The Blueprint by Hashtag Labs Hashtag Labs Inc.

Jarrod Dicker makes his second appearance on The Blueprint podcast to discuss the latest developments within The Washington Post's commercial group. The conversation includes a good look at the technical setup behind Zeus — one of the operating systems leading the way forward in the new publisher software category, Ad Management Systems — and a discussion around why certain product decisions were made. If you're looking to learn more about the emergence of the new publisher software category known as the Digital Ad Operating System (daOS) AKA the Ad Management System (AMS), then this podcast is for you.

This episode focuses on answering the question of "are the ads working"? It features one of NYC's strongest thinkers on that question: Noah Brier. Noah is a software and marketing entrepreneur who most recently built Percolate and is now just starting to build a new company called Variance. This episode features wonderful book recommendations and thinking paradigms for marketing and advertising professionals. 

Two industry veterans whose careers have spanned across organizations like The Washington Post, Hearst Newspapers, G/O Media, Po.et (blockchain), IAC and The Daily Beast, Rebel Mouse, Time Inc., and The Huffington Post come on The Blueprint to discuss key monetization strategies for digital publishers. Topics discussed include: Affiliate/commerce strategies, licensing a CMS and, of course advertising. 

Number 1 metric for publishers and advertisers today? Viewability. Keith Candiotti is an industry veteran with a sterling reputation within the ad ops space. During this episode we learn about Keith's unique path into ad ops (he used to drive an 18-wheeler!) and how his company, Optimera, didn't create just another Viewability reporting solution, but an actual tool that can help publishers to more easily meet their viewability goals. Extensive talk about viewability in this episode! 

Consumers of digital content have long been plagued by the "bad ad" — bad ad being a placeholder for many ills caused by less than ideal actors within the digital media space. Bad ads include, but are not limited to, things like: ad creatives with huge file sizes and the ever-dreaded mobile redirect (an ad that hi-jacks your browser and forcibly redirects you to a landing page). Enter Louis-David and Confiant: Confiant is a leader is in figuring out where the bad ads are coming from and helping publishers (and potentially exchanges and SSPs) to block them so that readers don't have to put up with challenged reading and viewing experiences. This is a fascinating conversation on why this is happening, some great bad ad actor anecdotes and various other points related to ad quality online today.

Paul Ford has been blogging since the 90s — he is an industry guy beloved by both the editorial and business sides of publishing. He's as authentic as they come. Paul's company, Postlight, is a development and product shop in NYC that often produces enterprise-grade CMS for some of the biggest clients in the world. In this episode, we learn about Paul Ford's journey and what a Content Management System is.