If you think your digital media planners do well and your budget on Internet ads is spent wisely, think twice. Following Google’s ad viewability report as of November 2014, which suggested that about 56% of all digital ads paid by advertisers are usually never seen by consumers, the Luxembourg-based startup Oxford BioChronometrics has proved that this number is actually much higher.

Trends, trends, trends… With the new 2015 year on the doorstep, all marketing experts make their forecasts on what people would watch, do, eat, wear, etc. The London-based trends and insights agency SBC Partners, part of Havas Media Group, has shared some views on the future of dining, fashion, retail, home, travelling, lifestyle, and more.

Earlier in October, the media agency OMD UK in partnership with the UK’s leading publishing company Time Inc. UK presented the results of their second-year joint research project aimed to better understand the ever-changing British society—the report called The Future of Britain, and its specific part The Future of Families.

Brands not only change the way we consume and communicate, but also lead modern science forward, investing millions of dollars into research and innovation in such areas as molecular biology, chemistry, aerodynamics, electrodynamics, and others. This article is a recap of the most far-reaching scientific discoveries made by global and challenger brands in 2014.

This week the global brand consultancy FutureBrand, part of Interpublic Group, have released the sixth annual Country Brand Index 2014-2015 report that ranks 75 countries by seven perceptional dimensions, such as: awareness, familiarity, preference, associations, consideration, decision/visitation and advocacy; where the main factor—associations—is weighted across six more related attributes of status and experience (Value System, Quality of Life, Business Potential, Heritage and Culture, Tourism, and «Made In»). 

A more fluid, open and diverse society of today has been re-shaping conventional social, cultural, and sexual norms to become a stereotype-free «consumer base» that requires different marketing approaches. Thus, traditional demographic marketing segmentation by age, race, gender, location, family status or income is not as important as it used to be 10 years ago. What’s important then?

On October 28th, Russia unveiled the logo of the upcoming international football championship to be hosted in the country in a four-year time. The Official Emblem of the 2018 FIFA World Cup Russia was revealed by FIFA president Sepp Blatter during a popular evening show on the state-owned TV channel «Pervyi Kanal»—surprisingly, over a video feed from space… where Russian astronauts from the International Space Station «Mir» actually «showed» the logo to the planet Earth.