Table of contents for May 9, 2022 in Adweek

The 2022 edition of the NCAA Tournament averaged 10.7 million total viewers and a 17.0 share (percentage of households or viewers who were watching television at that time) for its 67 live telecasts, a figure that rose 13% from last year and was the highest since 1994. In Saint Peter’s upset of Kentucky, CBS averaged a 3.1 rating and 5.46 million viewers, making it the third-most-watched opening round game of the tournament since 2015. That high-profile game surely impacted Edert’s rise to fame and paved the way for his NIL deals.…

When our head recruiter speaks to a promising candidate, she asks about qualifications and what they seek in a team culture. If things are going well, she’ll ask this: “So, do you have a side hustle?” No, it’s not a trick question, but part of our recruitment and retention strategy. Today, one in three working Americans has a part-time job along with their full-time employment, and an additional 24% hope to pursue a side hustle in the near future. While there is growing support of moonlighting among executives, it’s still often treated as an HR nuisance to be managed for fear of reducing productivity or incurring a liability. As a CEO who has been at the helm of three agencies, my message is this: Embrace the side hustle. Not just…

BET ON YOURSELF As women, when we are evaluating a new opportunity, whether it’s a new project or a career change, we tend to feel like we have to check all the boxes in order to be qualified. If someone sees something in you, we, as women, need to start also seeing more in ourselves. If someone is willing to bet on you, make that bet on yourself. I bet on myself to help transform a global company in UPS from a shipping and tracking company to a global logistics company. ACT QUICKLY How often are we hearing about moving with speed, moving with agility, having to pivot? I like to say moving with velocity. We have a culture where we ask ourselves constantly, “What more can we do?” because…

Almost from its origins in the 1990s, the job of chief marketing officer has seemed on the verge of extinction. Conjured on the fly as technology officers shifted the balance of power among finance, sales and marketing departments, the idea of the CMO emerged as the ground under brand strategy decisions was experiencing a tectonic shift. In 2020, time spent in the CMO role hit its shortest point since 2009 and remained just as low in 2021. According to Stuart Spencer’s annual CMO Tenure study issued in May 2022, the average CMO spent just 40 months in the post in 2020 and 2021. In comparison, the consulting firm found CEO tenure is more than twice that of the CMO. So what’s causing such a short CMO tenure? Lou Paskalis, former…

Denise Broady is the kind of new-school chief marketer that today’s companies covet—one with a deep knowledge of tech. But just a few decades ago, her journey from programmer to CMO at low-code platform Appian wouldn’t make sense. Broady’s career trajectory veered from the traditional in many ways. For one, she’s served in two different C-suite roles. “I’ve been a COO twice and a CMO twice,” she said. But she didn’t begin in either field and viewed her first post-graduate role in tech as a means to an end: transcending poverty. In 1979, at age 5, she fled Vietnam with her mother and brother. Their journey to the U.S. included six months in a Malaysian refugee camp. Once she got to Virginia, Broady set about assimilating and learned English by watching…

This year’s NCAA Tournament offered a glimpse at the future of name, image and likeness (NIL) deals in college sports. Though Kansas won the tournament, Saint Peter’s guard Doug Edert, who had 20 points off the bench in the tournament darling’s upset of Kentucky, ended up with a shining NIL moment. Thanks to his performance—and a mustache that would make Tom Selleck blush—Edert’s profile instantly rose on social media, and he secured NIL deals with Buffalo Wild Wings and Barstool Sports. The agreements, which occurred within a week of the game, highlighted how ravenous brands are to sign student-athletes, and the value of players’ real-time performance, after state laws and NCAA rule changes went into effect in July 2021 that cleared the way for student-athletes to profit off their name,…

Two years after the biggest health crisis in a century began, more people are taking the mantra of “You are what you eat” to heart. In an exclusive survey for Adweek, market research firm YouGov got a glimpse into the food habits of more than 19,000 people across 18 countries. In addition to taking a global view, we also focused on four of the nations—the U.S., China, Italy and India—most affected by the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, which showed clear national differences. For instance, Americans were 7% less likely to consider whether a product is healthy when making a purchasing decision than the rest of the world, while 22% of Americans would rarely or never consider it, compared to 18% elsewhere. When it comes to three major culprits in food—sugar, fat…

CHIEF MARKETING OFFICERS are charged with shaping the delicate strategies governing brand communications, identity, awareness and affinity. The pandemic has tested their skills like never before, with abrupt shifts in ecommerce and social media that altered the marketing landscape. On top of this, supply chain issues continue to upend existing loyalties between marketers and consumers. For this year’s CMO Awards, Adweek specifically looked at leaders who’ve stayed with their brands through the past three turbulent years—a time defined by political upheaval, economic turmoil and, of course, an ongoing pandemic. Here are the CMOs who charted a path through this period and toward a strong, stable future.…

For a company that’s managed to stick around for over a century, there are many moments to look back on with nostalgia and pride. But for Huffy, which turns 130 this year, the year 1995 wasn’t one to remember. Struggling to compete with less expensive Asian imports, Huffy lost $10.5 million that year. It would probably have gotten worse, too, were it not for some true visionaries who saved the day. Their names were Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Wile E. Coyote and Sylvester the Cat. In a bid to save the brand, Huffy inked a licensing deal with Warner Bros., owner of Looney Tunes. In short order, bikes rolled off the assembly lines adorned with the familiar animated characters. A year later, Huffy secured a deal with Disney and started…

At a time when 60,000 songs get uploaded to Spotify every day, it’s a given that bands must practice the art of self-promotion. But back in 1975, when vinyl records ruled and radio airplay was everything, rock stars didn’t think much about marketing. One notable exception: Kiss, which pulled off a promotional stunt that’s now the stuff of legend. When Cadillac High School football coach Jim Neff was looking for a way to break his team out of its 0-2 seasonal slump, he began playing Kiss albums in the locker room. The tunes got the boys so riled up that they wound up winning the next seven games and taking the championship. Hearing that story, Kiss promptly took a 145-mile detour and played a concert in the school gym. As…