News Corp Australia’s director of national sales Sharb Farjami last night announced a number of new major commercial initiatives at the company’s second Come Together event. The Australian arm of the global publisher took over a Fox Studios sound stage with speakers appearing onstage behind three giant video screens.
Farjamni was one of four speakers at the event with outgoing News Corp Australia CEO Julian Clarke (top) kicking off proceedings reminding the audience about the size of the News Corp Australia audience – 7m daily via their print and digital assets and 16m monthly.
Clarke said the company’s 2,500 journalists worked on Australia’s best portfolio of media assets.
The audience also heard from managing director – metro and regional publishing Damian Eales and chief operating officer and soon-to-be chief executive officer Peter Tonagh.
Lachlan Murdoch had originally been slated to speak, but after injuring his leg earlier this week, he had to pull out. The co-chairman of News Corp hobbled into the event on crutches with his wife Sarah, telling Mediaweek this was the third time in three years he had managed to injure himself!
Speaking in front of an audience of 700 advertising and media agency executives, Farjami detailed three significant launches for the company:
• News Connect, powered by Quantium – a new advertising product that brings together News Corp Australia and Quantium’s data to offer unprecedented audience targeting capabilities;
• MBX – a private premium exchange that combines the power of News Corp and MCN’s digital assets;
• News Corp Studios – an unrivalled content creation and marketing solution.
Eales explained that News Corp Australia is committed to helping its clients connect, engage and convert their target customers with absolute certainty.
“Our focus is to ensure that our advertisers and agency partners are, more than ever before, well connected to their customers, in engaging and trusted environments,” he said.
“Every single day we reach over 7.2 million Australians. Australians that have grown up engaging with our brands – brands that they know and trust. We know what matters to them, and we are well connected to them across print, desktop, tablets, mobile and social platforms.”
Farjami said “Our new offerings across programmatic, content, and data mean that we can create and deliver commercial solutions that connect with highly targeted individuals on a one-to-one basis, across our audience, which is unrivalled in this market.
“Importantly, when marketers advertise with News Corp, they have the certainty that we will deliver what we promise, each and every time. And, of course, our content doesn’t just attract large audiences; it also deeply engages them – across print, desktop, mobile, video and social.
“When you put it all together, we have a hugely powerful, compelling and unique proposition – one that sets us apart from anything else in the market.”
News Connect, powered by Quantium
News Connect is a new advertising product that combines existing News Corp data, covering seven million readers, with Quantium’s huge bank of data on the shopping, travel and purchasing habits of eight million Australians.
Farjami said: “This combination of data gives us the ability to create bespoke audiences by connecting what people read and watch with what they buy.
“For advertisers it means no more assumptions. It means creating audiences based on facts, enabling them to connect to audiences that matter across our entire network of engaging, premium properties.
“In terms of delivering qualified audiences, there is nothing better in the market than News Connect powered by Quantium, and we can offer environments that nobody can match for engagement.
“This is a game-changing product for all our commercial partners.”
MBX
MBX (Multi-Brand Exchange) is a private advertising exchange that brings together the power of News Corp Australia and MCN’s digital assets. With a collective reach of over 10 million Australians, MBX offers a programmatic solution that delivers reach, accuracy, quality, certainty and brand safety.
Mr Farjami said “MBX offers access to more premium environments than any other programmatic offering. That means access to Australia’s favourite online destinations, including news.com.au, all our metro and regional mastheads, all our lifestyle destinations including Vogue, GQ, Taste and Body+Soul, MCN’s digital portfolio and much more.
“With the depth and quality of data available through this partnership between News and MCN, our advertisers can programmatically pinpoint audiences like never before.”
News Corp Studios
News Corp Studios is a new content marketing offering that will help advertisers source, create, distribute and amplify content.
Farjami said “Creating content to inform and inspire mass audiences is what we do better than anyone else in Australia. News Corp Studios will leverage our 80 years of experience for the benefit of our commercial partners.
“We can not only source and curate professionally created content from our massive archive, but thanks to our award-winning Storyful platform we can surface, verify and licence the best user generated content from around the world.
“But News Corp Studios is not just about sourcing existing premium content, it’s also about creating content. We can offer access to the largest and best commercial editorial team in Australia. This team can author bespoke native content, and create videos, podcasts, photo galleries, infographics and just about any content our clients want.
“We can also facilitate access to Australia’s best talent, help form partnerships with this country’s biggest events, custom publish, and thanks to the biggest and best media network in the country, we can distribute and amplify branded content on an unrivalled scale.”
News Corp Australia hold the Come Together event at Fox Studios in Moore Park, a launch event to announce new products and initiatives to the industry. L-R Katie Page, Gerry Harvey, Lachlan and Sarah Murdoch.