Media agency vet Paul Woolmington on the balance of brand/performance with human/tech

Paul Woolmington certainly looks the part of an ad agency creative. But in actuality he’s one of the senior media-side executives with decades of experience under his belt, including at holding companies including IPG, WPP, and Stagwell precursor MDC Partners. Woolmington has also channeled that experience into startups. 

He co-founded Naked Communications Americas and founded The Media Kitchen before taking over the CEO reins of Canvas Worldwide, one of the largest independent full-funnel media agencies with clients ranging from Zillow Group to Hyundai Group.

Hitting its 10th anniversary this year, Canvas is now comprised of 600 staffers, with a full-funnel offering that has more recently heavied up on data-side and performance chops — but in a way that balances the need for upper-funnel wisdom and lower-funnel insights. Woolmington explained the approach Canvas is taking to maintain and cultivate that balance. 

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ChatGPT referral traffic to publishers’ sites has nearly doubled this year

ChatGPT is sending more of its traffic to publishers’ sites. 

Of the traffic OpenAI’s generative AI platforms send to external websites, 83% went to news and media sites in April, up from 64% in January, according to Similarweb data shared with Digiday. 

Referral traffic from ChatGPT also continues to grow this year. ChatGPT sent 243.8 million visits to 250 news and media websites in April 2025, up 98% from 123.2 million visits this January, according to David Carr, senior insights manager at data analytics company Similarweb.

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