Contrary to the song popularized in the ’50s, the character known for letting you know that only you can prevent wildfires is “Smokey Bear,” not “Smokey the Bear.”

“There’s no ‘the,’” Michael Bellavia, CEO of marketing and communications agency HelpGood, told Marketing Brew. “That will make the Forest Service go nutty.”

For the last 15+ years, Bellavia and his team have worked with the Ad Council, the US Forest Service, and the National Association of State Foresters to correct name misperceptions and raise awareness of how to prevent wildfires as the force behind Smokey Bear’s social media accounts. Smokey can be found on Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, and X, but he is no longer on MySpace.

“I think he finally got off of it,” Bellavia said. “As most people did.”

With years of experience across social platforms, Bellavia told us about how he has brought the iconic figure to life online and worked to keep him relevant in these ever-changing digital times.

Fired up: Smokey Bear turned 80 last month, but he has remained somewhat consistent over the years. As a federally regulated character, Bellavia said there are some limits as to what Smokey can and can’t do online, especially when it comes to straying from the “Only you can prevent wildfires” message.

“It’s a very tight lane, but that’s also what’s helped him stand the test of time,” he said.

Continue reading here.—KH

Gone are the days of scheduling a board meeting replete with pastries and orange juice just to finalize a TV spot.

Growth marketers today are tap-dancin’ their way into CTV land, and it’s all thanks to Roku. The new Roku Ads Manager is self-service and custom built for performance, and it boasts an insane level of reach.

How much reach, you ask? Roku powers 47% of all TV streaming time spent* in the US. That means your ads can run alongside premium content and top ad-supported channels where your audience is already engaged.

Oh, and this one’s for you, Shopify merchants: You can now launch shoppable CTV ads right on Roku. This game-changing integration allows you to drive conversions with seamless checkout via the TV remote .

Channel your inner CTV guru with Roku.

The clock’s still Tik-ing on the future of the internet’s favorite short-form video app.

On Monday, TikTok appeared before the DC Circuit Court of Appeals regarding several lawsuits challenging the law that President Joe Biden signed earlier this year, which calls for the app’s parent company, ByteDance, to sell it to a non-Chinese buyer or risk a ban in the US as early as January.

During the two-hour hearing, lawyers for TikTok argued that the law is unconstitutional, claiming that it limits free speech, and that Congress did not provide sufficient evidence of the app’s alleged security threats. TikTok creators Talia Cadet, Paul Tran, and Kiera Spann, who are plaintiffs in one of the lawsuits, were among those present at the hearing.

The three judges presiding—appointed by Trump, Obama, and Reagan, respectively—seemed interested in First Amendment concerns around TikTok’s US operation and users, per the New York Times, but at least two of the judges seemed less interested in TikTok’s argument that Congress has a lack of authority to pass the law in question.

Because some evidence submitted by the Department of Justice is classified and sealed, it’s hard to get a sense of the judges’ perspectives on the government’s security claims or predict what their final decision could look like.

Keep reading here.—KH

While Google was preparing to defend its advertising business in the US earlier this year, it reportedly looked to placate European regulators by offering a major sale.

In an effort to end an EU antitrust investigation into its ad tech businesses, Google offered to sell its ad exchange, AdX, Reuters reported Wednesday. That offer was reportedly rejected by EU publishers, who said the move wouldn’t suffice.

The news broke in the middle of a late-morning break during Google’s eighth day in court defending its advertising business in a case brought by the Department of Justice. The government has alleged that AdX, which publishers use to sell their ad inventory, is a core piece of Google’s advertising monopoly because it is built on exclusivity. Lawyers for the government have dug into the fact that publishers cannot access the countless advertisers that use Google’s ad tools without going through AdX, something that execs from News Corp and Gannett have testified to during the trial.

Matthew Wheatland, chief digital officer of the Daily Mail, took the stand Wednesday and testified that the publication had looked into changing from Google’s ad server but ultimately didn’t because of its reliance on AdX.

• In an undated, internal test shown in court, the Daily Mail found that it would lose 28% of its programmatic revenue if it moved away from Google’s publisher technology.

“Leaving AdX would be financially detrimental,” Wheatland told the court, adding that AdX’s take rate of 20% is higher—nearly double, in some instances—than other exchanges.

Continue reading here.—RB

Get unstuck. Could your CMS be doing more for you? Then allow us to introduce Contentstack. Their AI-powered digital experience platform (DXP) can help unlock the potential of composable technology while keeping performance and security top of mind. It even has API-first extensible architecture. Explore the platform.

Stories we’re jealous of.

• The New York Times spoke to Steve Burns from the ’90s children’s show Blue’s Clues about how he’s reaching adults as a TikTok creator.
• The Atlantic wrote about the new era of clickbait and ragebait videos.
• The Washington Post wrote about how Substack has become a lucrative platform for affiliate marketing.