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Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Hello
and welcome back to Inside
Marketing with Market Surge.
Today we're diving deep into the
intersection of data privacy and
performance in the ads world.
My guest is Ollie James,
CEO of ad attribution.
a next gen ad tech company supplying
high quality audience data for connected
tv, mobile, and desktop campaigns.
on a mission to help brands prove
ROI without breaking consumer trust.
And in an era where cookies are crumbling
and privacy laws are tightening, that
mission couldn't be more relevant.
Before leading attribution,
cut his teeth at rock ad the
identity resolution pioneer.
And manage strategic clients like
Apple, iTunes, and American Express.
What sets him apart is his ability
to turn complex ad tech into
commercial clarity, helping brands
not just collect data, but actually
use it responsibly and profitably.
So grab your notebook because
this one's packed with actionable
insights for marketers, founders
and growth leaders alike.
welcome to the show.
Ollie James: So much for having me.
Thank you for that introduction.
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah.
Well, my pleasure.
I, you've, you have a very
impressive resume and you know,
excited to hear your insights.
Now, one thing that I know you emphasize
is helping clients, maybe non-technical
marketers understand complex technology.
What would you say is
the secret to turning.
Complex technical topics into
you know, clear understandings
with these kinds of clients.
You know, I think that's something
that a lot of us struggle with.
Ollie James: It's really tricky and
I struggle with it myself because
we live in this world of acronyms.
And the trouble is with
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yes.
Ollie James: is that PE the acronyms means
different things to different people.
And I really struggle.
And I think one of the key things
is to try and simplify things as
much as possible and try to at least
clarify what the acronym means in the
conversation when you bring one up.
So when we're talking about roas,
then it's the return on advertising
spend versus, you know, some other
person's understanding of what it is.
And, and all of these I mean, in
my world I work sort of primarily
in the programmatic world and we.
You know, SSPs and DSPs and all
sorts of wonderful wonderful
different entities that interact
with each other during this place.
So I think that's the first key point
is to, when you're discussing something,
is to try and dial down on the acronyms
and assume that as a really smart guy
called is Keith Fagan, who is the chief
product Officer at Sovereign Who are
a partner Of ours over in the States.
And I had, I had dinner with him
once and he said, Ali, explain.
This to me, like I'm a 5-year-old
and it stopped me in my tracks.
'cause I then really realized like,
actually I'm not sure I can, and
if I can't, that means I don't
really deeply, deeply understand
the topic that we're talking about.
So I always hark back to what Keith was
saying about this oversimplification
because you get a lot of people in a room
that just kind of nod and pretend they
understand or, or won't stop or don't
feel they have the confidence to kind
of interject and say, I'm really sorry.
Can you just kind of unpack that
and dive a bit deeper into it?
So yeah, I harp back to
Keith's words on that one.
Explain, try to explain
everything like I'm a 5-year-old
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah.
Ollie James: get to,
the nib of the subject.
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah, no, I,
that's, that's a great rule of thumb,
you know, and, and I think earlier
in my career I was the one nodding
along frequently and, and I think
that over time that it is definitely
more valuable to you know, if you feel
like the 5-year-old in the room on the
technical topics, I think it's fair to.
You know, it's a good exercise in
humility, but it's a good almost pushback
to see like how well they understand it.
You know, like, can you,
can you clarify that for me?
You know, and I think it makes
for a fruitful discussion too.
I think that's worthwhile.
Ollie James: other one is the
is to try and use analogies
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah.
Ollie James: well if you can.
There was a, there's a great marketer,
a friend of Michael Briany Thomas, who
would describe, she would say like.
Use an analogy, like how would
you steal your neighbor's cat in
terms of marketing, and relate that
to how you draw an audience in.
And it's like, you don't go and try
and chase the cat around the garden.
You don't go with a box
and try and stuff it in.
Um, you leave a little, breadcrumb trail,
a little food, and you carefully entice
and you put marketing into this great
analogy of stealing your neighbor's cat
This cat and opened the cage and it runs
back across the garden to your neighbor.
But you gotta keep that cat AKA that
customer, you know, very happily curled
up on your sofa to say, you know,
it's now your cat, AKA your customer.
So that was a wonderful way she
used this analogy to describe
sort of marketing in general.
So I would think that another
one, and it stuck with me.
I thought that's always, 'cause
that's an approach to marketing and
it encompasses so much of what we
do and how to do it and the nuances
of actually winning a new customer.
And keeping hold of them.
So I thought that was a great one.
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge:
I, I like that a lot.
I might be borrowing that in the future.
I think, you know, and, you
know, I can totally envision.
You know how cats are so skittish and
they, you know, they are of course,
afraid and, but also motivated by
food and, you know, so you have
to figure out the balance between
trust and motivation and that's,
Ollie James: and we want
to keep hold of them.
and that's the key, isn't it?
And that sort of customer loyalty play.
People think of marketing
as just that top of funnel.
I mean, if you must use funnel as
an analogy, then, you know, but
actually people come out of the
bottom, and we lose customers right
the way down, at every single stage.
So, yeah, the cat, the cat one's fun.
Keep it on the sofa.
Warm, happy, and
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: yes.
Ollie James: not wanting to get
back out there to see what's in your
other neighbor or down the road.
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Right.
Well, good.
Good lessons about retention in that.
Ollie James: that.
You can pack into a simple analogy of
like stealing a cat and uh, I think
that really helps break that down and
you can apply that to technical terms.
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah.
Ollie James: out and maybe try and
sort of things into objects and
connect those objects together.
That's often a quite a good way in terms
of when you're explaining technical
subjects, is to get the, we used to
call it object orientated engineering
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Mm-hmm.
Ollie James: back in the day
where you would have object one.
How does that interact with object?
Two, and then draw the diagram,
and then suddenly, people can see
the infrastructure that's behind
it and the flow of a journey.
and always have the user, and
always have the advertiser.
And then if you can show how those
connections between those two, like
physically and as simply as you
can, as if you're explaining it to a
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Mm-hmm.
Ollie James: if a five
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah.
Ollie James: your class at
school, the first thing that
the teacher does is pick up.
a whiteboard marker.
I mean, these days I guess they
use a computer and a screen.
But essentially that visualization
of processes and interconnectivity
of the different elements of
technology is often a really good
way to help people understand what
it is that you're talking about.
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah.
And well, I like what you're saying
too about using, you know, with
the same client or same group.
at a client you use different, uh,
teaching methods, you know, so maybe
you've got the allegory and then you've
got the, uh, object visualization
on the whiteboard or the hands-on,
like, let's diagram this together.
You know, there's definitely
a lot of different value.
I actually find this topic really
interesting and I can tell you've thought
about this a lot but maybe let's apply
this to, another concept that I know
you're an expert in is, attribution.
Now, big question every marketer has, or
every business executive has is how do you
attribute, you know, what marketing spend
ad spend, results in the greatest return?
Now, you know, one thing that
we, always consider is that.
The ad isn't always the only touch
point that an individual has with,
you know, in a purchase journey.
And so but sometimes it's hard to figure
out what are the other touch points, and
how influential other touchpoint were.
Tell us a little bit about how you
think through attribution and, maybe
how you describe it to customers
that have that same question.
Ollie James: Sure.
I mean, I'd spent, my journey back in
2002, my career journey at Trade Doubler,
which is one of the Europeans, which was
the European biggest affiliate network.
So in an affiliate business,
an advertiser pays a publisher.
A commission from the action that's driven
through that publisher carrying the ad.
So you know, in the UK we have the
Telegraph the times, or we click on an
ad, we go through to an e-commerce store,
we buy something, and then the publisher
gets a commission from the advertiser
via the affiliate network for that sale.
I spent six years there,
using cookies which is a kind
of a packet of information.
It's like a barcode, that is
downloaded to the user's machine.
And we're able to read that barcode at
the end of the transaction to see whether
or not it was driven by a publisher.
And those cookies were going away and now
it doesn't look like they are going away.
I'm talking about Google Chrome, which
is one of the biggest web browsers.
we're deprecate the third party cookie
and say, Hey, you're not allowed to
drop this barcode, this sort of scanning
reflector, onto people's computers
anymore because there are privacy issues.
And they decided actually in the
end that they were gonna continue.
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Hmm.
Ollie James: we either tracked
the sale or the transaction
in session, so we would pass.
Bunch of code from the publisher to
the advertiser website and read that,
but that doesn't work when the user is
crossing over from their mobile device.
As you said, we've got this multi-touch
point of attribution, right?
So someone can see an ad on their phone
and they move across to their iPad.
They then walk past a billboard
and they see that again.
They get a friend of theirs, sees the
ad, and talks to 'em about it on the bus.
So you get that kind of referral
or you get, email marketing.
I was chatting to Sue Cat.
Chaplain from ESB Connect the other
day about her email marketing company.
And how that is a part of driving a sale.
And we say, what is it?
Seven to 10 to 12 touchpoints
before a user is actually
converted into a customer.
They have to see things, more
than once on multiple Devices
in order to actually transact.
And of course, on the flip side of
that, you get people that just see
an ad and buy it straight away, so it
doesn't apply to But the more considered
the purchase is, what I mean by that
is the more kind of expensive it is.
And it's more basic term.
If you're buying a car or you're buying
a family holiday, the more considered
that purchase is, the more touch points
you will find people interact with.
The more value that needs to
be added along that chain.
So it, it's the holiday review website
with a deep article on the destination
that you want to visit probably has a lot
more impact than the coupon site does.
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Hmm.
Ollie James: money off the taxi
when you get your airport taxi
or transfer when you get there.
So it depends on the kind of transaction,
the kind of things that are people buying
as to what helps and where the value lies.
But it's very.
we've not solved it.
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Hmm.
Ollie James: And of course, I was talking
to Andrew Litner yesterday about, he works
for a company called Brand Metrics and
we were talking about brand lift and how
you can measure that and the impact of a
brand can affect somebody's decision to
purchase, which we can't track online.
I can't say that if somebody is
a brand loyal person, they see an
ad once they go through and click.
Is it the publisher
that was holding the ad?
Was it a Google search Result
that sent it, was it chat GPT?
Was it one of these LLMs, these
AI agents that have suggested
that you visit this website?
Or was it because that brand
has just, you know, if you're a
snowboarder and you like your Burton
Snowboard brand within snowboarding,
and I'm a bit of a fan boy of.
Burton and yeah, I might see an ad,
but I knew I was gonna buy that Burton
jacket, albeit that the last one I bought
was a retro jacket that's like 20 years
old on eBay because I just, I really
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Wow.
Ollie James: buttons down the front of it.
So it wasn't that Burton have
particularly sold me on this massive.
Technical jacket.
It was just because I love
that old school brand.
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Mm-hmm.
Ollie James: that to say that,
that eBay ad converted me.
So brand has a, has a big impact on it.
And you can use, like you asked me about
the tools you have, you know, the Google
analytics will always claim that it's
search activity was responsible for
driving a hundred and it, and that they
want all of the value and, and everybody's
trying to get a piece of that pie and,
certainly with my company, we're trying
to provide the data layer that is able to
say, yeah, this person saw the ad across
their different devices and in this place
and try and help inform that decision.
Although I can't, think anybody,
whether we will ever be able to truly
look Behind that attribution story and
say where in this, elements created
the value that led to the conversion?
And then which elements were most valuable
and most important in driving that sale,
I think is of whether or not I've just set
myself up for this impossible hiding year
because, because it's an impossible thing.
But we can try and we can, we can
take inferences from the data that
we have, And use just a bit of, of
our common sense, and I think if.
comes down to a certain extent to quality.
And if we can make sure that we're
improving quality within that chain and
we have a really well-written email,
for example, if you're using email
marketing or we have a really great piece
of creative, we, we don't outsource.
Our copywriting to an AI agent.
We don't outsource creative to an AI
agent, and we keep that human in the loop
and we use the agencies and the really
smart people that the strategists within
our, our agencies and, and the senior, the
CMOs at brands, and I think that's the way
we can, um, ensure that what we're doing
is worthwhile rather than kind of worrying
too much about this whole big chain.
and which piece of it
was most influential.
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: yeah.
Well, you know, that's a great overview.
You know, the big question, I mean,
there's a lot of big questions,
but AI obviously has introduced
some additional complexity here.
You know, we're probably not too far
away from AI allowing us to advertise
directly on the platform, but for
now, like chat GPT, for instance,
already I know a lot of marketers are
trying to, improve their placement in
AI answers with certain techniques.
What kinds of data and, How has the
impact of ai, how has that changed, your
role in, helping define the attribution?
People are using it more and more.
They're doing different
kinds of searching.
there's a huge adoption cycle.
we were just talking about before
the call started there's a potential
bubble where things might be turned
on their head, Tell us a little bit
about how AI plays in the work you do.
Ollie James: There's a number
of different elements with it.
So we have identity data, so we
have lots of identifiers, IDs that
we take from sort of mobile devices
and well all your different devices.
Then we look at online activities
such as the time with which an ad was
clicked on, it's called a timestamp.
And we grab that 'cause that
timestamp is really, really long and
therefore it's unique essentially.
When, and we tie that to an ad ID or a
mobile id, and we build an idea of a user,
a digital representation of a user, and
we say, Hey, this person is likely to be.
Of a certain demographic or
interested in looking, has visited a
website that is about, I don't know
Florida vacations or whatever, and
therefore he's probably an intend.
He or she or they are probably
an intender to buy a, a Florida
holiday or something like that.
So I.
are seeing now that the, the on the buy
side, so the advertisers are using AI in
order to come and find those audience.
So they're using an AI agent to come
and they'll just tell it with a prompt.
Go and find me everybody that's
interested in Florida that's aged
between this and that, that earns a
certain amount of money that has visited
a related website within the last.
of months.
So rather than that, being a media
buyer, an actual person that's going
and selecting and researching us as a
data company and finding out whether
our data's applicable, it's all moving
towards, we're in the trial stages of,
of, of these AI agents buying media.
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah.
Ollie James: some of my headspace
and because we have to develop
the protocols and the compliance
mechanisms to make that safe.
And to ensure that, you know, the
user's privacy is maintained and
that the whole ad tech ecosystem
is communicating properly.
So there's add, CP A DCP is a
protocol that's just come out that
we're working on in order to try
and standardize the way that this
is all going to talk to each other.
So that's taking up a
lot of time and effort.
And the other thing is obviously the, I.
You are thinking a lot about how this
affects publishers because publishers
are cash strapped, they're under
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah.
Ollie James: they are having their,
you know, I dunno about if you spend
a pound on an ad, what does it get?
A couple of cents gets to the publisher
because we've built this big fat layer in
between the advertiser and the publisher.
And now the AI comes along and
says, Hey, you don't need to
go visit the publisher anymore.
We'll show you these results.
push you to where you need to go.
And so we're thinking about how we
make sure that publishers are still
remunerated well and that they don't
lose the small piece of the pie that
they have left, to these agents.
And how that distribution of equity
when it comes to ad spend is fair
and that we don't, 'cause otherwise
we just lose the publishers and
then you lose because publishing
an advert On our publisher website
is there to pay for the journalism,
and we have to have the journalists,
we have to fund that news cycle and
publishing and blog writers and content
writers that otherwise we lose that.
And then it's all AI and that nobody,
that's a very bleak, bleak world.
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yes.
Yeah, absolutely.
And no, that's it.
That's an excellent point.
You know, obviously there's going to
have to be some sort of re justification
or rebalancing of this environment to
keep incentivizing people to generate
original content, you know, and,
you know, do that as a profession.
Do you, so, so, you know, I guess
that brings me to another point.
You know, there's, there's a lot of
ethical questions in the, the data
gathering, the attribution, the use of ai.
What are some of the ethical questions
that, that you wrestle with and, and
you know, maybe some, some ideas that
you are a proponent of that, that
maybe our audience hadn't considered.
Ollie James: Yeah, I think, one of
the issues that we have is that the
end user, the average Joe, so to
speak, doesn't understand consent,
doesn't understand how their data is
being used, doesn't necessarily care.
Or isn't educated and savvy
enough to understand what the
implications of their data usage is.
And they're certainly not being
remunerated for having their data
being widely used and monetized
without their sort of knowledge.
And we've all seen that, you know, when
you visit a website, you click a button.
Do you accept cookies?
I mean, we've.
hit the actual point of people
just, I mean, yes or no,
Yeah.
They can have my cookie.
Yes.
I'll say good to those guys.
Someone else, I don't know,
a law firm or something.
No, I don't want that.
But actually the privacy
policies are the same.
I clicked yes, on the Burton website,
but on the Burton website, the subtext
will give them the ability to sell and.
This is not against and I haven't checked,
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah,
Ollie James: use them as an
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: an example.
Ollie James: It doesn't
matter which I click.
If I've said yes on one, then
that opens the gate for everyone
else to use it, and I don't think
people understand that enough.
So we need to
To educate users or we need to
take it out of their hands and say.
are gonna take that consent and make
sure that no one's data is being used
without them truly understanding it.
And we will use it in a way that
is not personally identifiable.
and in the US and Europe,
it's a very different thing.
In Europe, we have the,
you know, the GDPR.
Where you
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Mm-hmm.
Ollie James: You can't use sort
of people's email addresses or
you can't use them without there
being some encryption in place.
And in the US it's slightly different.
It's still, although we have state laws
now, so state by state by state in the
us, they're kind of waking up to it
and they look at what the Europeans
doing in terms of regulation and
privacy and they're implementing it.
But we've gotta be careful that we
don't sort of choke the system too
much and that we don't overregulate.
And I think that education
piece for users in terms of.
How, but how do you do that?
I don't know.
And because I don't think that most people
are interested, particularly, I wish
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah.
Ollie James: would just go away and
just let me go on the internet and
I realize that you're gonna show
me an ad, an ad for something that
I might like to buy, that would be
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah.
Ollie James: And once I've bought the
bloody thing, stop showing me the ad.
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Stop showing.
Ollie James: If we could crack that
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah.
Ollie James: it would be good.
But I think there's great work that
the IAB, the International Advertising
Bureau, global Organization, great work
that they're doing, the IAB Tech lab,
in particular are always coming up with
great solutions and suggestions, and
we're working together as an industry via
these different groups to address these
issues and to put technology in place.
It all comes back to quality as well.
And these websites that are sort
of made for advertising, built by
ai, there's a war against those.
We're identifying them, we're blacklisting
them, and we're trying to make sure that
users don't end up on them and that we're
not putting cash into these entities.
So there's lots of work
going on behind the scenes.
I think we need to be a bit more
vocal about it, shine a light on
it a bit more, and I think the
likes of Googles of the world could
be doing more to help with that.
The wall gardens, as we call them, ought
to be kind of leading the way and doing
more in terms of ethics and privacy,
but ultimately what we wanna do is to
get the cash the publishers, to the
content creators that are fueling this
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah,
Ollie James: And anything that's kind
of preventing that is a challenge.
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: well,
Ollie, that is a lot of information
to digest No, that's great.
you make my job easy.
I would say as the host, you have
a great way of explaining things
and this is, valuable information.
So Ali, if people are interested
in you, obviously, they
could reach out your website.
D-T-T-R-I-B-U-T-I-O n.com
attribution.
but where else could they find you?
What are any other
links that you'd like to
Ollie James: Yeah, I mean
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: plug?
Ollie James: I don't do a great
deal of socials 'cause of my age.
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Okay.
Ollie James: I am, but LinkedIn, I think
I actually got LinkedIn slash Ollie James,
'cause I've been on this for so long.
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: That's right.
Ollie James: that's me.
LinkedIn slash Ollie James.
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Fantastic.
Ollie James: Send me a message.
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Well,
you know, if whether you wanna
work with Ollie as you know, to
help you with your attribution or
need a great podcast guest, I would
definitely recommend Ollie for both.
So thanks so much for
joining us today, Ollie.
Ollie James: I appreciate you, Reid.
Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: I.
Ollie James: you very
much for having me on.
It's been a pleasure.
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