5 Questions with Tobi Elkin, Editor of MediaPost’s Real-Time Daily
This is part of an ongoing Q&A series from Eastwick’s Ad Tech practice. Every month we will be profiling advertising and digital media influencers to get an unfiltered glimpse or their professional and personal lives. If there is someone you’d like to see us profile, please email adtech@eastwick.com
1.What led you to cover digital media and advertising? What initially interested you about it?
I’ve been covering digital media, marketing and advertising trends for a while; I kind of fell into it. It’s part of business and part of the overall global economy. Now, more than ever, the business is experiencing upheaval and disruption from technology — used for positive and negative purposes. Initially, it was all about the creative and the campaigns — now, it’s about tech-based disruption and ad avoidance.
2. The ad tech space has become increasingly more congested. How do you see this playing out?
Hopefully some M&A activity! The ecosystem can’t sustain the number of players now in the space. They’re all fighting for their sliver of the budget. I think we’ll see some tie-ups, acquisitions and partnerships.
3. What innovative company do you feel the industry should be watching right now?
That’s an interesting question. I don’t want to single anyone out! In the media space, I’m watching a lot of the millennial women’s sites that are also gearing demographics downward to GenZ — companies like SheKnows Media and Refinery29. In ad tech, Rubicon Project, OpenX and Index Exchange are interesting — for their ideas, executive leadership and technology. Pure tech: Twitter has sputtered recently but I’m watching what comes next from them; Google and Facebook are givens — they’re getting on in years, so what’s next for them? The on-demand economy (companies like TaskRabbit, Crowded, Shiftgig, Storefront, there are too many to mention!)
4. Can you predict the buzzwords for 2017?
I’m not great at that. How about doing that in anagrams? Let’s just spell everything backwards so programmatic is: “citammargorp”? If I hear “at scale” one more time… How about a Top 10 list that calls out all the jargony buzzwords and every time we say or write them, we get fined $1 per mention?
5. What’s something people may not know about you?
I’d like to raise and tend goats and learn how to make cheese. I see a sabbatical in there somewhere…
Tobi Elkin is Editor at MediaPost’s Real-Time Daily and the RTblog. She can be reached at telkin@mediapost.com.
