triple-digit gains in brand consideration and preference
By Andrew Birmingham - Martech | Ecom | CX Editor

A comedian, a CRM overhaul, and a contrarian brand stance walk into a bar ... NOW Finance is delivering double and triple-digit brand lifts without triple-digit budgets. Boosting awareness consideration, and...
Super Cannes ‘25 | Partnered by QMS 3 min read
 

Did somebody say just slop? The 24 hour AI-built brand that ranked in System1’s top 10%

By Brendan Coyne - Associate Editor

Three of the world's top ten advertisers just generated hundreds of thousands of assets via AI at a fraction of the cost and time humans require, with a claimed 40...
News Plus 6 min read
AMI CPD: 0.5
 

‘It all starts from product marketing’: $6.2bn Airwallex global CMO says product marketing first, then brand and performance – and the big VCs are buying in
By Nadia Cameron - Editor - Marketing | Associate Publisher

B2B marketers are being told to regear marketing to a hefty brand orientation, but Airwallex VP, global marketing Jon Stona says there’s a third leg to making marketing pay...

Super Cannes ‘25 | Partnered by QMS 10 min read
AMI CPD: 1
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Super Cannes 25: Suncorp’s Brand, CX boss Mim Haysom on influencers; Why EY Parthenon says risk and creative works for c-suite and Tassal’s Matt Vince is thinking global

By Paul McIntyre & Brendan Coyne

Amid a Cannes festival heaving with influencers striking corporate deals, and an officially unspoken nervousness about what comes next, EY Parthenon's Karen Crum, an ex-genetic scientist and global strategy lead...
News Plus 5 min read
AMI CPD: 0.5
 

Hiring up, pay packets fatter, commercial growth marketers in hot demand as corporate sentiment turns – Perceptor jobs and salary review shows market gaps opening up
By Nadia Cameron - Editor - Marketing | Associate Publisher

Global reports of mass job cuts from AI are getting more frequent. Trump’s tariffs rattled markets. But closer to home, Perceptor’s new Market Trends & Salary Review shows AI hasn’t...
Super Cannes ‘25 | Partnered by QMS 10 min read
AMI CPD: 1
 

'The most important advertising thinking in 10 years': Ritson says System1-Effies database fusion cracks code on 12x profit multiplier from running distinctive, emotional ads longer
By Brendan Coyne - Associate Editor

"Avoid the pornography of change" was virtual Professor Mark Ritson's take on research by System1's Andrew Tindall that he thinks deserves a place in the marketing effectiveness pantheon of greats...
News Plus 8 min read
 

‘Go niche or go broke’: Commercial pressure hits general publishers hardest as platforms renege on deals, forcing revenue diversification scramble
By Kalila Welch - Senior Journalist

Social platforms are where Australians increasingly look to get their news fix, per the University of Canberra’s Digital News Report 2025, but squeezed publishers hoping to monetise those growing social...
Super Cannes ‘25 | Partnered by QMS 5 min read
AMI CPD: 0.5
 

Lots of little bits of attention: Analytic Partners’ Grace Kite, Jellyfish’s Tom Roach challenge ad wear-out, attention playbook as algorithms dictate new terms

By Brendan Coyne - Associate Editor

Packaging up lots of fragmented audience channels with consumer attention thresholds lower than what many say is effective - including the work from Dr Karen Nelson-Field and Amplified Intelligence -...
Deep Dive 6 min read
AMI CPD: 1
 

The CMO Awards Podcast Ep7: Uber, Guzman y Gomez CMOs reveal what makes their distinct marketing approaches effective
By Nadia Cameron - Editor - Marketing | Associate Publisher

Guzman y Gomez's Lara Thom and Uber's Andy Morley don't exactly have the same role and remit, even if they both bear the title of CMO. They don’t own the same...
Super Cannes ‘25 | Partnered by QMS 5 min read
AMI CPD: 0.5
 

Creators v ads and the attention v branding dilemma: Lessons from Alix Earle’s tie-up with soda challenger Poppi and Pepsi’s $2bn acquisition

By Paul McIntyre - Executive Editor

Pepsi completed its $1.95bn acquisition of pre-biotic US soda challenger brand Poppi in May with all the fanfare of a new shiny breakthrough coveted by the marketing profession – creator-influencer...
News Plus 7 min read
AMI CPD: 0.5
 

ACCC targets unsolicited selling, lead gen – especially on social media – as impatience with government on Privacy Act wears thin
By Nadia Cameron - Editor - Marketing | Associate Publisher

A fresh consultation paper released by the ACCC on unsolicited selling and lead generation practices triggered by a new designated complaints framework has raised eyebrows given the parallel agenda it...
Deep Dive 9 min read
AMI CPD: 0.5
 

LLM scraper bots are crunching brand, publisher search; IAB Tech Lab plots global coalition of the willing for ‘cost-per-crawl’ payments as viable open web ‘coming to a close’

By Brendan Coyne - Associate editor

The IAB’s Tech Lab arm is trying to rapidly deploy a framework that helps publishers – and brands – stay viable as search engines are displaced by AI-based answer engines...
Super Cannes ‘25 | Partnered by QMS 6 min read
 

'This is Google’s playbook’: Trade Desk global revenue chief warns advertisers on Amazon’s booming DSP as ACCC seeks special powers forcing Google to share data and pricing, open YouTube, search inventory to rivals
By Paul McIntyre - Executive Editor

The open web’s only challenger to Google – and increasingly Amazon – in automated advertising trading exchanges has warned Amazon’s powering global ad business is lifting Google’s strategy by luring advertisers...
News Plus 8 min read
 

‘Go niche or go broke’: Commercial pressure hits general publishers hardest as platforms renege on deals, forcing revenue diversification scramble
By Kalila Welch - Senior Journalist

Social platforms are where Australians increasingly look to get their news fix, per the University of Canberra’s Digital News Report 2025, but squeezed publishers hoping to monetise those growing social...

Mi3 Special Report:

Marketing & Customer Benchmarks: FY2025 Outlook

  • Three-speed marketing economy emerges for budget settings
  • B2B execs markedly upbeat v B2C peers
  • Customer Lifetime Value (CLV) surges in future KPIs
  • NPS retreats
  • More in-housing & simplification coming for advisors, agencies
  • AI: top five uses cases now and next
  • Swing to performance marketing from brand investment
  • "Brand" remains top KPI with CLV
  • 18 marketers vox pop their top personal - not professional - CX moments, brand campaigns and loyalty programs they actually use. And do they actually "love" any brands... surprising

Three-speed marketing economy emerges. Remit creep, complexity crunch, KPIs shift, advisor-agencies consolidate. Read all about it in a new benchmark series for marketers and marketing.

DOWNLOAD THE REPORT HERE

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Marketing & Customer Benchmarks: FY2025 Outlook

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