Nearly two years after many in the advertising industry revealed plans to invest more money in Black-owned media, those publishers said they are still educating media buyers and advertisers about what they have to offer.

Last week, IPG Mediabrands hosted its third annual Equity Upfront in New York—a three-day affair where some 30 publishers, including Revolt, Urban One, and Allen Media Group, pitched their companies to a room full of media buyers and advertisers, including Amazon and Johnson & Johnson, at least according to the name tags seen by Marketing Brew.

The first year of the upfront was dedicated to Black-owned media, but it’s since expanded to include “media partners with Asian, Hispanic, and LGBTQIA+ ownership” as well.

Big picture: Years after pledges were made, we’ve hit a point “where the rubber needs to meet the road,” Cavel Khan, chief commerce officer at Group Black, a collective of publishers and creators focused on bringing more ad dollars to Black-owned media, told Marketing Brew. That road has been paved with public proclamations and pledges from not just agencies but also companies like McDonald’s and GM. Still, last year, publishers told us they hadn’t reached equitable investment quite yet.

• During the upfront’s opening keynote address, Magna’s US president Dani Benowitz shared that IPG Mediabrands upped its ad spend in Black-owned media by 61% between 2022 and 2021, in Hispanic-owned media by 7%, and in Asian-owned media by 32%, though she didn’t share exact figures.
• In 2021, IPG Mediabrands said that it would allocate at least 5% of total media spend from client budgets to Black-owned media by 2023. As of today, the agency is “pacing” but “not ready to share numbers at this time,” according to spokesperson Zinnia Gill.

Continue reading here.—RB

Ozy, the controversial media company that started spiraling following a New York Times investigation, is back. Maybe.

Onstage last week during the second day of IPG’s Equity Upfront, Ozy CEO Carlos Watson divulged little about the future of his media business that announced it was shutting down (but then didn’t) in 2021.

While onstage, he hosted the former mayor of San Juan, a correspondent on The Daily Show, and two college students, both recipients of the Ozy “Genius Award,” all while declining to address any of the controversies surrounding the company or the status of reported federal investigations.

And yes, he did walk onstage to “Hustlin’” by Rick Ross.

While his presentation was short on details—read this recap in Semafor if you don’t believe us—Watson shared, in passing, that Ozy Fest would return this summer in Miami.

Marketing Brew has learned how Watson and Ozy are pitching advertisers on the return of the festival, which Watson called “TED meets Coachella” during his upfront presentation.

• In an email shared by a media agency staffer with Marketing Brew, Ozy shared sponsorship opportunities at the request of the agency, including for Ozy Fest 2023, a two-day festival taking place in Miami this June that the publisher claimed will attract around 60,000 attendees.
• The cost of a sponsorship wasn’t shared in the email, which said pricing would be customized based on the offering.
• According to the email, the company is pitching potential sponsors on a range of content tied to Ozy Fest, including a series touching on topics from racial justice to…pickleball.

Keep reading here.—RB

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

Explain: If you don’t know the difference between “programmatic guaranteed” and “private marketplace” deals, well, you’re in luck.

Higher and higher: Some SEO tips and tricks that can help with podcast rankings.

Light-bulb moment: Here are 11 ways brands can approach creating Instagram Reels.

Build a better brand: Companies that use Frontify’s brand management platform see 367% ROI, according to Forrester’s Total Economic Impact™ study. Check it out to learn how Frontify’s tools can help your teams thrive.*

^{*This is sponsored advertising content.}

Stat: 321 million. That’s the number of impressions Rihanna’s Fenty Beauty line received on Sunday, per Sprout Social figures cited by Ad Age.

Quote: “Looking forward to Tesla Investor Day on March 1. By this, we mean the broadest definition of investor, as in the people & life of Earth. It will be a message of good hope & positivity for the future”—@ElonMusk

Read: “Why Are You Seeing So Many Bad Digital Ads Now?” (the New York Times)

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

• How an intern helped the Savannah Bananas baseball team become TikTok famous
• Navigating the ‘slippery slope’ of personal endorsements in podcast ads
• One rebrand at at time: How this branding expert built a following on TikTok