Welcome to Scout! Each week, our team tracks down the best digital marketing articles, POVs, and reports—so you don’t have to. Here’s what to read from the week of 10/28/22 – 11/3/22 to stay ahead of the curve:

It’s been just days since Elon Musk officially purchased Twitter, but boy has he been busy: Fire CEO and top executives? Check. Give the directive to investigate reviving Vine? Check. Convene with concerned advertisers to discuss brand safety? Check. Post a tweet that links to a site known to publish fake news? …Also check. Where to from here? Who the heck knows.

In other brand safety news: Apple faced some severe outcry when they allowed gambling ads to appear under apps designed to help users overcome gambling addiction. It’s a brand safety hiccup that perhaps speaks to Apple’s relative lack of experience managing an ad platform.

As the holidays approach, brands are grappling with the realities of inflation (see: Amazon predicting its lowest holiday sales growth ever). For their holiday campaign, Kohl’s has opted to face it head-on: They’re running with the tagline “More Gifts. More Savings.” They’re also leveraging social media creators to craft content surrounding savings hacks, as well as shoppable influencer gift guides via a mobile-focused strategy.

This year, US programmatic video ad spend is forecast to hit $62.96 billion (that’s up more than $10 billion from last year!) For advertisers in need of a refresher on how to make the most of this channel, this piece is for you.

Speaking of digital video: All eyes are on Netflix as their ad-supported tier launches on November 3. Though their COO and chief product officer told investors there has been “very strong” demand for ad inventory leading up to the launch, only time will tell if the platform will be able to give advertisers what they want.

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