Las Vegas is famous for gambling. But that doesn’t mean the marketers visiting casinos during CES last week were ready to make many bets with their 2023 ad dollars.

At the Vegas-based tech showcase held last week, conversations between media companies and agency partners often looped back to 2023’s uncertain economic picture, attendees told us—and on how much advertisers will be willing to commit in the coming months for the 2023 television upfront season. So far, it’s anyone’s guess.

“This is the year of a million scenario plans,” Amy Ginsberg, chief investment officer at Havas Media Group, said. “I think that we’re all sitting here and saying that we think spending is going to be down year over year—but [by] how much? Clients are very much waiting to make those decisions, because they don’t know either, and they don’t want to get caught having spent all this money and not being able to get it back.”

Hold up

CES often serves as the official media industry kickoff event ahead of upfronts, a presentation-laden week in May during which billions of advertising dollars are earmarked for media conglomerates like Disney, NBCUniversal, and Paramount.

• This year, as with prior years, plenty of conversations during CES were centered on planning for the upfronts, Dan Robbins, VP of marketing at Roku, told us.
• The timing and format of upfronts themselves continue to be a pain point for some marketers, especially after they learned at the beginning of the pandemic that having dollars locked up in spending commitments can backfire, Tim Lardner, client strategy partner at digital marketing agency PMG, said.
• “We have some customers where the only marketing that they weren’t able to cut during [the early days of Covid-19] was what was already committed,” Lardner said. “And then that money was just wasted.”

Read the full story here.—KS

The podcast ads are coming from inside the house.

Like with any channel, brands looking to advertise on podcasts have a range of agencies that they can hire to do the work for them. But some teams and execs choose to handle the ins and outs of podcast ad planning, buying, and measurement almost entirely on their own.

Last year, Marketing Brew spoke with a few brands doing just that while spending millions of dollars on podcast ads. Here are a few things we learned about how they’re pulling it off.

Playing the long game

Athletic Greens and Cariuma have at least two things in common: They’re invested in podcast advertising and say they’re in it for the long haul.

Athletic Greens Chief Growth and Marketing Officer Jonathan Corne told us his partnerships team, which handles podcast ad spend, tries to maintain relationships with hosts once they’ve started working together. They might change up the cadence of their ads with a certain network or show, but “what we don’t want to do is cancel anything,” he said.

• Tim Ferriss, host of the business podcast The Tim Ferriss Show, was one of the first podcasters to promote Athletic Greens and is now an investor in the company, according to Corne.
• Neuroscientist and Stanford associate professor Andrew D. Huberman, who’s also the host of the podcast Huberman Lab, has been promoting Athletic Greens for about two years and joined as a medical advisor, Corne added.

Cariuma’s chief digital officer, Felipe Araujo, has a similar philosophy; he told us he’s all about fostering long-term relationships with podcasters through year-long deals as a way to help Cariuma feel “ingrained in the culture of the show” instead of being a one-and-done sponsor.

Continue reading here.—AM

Ah, January. It’s the time when post-holiday blues fade, New Year’s resolutions are thrown out the window, and December’s gifts are returned.

There’s more where that came from: People also seem more inclined to leave their jobs at the start of the new year. According to Indeed, “many organizations start their new fiscal year in January,” meaning more positions could be available. And in 2021, data analyzed by Monster found that “January and February are the most popular times for people to search for a new job,” according to CNBC.

Last week, we asked if you’re looking for a career change this year. More than 1,300 readers responded, and the majority are at least considering it.

• 43% said you are
• 34% said you’re not
• 23% said you’re unsure

Zoom out: Our small survey seems to line up with similar research on the topic. Last year, nearly 60% of marketers were “either ready for a change of job or currently considering it,” according to a survey conducted by UK trade publication Marketing Week.

• Similarly, 2021 research from We Are Rosie found that 63% of respondents were “planning a job change or career move.”
• Between 2020 and 2021, there was “a 31% growth in LinkedIn members with marketing careers changing jobs year over year,” according to the company.

If you are planning to look for a new gig, do you plan to stay in the marketing industry, or are you searching for something completely new? Reply to this email to let us know.—MS

There are a lot of bad marketing tips out there. These aren’t those.

Explainer: What the heck is programmatic video creative management? It isn’t as scary as it sounds.

Prime time: Amazon is expanding its Buy With Prime program to all US sellers. Learn more about it here.

Keep it simple: How to build a full social strategy in four easy steps.

Learn: You’ve got the marketing skills, but do you struggle with data analysis or visualization? The Brew’s Data Storytelling sprint can help you fine-tune your data expertise and make you a better marketer in the long run. Secure your spot today.

The holiday season is one of the most significant moments for retailers, bringing in nearly $800 billion annually.

But what happens after the holiday rush? Many businesses enter a so-called “post-holiday slump,” which can pose a serious financial challenge if they’re not prepared to combat it.

Don’t let that happen to you. Check out Retail Brew’s guide for quick tips on finding sales success in the new year.

Download your copy.

Stat: 70%. That’s the percentage of agency professionals who said that they’re “optimistic about prospects for the agency business as a whole heading into 2023,” according to Digiday+ Research.

Quote: “For my everyday casual clothes I’d go to T.K. Maxx, the discount store. I was particularly fond of their once-a-year sale, when they’d be flush with items from Gap or J.Crew, items that had just gone out of season or were slightly damaged.”—Prince Harry, in his new memoir, describing how a prince shops. And yes, T.K. Maxx is just T.J. Maxx with better healthcare.

Read: “Inside The Secretive World Of Shark Tank Deals: Who The Real Winner Are” (Forbes)

Catch up on a few Marketing Brew stories you might have missed.

• Dispatch from CES: Fear and loathing (the metaverse) in Las Vegas
• Which brands will be the big podcast ad spenders of 2023?
• For its first Super Bowl ad, FanDuel is getting Rob Gronkowski back on the field, but not as a tight end