Agency news
The Ad Council launched a $50 million fund for a national COVID-19 vaccine education effort. It also rolled out the next phase of its COVID-19 education campaign, which addresses the mental health toll of the pandemic.
Jimmy John’s appointed Anomaly as its creative agency of record.
Amsterdam-based digital creative agency Dept acquired U.S. design agency Basic.
The One Club and the School of Visual Communications launched 2nd Skill, a training program for creatives to skill up on UX, UI and digital content strategy.
PMG added 12 new hires to its creative team -- including five -- from The Richards Group to join its Dallas office.
On the move
Changing the tires: Ford tapped former Ebay CMO Suzy Deering as its new global CMO, and Audi promoted its communications officer Tara Rush to CMO in the U.S.
Celestine Maddy has joined Pinterest as Global Head of Consumer Marketing.
BBH chairman and global chief strategy officer Sarah Watson is leaving to pursue a coaching career.
Jay Askinasi rejoined Publicis Groupe as U.S. chief growth officer after a stint at Xandr.
Shutterstock appointed Aiden Darné as head of global production for Shutterstock Studios, the company’s new creative arm.
LA-based creative agency Battery hired former 72andsunny exec Danielle Tarris as head of production.
Creative and technology studio Preymaker hired Jasper Kidd, Alan McSeveney and Jamie Scott.
Production agency m ss ng p eces brought on AR creator Asad J. Malik, artist Ash Baccus-Clark, and creative collective Hexagram to its immersive directorial roster.
Visual IQ co-founder and CEO Manu Mathew joined Ad-Lib as president, Americas and board member.
Adjust named Katie Madding chief product officer and Bill Kiriakis as chief revenue officer.
Tech download
Data provider Experian bought cross-device data company Tapad for $280 million.
Acxiom partnered with Cadent as its preferred TV data activation provider.
Adobe expanded support for B2B marketers in its CDP by allowing brands to create, manage and activate unified consumer profiles.
Narrative partnered with Killi to offer compliant first-party data to its customers.
In the media
Snap has launched its TikTok competitor, Spotlight, its first-ever video sharing feature, and will shell out up to $1 million a day to creators making viral content.
Speaking of viral content, influencer Charli D’Amelio is the first person to hit over 100 million followers on TikTok.
YouTube suspended conservative news network One America News from its ad-revenue sharing program for promoting a fake cure for Covid-19.
Instagram introduced updates to its branded content features, including adding branded content tags to Reels and Instagram Live, allowing brands to post branded content ads without creators posting organically first, and adding branded content pins and tappable elements, such as locations and hashtags, to Stories.
Twitter will show users a warning label if they try to like a flagged tweet.
‘Tis the season
Why shouldn’t Black Friday extend to B2B services? The Variable is offering Black Friday deals on creative concept development, innovation sprint sessions and more as part of its “Year to Forget” holiday event.
The National Retail Federation predicts that holiday shopping sales will increase between 3.6% to 5.2% this year, despite COVID-19.
The show must go on. Macy’s will host its 94th annual Thanksgiving Day Parade this year with no spectators, but a live airing on NBC and Telemundo.
Facebook kicked off its Season of Giving holiday campaign. It will match up to $7 million in donations to U.S. nonprofits made through Facebook on Giving Tuesday.
Walmart will feature shoppable recipes in a holiday special of Struggle Meals, an original series from Tastemade.
DoorDash added a gifting feature to allow people to send each other food for the holidays.
Old Spice will host a virtual white elephant holiday game on Instagram. The grand prize: a mancave, valued at $13,000, decked out with a custom Old Spice billiards table, a 75-inch flat screen TV and Old Spice swag.
Nikon will make its online photography classes available for free until Dec. 31.
Ferrero Golden Gallery Signature is hosting virtual holiday activations including a tasting with Pastry chef Zac Young on Instagram Live.
Bumble launched a resource for online daters during the pandemic.
Pornhub is bringing back its premium lifetime membership on Black Friday.
Brand Buzz
HomeGoods will launch an e-commerce platform in the second half of 2021.
Jennifer Aniston joined Vital Proteins as chief creative officer, where she will help with product development and brand strategy.
HBO and Verizon Media teamed up on a first of its kind AR branded entertainment partnership for the launch of season two of His Dark Materials.
Spotify Studios and UM teamed up with the US Postal Service to tell bite-sized stories about POSTAL workers that have impacted their communities. The 60-second stories will be hosted by Gimlet’s Jonathan Goldstein and run within Spotify podcasts.
For Good
Triscuit launched “The Missing Ingredients Project” with a commitment of more than $1 million over the next three years to support expanding access to food across the U.S.
Safeguard, the soap brand from Procter & Gamble, has teamed up with creative agency Canvas to provide U.S. schools with a hand hygiene lesson plan that teaches students proper hand washing habits. Singer Meghan Trainor will surprise five teachers on Zoom with Safeguard sanitizer and a $1,000 gift card for their classrooms.
McDonald’s is launching #HereForRMHC, a social media challenge to drive support for the Ronald McDonald House Charities, in which it will donate $100 for every person who posts the RMHC heart on social media until it hits $100 million over the next five years. Chrissy Teigen and John Legend will support the program on their social channels.
The Google News Initiative launched the GNI Ad Transformation Lab, a program to help Black and Latino-owned news organizations advance their digital and programmatic advertising capabilities.